On January 23rd, 2025, I attended the E+I Fellows Preview Night, an event at Grove City College hosted by the Center for Entrepreneurship + Innovation (E+I). What started as a nerve-wracking event turned out to be a great experience for me as a first-year student to build my networking and communication skills.
For those new to Grove City College or E+I, the E+I Fellows program recruits local startups, nonprofits, and small businesses to work with students of all different majors through a $25/hour internship paid for by E+I. This program is a genius model because it creates a mutually beneficial relationship between all parties involved; the students are getting excellent experience for their resume and a much higher wage per hour than the regular student rate, and the small businesses are getting the help that they desperately need but could not otherwise afford to pay for themselves.
Preview Night is an event that the E+I hosts where students interested in applying for the E+I Fellows program can meet the businesses that they might want to consider applying for. It’s a great chance for students to put a face to the name on their application, hand out resumes to highlight experiences potentially overlooked on the applications, and network with fellow students and businesses.
I was not able to attend Preview Night last semester, so as a first-year student, this was my first time attending the event. I am what you would probably call an extreme extrovert; I absolutely love talking to people and getting to know them. Whenever I hear people talk about networking, which is frequent here because the my entrepreneurship major stresses it in basically every class, I never get nervous because I’ve felt like God has given me a natural talent for forming those connections with people. An event like this was different for me though. Despite my extroverted personality and my love for networking, I was still nervous about going to Preview Night. But I wasn’t going to let the nerves and fear stop me from putting myself out there and attempting to build important connections, regardless of the outcome of getting an internship. So, I put on my slacks, blouse and flats and walked across the parking lot between my dorm room and Rathburn Hall, the building where the event was held.
After checking in and getting a name tag and bag of E+I swag (which was awesome by the way), I took my place in line and waited for the doors to open, since I got there about 5 minutes early. I tried to calm my nerves, but when the doors opened to go into the Great Room, my nerves only increased. The thing about these kinds of events is that, for me, the very beginning of it can be the most nerve-wracking; working up the courage to go up to that business you really want to impress and putting yourself in a situation where you could make a mistake or just sound really dumb. After about five minutes of standing around awkwardly, I decided to just go for it and worked up the nerve to go up to a table; the Peters Township Chamber of Commerce. It took about a minute for the conversation to get rolling, but then it took off and flowed naturally. Just like that, the nerves were pretty much gone, and I stayed at that first table for about 15 minutes just building a relationship with the woman there and listening to her tell her story about her journey with the chamber.
While the nerves always returned at least a little bit when moving to a new table, the confidence I gained from that first table was enough to push me forward to continue making my way around the different business tables. I spent an hour there visiting about 6 tables, talking to multiple classmates about their experiences, and eating some tasty appetizers. In the end, the event was an amazing chance for me to grow my networking skills and build confidence, so I’m very thankful for opportunities like this that the E+I provides for students regardless of major, but I’m even more thankful that I actually took advantage of the opportunity and didn’t let my fears hold me back.
If you ever get presented with chances to grow your network or build useful skills, for your career or just for life in general, I strongly encourage you to never let fear or nerves get in the way of pursuing those opportunities. There’s no telling what God might do with the relationships or skills you build in those opportunities, or even the character development that can happen by merely stepping out of your comfort zone and putting yourself into positions where God can use, lead, or direct you.