Day In the Life of an Agronomy Sales Intern - Dawson Schulenberg
Jun 20, 2020
Do you ever wonder what the River Valley Cooperative Agronomy Sales Interns are doing throughout the summer when they are not out scouting fields?
Well, a typical day in the life of an intern varies from person to person. Dawson Schulenberg is one of the four agronomy interns employed at River Valley Cooperative this summer, and he volunteered to let member-owners see a sneak peek into what a day in his life looks like as an intern at the Annawan, Illinois River Valley Cooperative location.
7:00 AM
Dawson’s day typically starts at 7 am when he arrives at the Geneseo location to clock in for the day and pick up his River Valley Cooperative truck. Dawson then travels to Annawan, Illinois, to begin his workday.
7:30 AM - 8:15 AM
At 7:30 AM Dawson arrives in Annawan and meets with his internship mentor, Adam DeRycke, a River Valley Cooperative Account Manager, to discuss his schedule for the day. Each and every day is always a little different, but on this particular day, Dawson and Adam decided to head out to the fields first to do some crop scouting.
8:15 AM - 10:30 AM
Dawson and Adam arrived at the first field of the day at 8:45 AM. While in the field, Dawson completed a few stand counts to estimate the population of the field. Next, they headed over to a field in Annawan to check out some weeds, grasses, and water hemp that had been popping up in the farmer's field. The final field that Dawson and Adam visited was having some difficulties with a fungal disease called Pythium. This condition can lead to seed and plant rot once infected. After making some phone calls to each of the growers to inform them about updates in their fields, Dawson and Adam then started driving back to the Annawan location.
10:30 AM - 12:00 PM
Once they returned to Annawan, Adam had to leave to attend a meeting at the River Valley Cooperative location in Geneseo. While he was attending this meeting, Adam informed Dawson about some seed bags that needed to be picked up at the River Valley Location in Fenton, Illinois. While Adam was attending the meeting, Dawson drove to Fenton to pick up seed bags.
12:00 PM – 12:30 PM
Once Dawson got back from Fenton it was around noon, so he decided to take his lunch break and mingled with his fellow coworkers.
12:30 PM - 2:00 PM
After lunch Dawson went to pick up seed boxes at the Geneseo River Valley Cooperative location. Once he arrived in Geneseo, an operator then used a forklift to place the seed boxes onto the back of the truck while Dawson tied the boxes down. He then had to deliver the seed boxes back to Seth Lanwehr the Seed Coordinator at the Annawan Seed Facility. Dawson arrived back in Annawan around 1:45 PM and Seth then helped Dawson unload the boxes with a forklift.
2:00 PM – 3:00 PM
After dropping off the seed boxes with Seth in Annawan, Dawson then traveled to Geneseo to pick some more seed boxes from a seed customer.
3:00 PM – 4:00 PM
After completing the last delivery of the day, Dawson filmed a few final clips for the, ‘Day in the Life of an Intern’ video. Once that was finished, he headed back to Geneseo to drop off his work truck and clock out for the day.
Thank you, Dawson, for providing insight into what a typical day in the life of an intern at River Valley Cooperative is like!
If interested in a possible internship with River Valley Cooperative, please contact our Talent Manager Daniele Mineck by email at mineck@rivervalleycoop.com or check out our website at www.rivervalleycoop.com/careers/students.