She sat more than 5,000 miles away from comfortable Elon, N.C. She and her friends were on spring break, so they had left London and traveled to Italy for a brief and relaxing respite. It was a perfect time to visit another country and soak up its cultures and traditions.
“When I received the e-mail asking for a phone interview,”Bui says, “I couldn’t sit still after that.”
She phoned in April 2 and about a week later, she get ane-mail saying she had received the internship.
“I was through the roof excited,” she says. “I was sittingin our living room (back in London) and screamed when I read it. It was reallysurreal and I wasn’t sure if I had read the e-mail correctly. I read it a dozentimes just to be sure.”
Bui says she was disappointed to leave London at the end ofthe spring semester, but having an internship with CMT eased her transitionback to the States. As an intern with Production Management/Promos at CMT, Buideals solely with show promotion. So far, she’s assisted on a shoot, completedresearch projects, called venues and agents, put together a casting book and helpedwith call sheets.
But it was her whirlwind first week, when she got to workwith the marketing department for CMA Music Festival, that’s been mostmemorable so far. “It was intense, to say the least,” she says.
During the four-day span, in which she worked at a CMT boothat the Nashville Convention Center, she met several country music guests,including Emily West, Ashton Shepherd and the final four duos from “Can YouDuet,” helped organize a karaoke/recording booth to promote “Can You Duet” and oversawautograph signings.
“While the hours were long, it was a great way to start theprogram,” Bui says. “I got to meet most of the interns, meet artists and seeamazing concerts.”
She says she enjoys working in an environment thatappreciates and seeks out creative input. She says there’s always room forimprovement and growth, and her bosses encourage interns to branch out and workwith other departments.
“(The internship) will give me insight on how a networkoperates,” Bui says. “Television production/management has been my goalforever, and it is nice to be doing what I want to do.”
Bui says theinternship with CMT has been ideal because she’s more interested in theentertainment side of the broadcast medium.
“I have always wanted to work in the entertainmentbusiness,” she says. “While I really enjoy the fast-paced news world, it justwasn’t me. The internship at CMT is more of what I want to do in the future.
“I like planning and organizing, so production managementfits pretty well. I love music and the music business is also reallyinteresting. Television and music are a great combination.”
Intern Insider will run one to two times aweek during the summer and will feature brief stories about some of theinterns from the School of Communications.