Name: Briana BouchardClass Year: 2014
Major: Mechanical Engineering
Hometown: Madbury, NH
Internship organization: Allergan, Medford, MA
Internship title: R&D Engineering Intern
1. Describe your internship organization.
Globally, Allergan is a multi-specialty health care company focused on discovering, developing and commercializing innovative pharmaceuticals, biologics, and medical devices.
2. Describe your internship responsibilities.
Working in Research and Development, my responsibilities range greatly from day to day. I could be writing a study report one day and be preparing test samples the next day. For the most part, I am providing any support I can to the textile engineers in my department. Sometimes they are looking for specific support with a mechanical engineering related task and other times they are looking for general support with an upcoming project. These tasks can be as simple as creating graphs of data in excel and can get as complicated as creating a surgical model to show how to use our product. The best part about it is that not every project has a foreseeable outcome or solution. We spend a lot of time discussing and thinking outside of the box.
3. What has led you to pursue this type of work?
I’ve always been interested in the medical field, but I wasn’t sure that medical school was the right fit for me. In the last couple of years, I’ve decided that I want to apply my mechanical engineering degree to some sort of medical research. After working at Biogen Idec, a pharmaceutical company in Cambridge, MA, I realized that I wanted to go into the medical device industry. I saw how these devices could improve patient care and allow doctors to offer treatments in new and more effective ways. In looking for summer internships, I applied to many medical device companies and several more traditional mechanical engineering internships. When the opportunity at Allergan presented itself, I knew that the internship was exactly what I was looking for. It was the perfect balance between mechanical engineering and medical research.
4. Describe one highlight of your internship experience thus far?
One of the first major projects I contributed to was a breast reconstruction model that our marketing team could use to show surgeons how our product works. We sent the model out for use at a conference and the feedback we received was overwhelmingly positive. It was an amazing experience to know that I had made significant contributions to a model that would allow surgeons to understand the benefits of our product.
5. What’s one piece of advice you’d give to other interns?
I think that in any internship experience it is crucial to broaden your scope of learning by offering to take on projects that aren’t necessarily part of your job description. Learning what other people do in the organization is important and you could find something that you didn’t know existed or that you are more interested in.
