Sunday, June 21, 2020
By:
Though I expect the coming weeks to inevitably include stress and close deadlines, the latest week of this internship has been smooth sailing for me. It is with great relief that I can say that I am ahead or on top of everything requested of my supervisors at NIST. In the meantime, I have not sat on my hands; I have tried to not let the unique opportunity of being a John Mather Policy Fellow go to waste.
This week, I began studying for the graduate quantum field theory (QFT) class I am taking in the Fall (I am using Zee, 2nd edition) and I volunteered to help review applications for partnerships with NIST’s Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP). I mention the QTF class, because I found that in this telecommuting environment, working on physics problems for a 30-90 minute break enhanced my workflow substantially more than looking at my phone or grabbing a bite to eat. Since this blog is about my internship and not theoretical physics, I will focus on the MEP proposal. However, I will say that it is substantially easier to spend hours on NIST work when the alternative is figuring out a step in deriving the Dirac/Feynman path integral formalism that I’m stuck on still.
That isn’t to say there are not equally complicated and confusing things with work associated with my NIST/MEP work. Though the evaluations are due Tuesday, I had hoped to finish my work by tonight (Sunday) and send it out early on Monday. However, though the majority of the form is fillable, when I try to enter the literal numerical scores, I am told the file is an XFA form that can not be edited by Adobe Acrobat. Of course this can not be solved until I hear back from my contact on Monday. I think many readers can relate to working in large organizations, using many disassociated systems, and find themselves shaking or scratching their heads at some trivial yet impassable step. Though small hiccups can be frustrating, it puts a smile on my face knowing that I have made it to adulthood with my pedestrian bureaucratic problems.
Though I will not go into any details about the organization I am reviewing, I will say that I am proud of my work. It includes independently reviewing whether this manufacturing organization has justified why it deserves an award. This organization proposes to distribute this award amongst many subsidiaries and partners—enhancing funding throughout the multi-state region. The dollar figure is large enough to hammer in a deep feeling of responsibility while reviewing the application.
However, there is also a human connection. This application includes the resumes of the organization’s leaders, and letters of recommendation from ongoing partners. There are the brief bios in third person, clearly written by the individual themselves. I am filled with the distinct and fantastic sense of how many people stand behind this application, this organization, and the American manufacturing industry in aggregate.
I really enjoy working with others, and having this sense of deep connection with how important my work this summer is. Outside of MEP work, that came on the Thursday team meeting where a work group adjacent to mine acknowledged how they are using the 2020 annual report templates I wrote last week. With theoretical physics, one is always acutely aware of the shadows of the past, cast by those giants whose shoulders we stand on while learning. There is always darkness and mystery ahead. As a policy intern, the opposite is true. Rather than enigmatic darkness and the mysteries of the universe ahead of me, I see all those who are helped by the work I do. The dichotomy between these paradigms is great, but complement each other like salt and sugar.
Max Dornfest