Bailie Kyle is a second semester senior in college at Penn State Altoona majoring in Human Development and Family Studies (HDFS). HDFS is the study of life; from birth to death.
“I grew up in Altoona for my entire life and lived in the same house, so it was pretty easy to only go eight minutes from home and looking at financial aid and paying $60,000 to $20,000 makes a really big difference,” Kyle said.
Kyle is aiming to accomplish her Bachelors of Science in Human Development and Family Studies Degree, and she is going on to get her masters in school counseling.
“I’m not minoring in anything, but a lot of HDFS majors do minor in Child Maltreatment and that gives them opportunities to work with children at the courthouse that are going through court cases with their parents or stuff like that,” Kyle said.
“At the start, I had to do Gen Ed’s [General Education], which you’ll do the first couple years, then you’ll get more into your major classes. The major classes include a class like ACFs [Advisory Council of Faculty Senates], which basically teaches you how to do a counseling session,” Kyle said.
That led Kyle to becoming a peer advocate at Penn State, which is where she would sit in a library for two hours once every week and students would come talk about anything, including if they’re stressed out about school, home life or anything concerning them.
“Then once I got into my senior year, I took a class. It was my pre-internship class, where we basically figured out where we’re going for our internship and did our internship proposals. So you will have to do that and then now to graduate, you have to do 480 hours of an internship. And I’m doing mine here in the guidance office,” Kyle said.
Kyle had different options when it came to choosing a place to do her internship.
“I had State College that offered me an internship, but it was just too far away. I had another school offer me one. Then my last choice was Altoona. I applied to Altoona and ended up getting it. I switched majors three times; I started out with Kinesiology which I decided that I hate biology. Then I went into education. I decided I didn’t really want to teach, but I still wanted to be in a school setting. Then I remembered how great my counselors were in high school at Altoona and decided to go into guidance counseling,” Kyle said.
When Kyle was looking for an internship spot, she knew she wanted to be a counselor or a guidance counselor and wanted to be in secondary school.
“Ms. Kyle emailed to see if we could meet regarding opportunities in Altoona for an internship. I met with Bailie to see what her needs were to intern. I reached out to Mr. Yingling to see if anyone in the counseling department would be willing to allow Bailie to intern,” Assistant Superintendent of curriculum, instruction, and elementary programs Haley Fleegle said. “We always make sure first that there is a Memorandum of Understanding or agreement with the University in which the student attends. This document outlines the roles of each party in participation during the internship. We then reviewed her resume and request. I then reach out to staff to see if I have someone willing to support the student with the internship.”
“I spoke with Bailie over the telephone, and she seemed very interested and enthusiastic about the internship. She had to contact Mrs. Haley Fleegle. She then had to make sure she had all of her clearances to be able to work in a school setting, as well as a TB test,” head of guidance Drew Yingling said. “Since she was at Altoona for her high school years. I was very pleased she came here for her internship. She said she had a great experience at Altoona High School and wanted to be able to give back to our community and help others. The experience she gains here will help her tremendously with that pursuit.”
A typical day for Kyle is sitting in on counseling sessions, helping with scheduling and sitting in on administrative meetings.
“I’m really enjoying the internship. At first I was a little nervous as everyone is when they start something new. But everyone here has been so welcoming, and it’s cool being back at my old school, my old stomping grounds. Getting up every day is a little hard. Because I’m not used to waking up I mean, all my classes in college are scheduled after 9 a.m. So getting up at 6 a.m. and going back to that was kind of hard but I’m getting used to it now. I just take a nap when I get home,” Kyle said.
“My mom’s disabled, and I take care of her full time. Her care worker quit and went to a new job. So my sister and I started taking care of her full time and my sister was closer. She was in her junior year of college, so I decided to let her finish out her college degree, and I would stop school and take care of my mom. I took about two semesters off, so I took a year off and then I went back in spring of 2021,” Kyle said.
Despite the challenges Kyle went through, she is in her last step in completing her senior year of college.
“The internship is actually such a huge help. It’s really helping me understand the ecological systems theories better and helping me to understand that, helps me to be able to be a bigger help to other people,” Kyle said.
“Internships are a great experience for students. It allows you to see first hand experiences that cannot be taught from a book. Students get to work directly with staff to learn through on the job training. This knowledge allows students to ensure they are confident with their choice of profession and learn the ins and outs of the day to day role of the position,” Fleegle said.
