My Sisters Closet of Monroe County provides internships and work-study positions for many students at IU.
My Sister’s Closet is a nonprofit organization that assists women with professional support services while achieving economic self-sufficiency. Funding from its resale boutique located in Bloomington, as well as sponsors and donors, allows them to provide free tools and training to at-risk women. The boutique started taking interns around 20 years ago.
Internships require minimum 120 hours in store, generally, over 1.5 semesters. Interns get the chance to make a positive impact in the community while learning transferable skills for a variety of industries. Some of the common internship positions are in apparel merchandising, e-commerce operations and inventory management.
Students who work at the boutique come from multiple areas of study, not just merchandising-related. IU freshman Angela Almanza is majoring in social work and does work-study at My Sister’s Closet. She connected to the boutique using Handshake.
“I love the fashion industry, but what caught my eye the most from every other job that I interviewed was they are a nonprofit organization,” Almanza said.
Almanza started working at the front of store but said she found a passion for working with customers, brides specifically, after moving to the Formal Room, which displays the store's formal and bridal gowns. Almanza hopes to intern with staff member Terri Stephens in the future to work with clients. One expectation for student interns is to contribute to a positive store atmosphere, making it a compelling place for clients and customers.
“We always get complimented on customer service because everybody's really friendly and brings the energy to uplift everybody else,” Almanza said.
Work-study jobs are typically offered to students who work part-time while in college. Almanza said she was hesitant to apply for My Sister’s Closet’s work-study after high school, where she’d heard judgmental comments about those who applied for the work-study programs because of its basis on financial aid. Deciding that the negative opinions of others wouldn’t stop her, Almanza said that ultimately, it ended up being the perfect place for her.
“I don't think that that should hold you back from going to a job interview or going through the program and to not close the doors to any jobs,” Almanza said.
Kate Van Wyck, the store manager at My Sister’s Closet, handles all operations running the store and recently took over the internship department. She has worked in retail and women’s clothing industries for more than 20 years. She said she tries to place interns in positions based on the direction they want to take during their time at the boutique.
“Depending on what their major is, what their interests and talents are, they will go into different lines,” Van Wyck said. “There's a lot of different things that overlap that we get to cover just kind of depending on our needs as a business and a nonprofit as well.”
With so many options available, interns have the opportunity to discover what their personal goals are and what they may want to do as a career, all while gaining valuable real-world experience in the process.
“We are a business that is directly impacting women in the community, and we always have work to do,” Van Wyck said. “We have a lot of women who work and volunteer with us who have a lot of skills to offer and a lot of community to share.”
Van Wyck said interns and volunteers earn a dollar of in-store credit for every hour worked as well as discounts in the boutique.
“Because what we do for the community and women at large is help dress them professionally and for an interview, we also offer you a professional outfit as part of your internship work,” Van Wyck said.
IU senior Annaliesa Gowe is a ballet major with a minor in arts management. She was interested in interning for the organization after earning volunteer hours at My Sister’s Closet for some of her nonprofit sector course assignments.
“I had done a couple of different sessions of volunteer work; when I had the opportunity to have an internship for my last semester of college I was like I already have a connection and a relationship with the women that work there and I appreciate what they're doing, so I interviewed for a position as an intern, and I got it,” Gowe said.
Interning offers different responsibilities from volunteer work. When she was a volunteer, Gowe said she would sort donated clothing and put price tags on them. Now, she is more involved with the community side of the boutique.
“I work on volunteer outreach and making sure that we have enough volunteers wanting to stay involved,” Gowe said. “I do a lot of talking with customers and volunteers.”
Gowe said she sees the intern experience as a stepping stone for her future career in the arts, possibly even at a nonprofit where her volunteer experience with My Sister’s Closet could come in hand.
“(Nonprofits) don't have a lot of money to pay people salaries so then they run completely on help from volunteers. I'm learning how to gain traction and gather information from people to help them be scheduled, to stay interested,” Gowe said. “I think that will carry over to any realm of the nonprofit sector.”
More information about internships and work-study at My Sister’s Closet can be found under the Get Involved tab on their website. Undergraduate and graduate students can apply on the website or Handshake.
