SEED staff member David Brewer met Tanya Rosado in January 2015 while doing a presentation for South Atlantic pastors and leaders. Tanya was in Eastern University’s Masters in International Development program and looking for an internship.

SEED’s process with all potential interns is to learn what their goals are, what they would like to do for SEED and for micro-enterprise that makes sense, and then see if together we can craft an internship that is to mutual advantage. (If you’re interested in exploring a SEED internship, email david.brewer@seedlivelihood.org.)

David and Tanya quickly discovered that there were some very good connections: Tanya has been a youth director with the Free Methodist Church for the last 10 years, spending part of that time on the mission field in Peru and the other part closer to home in Tampa, FL; she’s passionate about people connecting to God spiritually and in every aspect of their lives; and she senses God leading her toward development work in some form.

Each SEED intern gets a general introduction to our work, discussion of development content from a shared-reading text, and then a specific project to own. After discussion, Tanya decided she wanted to explore what it would look like for SEED to have multiple shipping locations (mini-warehouses) instead of shipping everything from Indianapolis. This project required her to mine data on shipping, online orders, events and trunk shows, Champions and more.

Tanya just recently presented her findings and recommendations, and the SEED staff team are talking through the implications. It was both enjoyable and enlightening to work together these past several months. Thanks for your partnership, Tanya!