American Action Forum--Annie Xie

For my internship, I worked at a think-tank that researched policy and made recommendations based on center-right values. Much of my work as an energy and environmental policy intern involved writing blogs, summarizing news articles and energy events, and answering research questions from my supervisor. During my internship, I was able to research and write about topics personally interesting to me. This often forced me to take some complicated policy topics and make them understandable to the average reader or to balance emotional writing with persuasion.

I also enhanced my writing skills as I summarized news articles and events. Searching for relevant daily articles taught me to appreciate news briefs for clipping and long-form analysis for personal study. I enjoyed attending events and hearings and learned about the variety of key players and experts involved in topics such as natural gas development. My writing skills improved because summarizing these articles and events required me to understand key points made and other points that might be of greater interest to my audience, which was my supervisor.

The greatest skill I acquired was how to navigate government websites and documents. When my supervisor gave me research questions, I often went to a government site for primary research. One of topics I had to research was about regulation surrounding oil and gas projects, particularly the National Environmental Policy Act. I had covered it previously in my environmental policies and laws class, but this research projects taught me more about the categorical exclusions from the NEPA process and how timeframes for the whole process can vary widely between agencies. I also learned about how data moves through government agencies to policy-makers, sometimes through organizations like mine.

During my internship, I was able to do substantive work and research to contribute to my own skills and portfolio, as well as the work of my organization. While I appreciated a deeper look into the world of policy analysts, I learned that this is not my career goal. Much of policy analysis seemed to include making tough decision between which sets of data to incorporate, which set of metrics to quantify, and which group of people to sell your ideas too. I would prefer a career visiting offices and representing an opinion, rather than sitting behind a desk researching. I was glad to do the first-hand research required to expand my base of knowledge; however, it seems that most decisions are made with personally communication, not with research papers.