Make a joyful noise

For many high school students having a job they love doing can be rare. Finding a job in their field of interests can be hard. However, senior Julie Doyle has found a job she is passionate about.

Doyle is an intern at Orchard Hill Church. She works mostly with BIGhouse, which is a Christian youth program welcome to all high school students. “I do a lot of behind the scenes work for the BIGhouse music, so I schedule people for different bands. We audition people, set up the stage and pick out music,” Doyle said.

Two of her friends had done the internship at Orchard in previous years, and that was how Doyle became interested. “Jarek Bakken was the intern my sophomore year, and Jack Van Gent was the intern last year, and I just thought it was really cool. It had a lot of sweet opportunities that I was like, wow, I really want to be apart of this,” Doyle said.

Doyle prepared for the internship by attending the Global Leadership Summit, which is an annual training event for church, ministry and community leaders to sharpen their leadership skills. “I first started as part of the global leadership summit. Those were my first two days. I went to that just trying to learn the ropes of what it takes to be a good leader,” Doyle said.

As with most jobs, Doyle faces some day to day communication challenges with her internship. “When I try to communicate with people proactively and they don’t respond right away, it can be challenging. But don’t get me wrong; it’s a lot of fun,” Doyle said.

Doyle is passionate about music and is involved with band at the high school, so this job allows her to work with something she loves. However, Doyle does not believe she will go into any type of career involving music in the future. “Right now I’m looking into physical therapy, so I could use some of these leadership skills to help me start my own physical therapy practice,” Doyle said.

The internship so far has prepared Doyle for whatever future career she may want to go into. “If I want to open my own physical therapy practice someday, it will take a lot of communication, so just being able to communicate with people is a good skill to have. Also scheduling time and time management are important, along with just being able to work well with others,” Doyle said.

There are many things Doyle loves about her job, but specifically her favorite is the interaction with all the people at Orchard. “My favorite part of the job is getting to know different people at the church, especially learning about their faith stories. It helps me grow in my faith,” Doyle said.

Doyle is still doing her internship at Orchard Hill Church and plays guitar in the band every Wednesday night at BIGhouse.