When Matthew Ebling applied for his internship with Adobe Systems last fall, he thought he had no chance of landing the role. But come May 2017, the Digital Worlds Institute (DW) graduate student found himself living and working as a product management intern in the heart of Silicon Valley.
As part of the Creative Cloud Asset Team, Ebling worked with various departments at the Adobe headquarters in San Francisco. After just one summer, he said he would absolutely return if given the chance.
“The west coast is the best coast for sure,” Ebling said.
And while many of the projects Ebling worked on are confidential, he said his favorite part of the experience was the comradery that the company encourages.
“It was cool to see how departments work together,” Ebling said. “I was able to have one foot in so many different worlds.”
From market research to collaborating with the design team, he got a taste of working for a company that employs almost 17,000 people—and invests in every single one.
“The whole place is just designed with the people who work there in mind.”
The internship came to Ebling through a combination of luck and diligence. The Adobe team reached out to DW, and from there reached Ebling. When he heard that he had been accepted, he was over the moon.
Just a few years before, Ebling was living in New York City doing freelance work as a performer. Working as a voiceover artist for an iPad app that taught children to read, Ebling said he realized that working with digital media might be more than just a hobby.
“New York was a huge catalyst in the decision for me to come to Digital Worlds,” he said.
And without DW, he knows he never would have landed his job at Adobe.
“I chose this program because it fulfills the capacity for knowledge within more than one industry,” he said. “Whether I wanted to focus on game design or digital illustration, it doesn’t matter, because (DW) can hook me up with the equipment I need.”
To other Digital Arts & Sciences students seeking internships in digital media, Ebling recommends diligence and persistence, but also making sure you do something you love. He said he started applying from the minute he began studying at the University of Florida.
“At Adobe, they threw a big summer party on a random Tuesday, and the head of technical support for the whole company was the DJ,” he said. “Where else does that happen? I’ve got to get back there.”
