Internships help Johnson prepare, gain experience for sport management career

While growing up, Morgan Johnson was always around sports. Now, through those experiences and multiple internships as a Northwest Missouri State University student, she has a better understanding of the career she wants to pursue.

“I played sports and was always around sports, and I just really enjoy the fact that sports are never the same two days in a row,” Johnson said.

Johnson, a senior sport management major from Raytown, Missouri, has participated in three internships on and off campus that have helped her enhance the skills she is learning through her Northwest coursework. In the last three years, she has interned with the Kansas City Current women’s soccer team, Northwest Department of Athletics and, most recently, the Kansas City Royals, where she worked behind the scenes with fan experience initiatives.

With the Royals this season, Johnson helped put on pre-game ceremonies and in-game promotions including the ceremonial first pitch, Play Ball Kid, Steal a Base and hot dog derbies. She received a scholarship from the Missouri Park and Recreation Association Charitable Trust last spring to support her internship experience with the Royals.

“I have had a lot of fun getting to interact with the fans, especially picking fans to be a contestant in one of the games,” Johnson said.

During the summer of 2019, Johnson worked for the Kansas City Current as the partnership activation intern. Her responsibilities included working every home game for the Current and making sure banners and signage for partnerships were hung properly throughout the stadium.

As an intern with Northwest athletics last fall, Johnson helped set up facilities for football and basketball games. At Northwest, the sport management program prepares students for leadership roles in professional, collegiate and community sports organizations.

“My favorite thing about the sports management program at Northwest is that I truly feel that I am prepared to go out and start working when I graduate,” Johnson said. “I am very thankful to Northwest for having a major that allows me to gain hands-on experience and fits my passions.”

Additionally, Johnson has been active on campus, especially within residential life, which has helped her develop other skills. She was a resident advisor for two years and is an assistant resident director this fall. She also is president of Northwest’s chapter of National Residence Hall Honorary.

Johnson hopes to use the skills she has learned throughout her time at Northwest and through her internships to build a career in game day operations with a Kansas City sports organization upon graduating next May.

“With each internship I’ve done, I’ve worked with people who have been working in the industry for years,” Johnson said. “This allowed me to soak in as much information as I could about each of the different areas of sports I worked in.”