It all started a few years ago when I decided to attend a Career Fair for students in the College of Agriculture at Penn State. My goal was to make some connections and explore what opportunities were available after graduating college. At this time I realized I was lacking in physical, hands on experience in the landscape field. It was odd; I was working to complete a degree in Landscape Contracting, having never worked in the field. That was when I knew I needed to get to work; I needed to participate in an internship program.

My first choice was to intern with a company that would place me in a rotational internship situation. Since I really wasn’t sure what I wanted to do I figured this would be the best way to experience the many facets of landscape contracting.  I was selected for a summer internship with Chapel Valley Landscape Company, a full-service landscape contractor in the Baltimore-Washington-Northern Virginia corridor. The internship was a 12-week program enabling me to gain a real world perspective of both residential and commercial installation, maintenance, and irrigation, as well as corporate support functions.

Read More...