For one CU student, stuffing coupons into thousands and thousands of water bottles is all in a day’s work. Senior Andy Fox, who is interning with the arena football team the Grand Rapids Rampage, stuffs a lot of water bottles. But he does a lot more too.

A business management major, Fox’s title with the Rampage is community relations intern. This title holds many different responsibilities, and Fox gets to do them all.

One of the main areas Fox works in is with donation requests. Organizations will contact the Rampage for donations for benefit auctions, outreach events and other activities.

“We don’t donate money, but we do give away a lot of free tickets,” Fox said.

The Rampage also gives away things like seat cushions, pennants and mini footballs with their donations. Fox said he usually works with 10-15 different organizations per week. He said the hardest thing about the process is having to say no to organizations that have already gotten donations.

Fox also gets to interact with some of the players. Player appearances are scheduled mostly at schools around the area. The player will go, talk to the kids and have meet and greets with the parents and principals. Fox’s job for this? He picks up the player and takes them to the place.

“I thought that the ride would be super awkward, but it wasn’t,” Fox said about his first experience with a player. “(The player) was really passionate about the kids.”

Fox is working to start a new reading program with the Rampage. He wants to make it a mix between the NBA’s Read to Achieve program and the program that the West Michigan Whitecaps do. The Whitecaps give ticket vouchers away for a certain number of pages or books read.

“I want the readers to excel, like get rewarded if the reading level has gone up,” Fox said. “It’s still in the works.”

Other responsibilities include taking inventory and looking for new sponsors.

Fox likes the whole business atmosphere he gets to work in.

“I’ve always dreamed about working in sports, but I never dreamed about working in arena football,” he said. “It’s interesting to see what I’ve learned in the classroom apply. This is a real company, but different than what I thought.”

Fox said that he enjoys working with the fellow staff members because there is a big stress on teamwork. The staff holds “team huddles,” which are the equivalent of meetings. At these “huddles” they discuss issues like season ticket holders, donation packages and problem solving.

The front office where he primarily works has about 12 people that run organization.

“They are the hardest working people I’ve ever met,” Fox said.

Alex Clark, the director of media and community relations for the Rampage said Fox is important as an intern.

“Andy’s work ethic has been stellar, primarily due to his attitude,” Clark said via email. “As with any job, Andy succeeds here because he is passionate about sports and views every task as important to the growth of the team.  He has invested his heart in this organization, and that will serve him wherever he goes.”

Fox started pursuing this internship last spring and was hired in June. He got some help with connections to the right people, and then asked about an internship until he got the job. He started working in August. He puts in about 18-20 office hours per week.

The internship is not paid, “but it does have incentives,” Fox said.

He gets a lot of Rampage gear, and sponsors usually give them a lot of free stuff too.

“As long as I’m getting my name out there I’m fine with it,” he said.

Fox has been asked to continue interning in the spring, where his responsibilities will be different again. He might be working on the concourse level, in the tunnel or in the press box along with some of the responsibilities he has right now.

“In season is a lot crazier than off season,” he said.