Student Internship Spotlight: Daniel Pintard
Class of 2025
Degree:
Internship:
National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Location:
Bethesda, Md.
Duration:
Four months
Why did you choose to attend Marymount?
I was a transfer student, so after my sophomore year I was looking to switch schools. My older brother was living in the DMV and suggested a few schools to check out in the area, one of which was Marymount. I decided to come here specifically because it had a small environment similar to my previous school, which I like because you can form more intimate relationships with peers and professors. But what really made Marymount stand out was the culture of success that students and professors cultivate. If you’re an ambitious student, faculty will do everything in their power to help you succeed and fulfill those ambitions. As someone interested in a niche research area, that really helped me feel supported throughout my studies.
What did you do as an NIH intern?
I was part of the NIH Summer Internship Program and worked at the National Library of Medicine, dealing with a lot of data management and dissemination. I had the chance to dive deeper into my research area of interest, computational biology—the intersection of computer science and biology which involves organizing and analyzing data sets to be used in research and experimentation. I worked on analyzing data from cells in the human retina. Day-to-day responsibilities would vary but I was always doing something related to my area of interest—whether that was reading scientific literature, working on code to help analyze data or meeting with my supervisor and other lab members to discuss project updates.
What was your biggest takeaway from this internship experience?
I learned so much from this internship because it was a very comprehensive work experience. It gave me a taste of what it would be like to work in the research field full time, which was awesome, and helped me solidify my career goals of continuing to work in computational biology. It was nice to have that sense of assurance that I really enjoy this work and can thrive in a lab environment.
How do you feel Marymount prepared you for this internship?
The environment that professors create for students is very conducive to preparation for field work, especially for science majors. Professors are very forward-thinking, stay up to date on literature and advancements in their fields and use that to inform how they teach their classes. That really helped me learn more about science as an ever-growing field and how you should never stop learning. I also found it helpful that they didn’t sugarcoat anything. They really “tell it like it is” in regards to the difficulties of the research field and the nonlinear nature of the job. I appreciated that as I’m going into this real-world environment, because it wasn’t as jarring for me. I was well prepared for both the good and the bad that would come with the internship.
What’s your advice to other students looking for internship opportunities?
Find a way to show individual initiative. My supervisor told me one of the things that stood out to him from my résumé was that I had conducted independent research in my interest area. I had participated in the Marymount Student Research Conference for two years, conducting and presenting my own independent research. He really liked the initiative because that’s the sort of thing you need in the research field. So find a way to show initiative in your given field—whether that be freelance writing, independent research or part-time work—because that will help differentiate you from other applicants.
