Summer Interns: Wesleyan Students Sharpen Career Skills
Patrons of designer Diane von Furstenberg’s New York City flagship store have access to the first-floor retail space, where all her signature brightly patterned wrap dresses reside. However, the second, third, fourth, and fifth floors of the Washington Street structure house a wholly different operation—the production studios and staff offices that make the brand tick. Kyra Nielsen ’27 has spent her summer on those upper floors learning what it takes to be in the fashion industry where she may one day make her mark.
Nielsen's interest in fashion stemmed from her grandmother, May Kwok, who left her a chest of vintage 1960s pieces from Hong Kong in her will.
“Being able to share all of her clothes and all of her beautiful pieces myself, being able to show them to the city, being able to like show them to this fashion studio, share them with my friends, it's just awesome,” Nielsen said.
A career in fashion became a serious consideration for Nielsen at Wesleyan, she said. She long held it as a hobby but thought she would end up in finance—she is an IDEAS, art studio, and economics triple-major—before taking a product design class with Assistant Professor of Design and Engineering Studies Yu Nong Khew.
“When I got to Wesleyan, I realized how tangible being a designer could be,” said Nielsen, who is still considering a path in finance as well. “I started going into that more, and I started joining these spaces within the IDEAS program and just learning more at Wesleyan with Yu Nong Khew through all these product design courses. That’s when fashion seemed more practical to me.”
She hopes to one day be the person holding the clipboard behind the runway curtain making sure a show runs as intended. As an intern she acts more as the utility infielder of the operation—appearing wherever needed on a moment’s notice. Some days she is setting up clothing racks of the next collection for models at a shoot; other days she is helping with casting or re-styling mannequins in the retail space for visits from major magazines. Along the way, she is constantly making connections that may prove fruitful for her life after Wesleyan.
Madison Macalintal ’26 rarely has down time at her social media internship at Warner Brothers Television Group. She spends her days floating between capturing social media content, digging through archives for clips of shows that will engage an audience, or even building sets for podcast recordings, she said. She recently spent the day on set of The Pitt, a modern-day hospital drama set in Pittsburgh, to record the cast’s reactions to the release of this year’s Emmy Award nominations.
“We're building a podcast studio and helping out with a YouTube studio, so sometimes we'll be building shelves, or we'll be switching the backgrounds out for some of these videos,” Macalintal said. “But the cool part with that, is that we'll actually get to sit in on some of the shoot and get to hear from our talent, which is really exciting.”
Macalintal attended a workshop through Wesleyan from the T. Howard Foundation, an organization that connects students of color to positions in media. She also received a summer grant through the Gordon Career Center to help fund her housing costs for the summer in Los Angeles.
“The info session through Wesleyan was really helpful in connecting me with the right community and the right people, and they were the ones who helped me find this internship and really get my foot in the door,” Macalintal said.
Isaac Moss ’25 was one of 11 students whose internships were funded through the Shapiro Center for Creative Writing and Criticism. Moss, who graduated with a degree in physics and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies this past spring, is working as a talk show production intern on WNPR’s talk shows this summer.
They spend their days booking and producing programs like “The Colin McEnroe Show,” a popular show on culture in the state, and “Where We Live,” a local interest show. They have produced shows on the future of farming in Connecticut—after working at Long Lane Farm at Wesleyan—and on professional sports mascots so far this summer.
“Having the ability to help curate those voices and write about things that excite me, that I hope will excite other people, too, has been really fulfilling so far,” Moss said.
While Moss, a Maryland native, stayed in Connecticut for the summer, Noah Lim ’27 of Lexington, Massachusetts, traveled to Hawaii where his parents grew up to intern at Makai Ocean Engineering, a company that works with underwater technology. Lim has spent his time designing parts and doing fiber optic work, he said.
“The actual experience of being in an engineering company has been pretty eye opening,” Lim said. “Seeing the precision you need to have for real-world problems, and all the steps and revisions it takes to create a fully functional design, I think was pretty cool. It’s something I didn't know before this.”
Maze Labowitz ’26, a computer science major, is also out on the West Coast, interning in the game development division of an artificial intelligence company called Fundamental Research Labs. Labowitz has spent their summer working on a few different games, but has made the most impact in the company’s games on the Roblox platform. They developed a feature within the company’s Roblox game AI Friend Zone, which allows the player to develop a friendship with an AI character through different activities. Labowitz developed a checkers mini-game with the AI character, which the company hopes will act as a model to play other types of games.
“I’m learning a lot on how a team might approach different design problems plus the technical architecture and organization of games,” Labowitz said.
Vansh Kapoor ’26, an art history and art studio double-major, has been researching and giving gallery talks during his internship at The Frick Collection in Manhattan—a museum at the Fifth Avenue home of former steel magnate Henry Clay Frick. Kapoor, an education intern, said he gives talks on Rembrandt’s self-portrait from 1658.
“He’s dressed in velvet and fur, holding a scepter-like stick, his eyes lost in shadow. The whole painting feels performative, like he’s imagining himself into a higher social class. It turns out, Frick kind of did the same thing. When his dealer pitched him the painting, he wrote: ‘It will dominate the room, just as you dominate everyone you meet,’” Kapoor said. “And that’s exactly how it’s hung—on newly reinstalled silk brocade wallpaper, manufactured by a small business in Lyon, France that also supplies Buckingham Palace.”
Emerson Jenisch ’25 is interning in the Community Engagement Department at Jacob’s Pillow, an annual international dance festival, for the 2025 festival season. She has been involved in movement workshops with children and community dance classes, she said. “The beauty of the Community Engagement Department at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival is in its opportunity for connection, collective movement, listening, and spontaneous conversation,” Jenisch said.
