On Tuesday, Lieutenant Governor Byron Mallott and his summer intern, Kathryn Treder, visited KRBD. We aired a report about Mallott’s visit yesterday. Treder, originally from Anchorage, told KRBD that she’ll be a senior at Stanford University in the fall.
“I am a double major in political science and comparative studies in race and ethnicity,” she said. “So, that’s sort of how I ended up in the Lieutenant Governor’s office.”
Treder is one of 10 kids.
“My family is everything to me,” she said. “It’s probably the single most influential factor in making me who I am today.”
She said as the second-oldest child, she felt pressure to perform well academically and set an example for her younger siblings.
“And I think in a lot of ways, it made me grow up really fast,” she added.
Treder said she does a lot of research under Barbara Blake, a senior adviser to the lieutenant governor.
“It’s a good medium between a lot of theory and a place to insert your ethics and moral opinion, but also have more of that math-y science-y side,” she said. “So, I think that’s sort of why I like that hard science side of the soft science.”
As far as internship mistakes go, Treder hasn’t had many to speak of. She said her biggest goof-up came just this week, while she was in Metlakatla with Mallott and his wife for Founder’s Day.
She accidentally told Mallott’s wife to go to the wrong place in order to leave the island.
“I totally freaked out because I thought I had sent them to the wrong place,” she said.
Everything turned out fine in the end, despite Treder’s horror about her mix-up.
The toughest part of her internship with Mallott’s office probably wasn’t keeping his schedule straight or spending hours on research.
“I was biking five and a half miles to work, and then five and a half miles back,” she admitted of her commute.
Treder’s internship wraps up next week.
