Sarah Saltsman
Sarah Saltsman ’16 is changing jobs!
She has been working as a Diversion and Vivitrol Coordinator for the Athens County Prosecutor’s Office since graduating from the College of Arts and Sciences at Ohio University with a BA in Sociology-Criminology and minor in Psychology.
She has recently moved closer to her family in Cleveland and is excited to be starting as a Probation Officer for Cuyahoga County’s Common Pleas Court in October.
What she loved most about her role as a Diversion and Vivitrol Coordinator was that it was face paced and every day was different. She had the opportunity to make a difference in people’s lives.
Saltsman monitored people suffering from opiate drug addiction. Monitoring involved coordinating appointments for clients to receive a shot of Vivitrol every 30 days for over a year.
More importantly, she encouraged them through the process and helped them get jobs and housing while getting over their addiction.
“It was a very rewarding experience for me to be a part of,” she says.
Her OHIO Experience
Saltsman says her time as a student at Ohio University not only prepared her for her career, but also prepared her for, well, life.
She was very shy coming into college and all the interaction she experienced with fellow students, professors, internship supervisors, and co-workers helped her develop social skills. Something she couldn’t have learned in classes alone.
Benefits of an Internship
Her internship experience as a junior and senior year at the Athens County Prosecutor’s Office became a full-time job right after she graduated. She found the internship through a friend, who was an intern in another area of the Prosecutor’s Office. The Diversion office had never had an intern, so she mentioned Saltsman’s name. Saltsman was their very first intern! Her supervisor later contacted Roberta Roberson, the Sociology and Criminology Internship Coordinator, about participating in the program.
Saltsman says the benefits of an internship include being able to incorporate what you learn through coursework into an actual job setting and just having experience in a work environment, since the majority of the jobs for Sociology and Criminology require experience. Again, those social skills developed outside the classroom help after graduation.
“I think it was beneficial I started so early and got as much experience as I could,” she says. “It also really helped with interviewing to be able to talk about working there and show that I was familiar with that work environment.”
Advice?
“One thing I would tell my college self now would be to do and enjoy as much as you can. The four years at Ohio University will be over before you know it!”
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