Uncovering Stories From the Numbers

The first thing I do when I arrive at my internship is open Microsoft Teams. Before I even know what my day will look like, I check my messages, see what tasks have been assigned to me and start deciding what needs to come first. Some days, I know exactly what I need to accomplish. Other days, I open a new task and think, “Where do I even start?”

That uncertainty is one of my favorite parts of being a Corporate Accounting Intern at Cleveland Dental Institute. I chose this internship because I wanted to see what the concepts I study at Whitman look like when real money, purchases and decisions are involved. As an Economics major who is minoring in Finance, I spend a lot of time learning how to interpret numbers. At my internship, I have learned that numbers can tell a story, but only when you learn how to look at them. 

One project that made this especially clear was posting invoices for the next two years of the current residency program. At first, it seemed like a straightforward task: enter the information and make sure everything was correct. But as I worked through the invoices, I realized that I was helping organize the financial side of a program that will continue operating for years. Knowing that made me much more aware of every number I entered. Accuracy was no longer just something I was told was important in accounting; I could see why it mattered. 

Another project took me in a completely different direction. I was asked to analyze purchases made through eBay and compare the organization’s spending over the past six months with the previous year. I remember looking through the transactions and realizing that I was no longer just seeing individual purchases. I was starting to see patterns. Why did spending change? What was being purchased more frequently? How did this year compare with the last? These questions made me think about the number and type of dental patients our clinics were welcoming and how that changes over time. 

That was the moment accounting started to feel connected to economics and finance in a way I had not experienced in a classroom. A transaction is more than a number on a spreadsheet. When you look closely, it can tell you something about how an organization operates and where its money is going.

My internship has also taught me that professional growth happens in the small moments. It is learning how to prioritize five tasks at once, asking questions instead of guessing and checking my work one more time before calling it complete. I have become more confident working independently, but I have also learned that being willing to ask for help is part of doing good work.

If I could give other students one piece of advice, it would be to apply even when you are not sure you have everything figured out. You do not have to know exactly where an opportunity will take you. Sometimes, you just need to open the Teams message, start the task and see what you learn along the way. If you are looking for that opportunity, explore the Whitman Internship Grant, read other student internship stories and connect with the Career and Community Engagement Center at Whitman. Your next experience might teach you more than you expect.

Monyati Alsabbagh ’27 (she/her) is an Economics major who is minoring in Finance from Amman, Jordan. Thanks to the Whitman Internship Grant, she completed a corporate accounting internship at Cleveland Dental Institute. Her favorite part of the internship was discovering the stories hidden behind everyday financial transactions.