Summer Internship Photo Contest Winners Announced!

“ You don’t take a photograph, you make it.” – Ansel Adams

An exceptional photo not only captures great imagery, but tells a story that transcends the pixels on the screen. While we had tons of unbelievable photo contest entries, the two photos we selected as our grand and first prize winners, shared the story of how their internships were larger than life and directed their professional future.

Grand Prize Winner, Kunal Ajmera!

Congratulations to Kunal Ajmera of Johns Hopkins University, the winner of tis summer’s Ultimate Internship Photo Contest!  Kunal became interested in medical field and cloning well before going to college. He wrote about Dolly in his personal statement when applying to Johns Hopkins, and spent the early years of his academic career studying the underlying theories and concepts of cloning. His internship at the Center for Sensory Biology provided the opportunity of a lifetime — a chance to complete research that would impact the future of the field and after months of painstaking lab work, he got to see the fruits of his labor and understand the roller coaster of emotions experienced by professional researchers.

My happiness knows no Bounds. By Kunal Ajmera “Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine – Center for Sensory Biology”

Sure it’s not a classic-fun-happy-faces internship photo. Sure it looks like a bicolored sad-makes-no-sense-to-me picture. But it’s actually a picture which pretty much sums up my WHOLE summer internship. I had read all the cool – Dolly, Ian Wilmut, second creation, cloning stuff as far back as when I was in the eighth grade. I mentioned that in my SOP to get into college – that’s the kind of stuff that drew me into pursuing a career in Biotechnology. And it did get pretty boring until I landed this pretty exciting internship. The picture is the result of three whole months of hardcore wet lab. Cloning, animal tissue culture, ligation – all the contents of a today’s sci-fi movie – only real! All the things that I did, I only assumed they were happening, I could never see them actually happening. But taking that picture besotted me with internal calm. The culmination of three months of hard work. The work that I did is part of a bigger project that the lab was undertaking – the role of Fat3 cadherins and Amacrine cells in neuron development. What I was to develop was a transgenic vector containing the gene of interest and then construct a TAG reporter – if it worked, it turns green in the nucleus and red in the cytoplasm and membrane. The picture explains it all, it works ! What I experienced and am even now, is sheer joy knowing no bounds!

First Prize Winner!

At WayUp, we are believers that internships are vehicles not only for professional development, but career exploration.  Taylor our First Prize winner, interned for her school athletics department, a position that allowed her to not only explore new career skills, like creating creative ad campaigns, but also to transition from being a spectator at University of Washington sports events, to being a participant in all that goes on to make the events a success.  Not to mention getting to hang out with “Dubs” the school’s Husky mascot, as well as current and former athletes on the team.  Like all good internships, it provided challenge, excitement, and plenty of educational opportunities.

From the Sidelines to the Headlines, Taylor Raquer, “University of Washington Athletics Design Intern”

The BEST part of my internship is getting to be a part of all things athletic. I recently was asked to design a Go Green ad to be placed in our college football game day book. We didn’t have a good photo, so my boss decided to stage an awesome shot where I even got to meet the famous Harry the Husky Mascot! I could hardly contain my excitement throughout the shot.

Later, helping out at a football kick-off celebration I got to strut it on the Husky field, which I had spent 3 years watching from the sideline.

Finally, my dreams really came true when I got to take a picture with the REAL-LIFE Mascot named “Dubs.” He was the sweetest little fellow. The smile didn’t leave my face for the rest of the night.

Notable Mentions: Hootsuite & Dreamworks