Made in the editing room: Grace Stensland ’23

Class of 1981 Internship Endowment

Rob McIntyre, an Emmy award-winning supervising sound editor and sound designer, and Grace Stensland ’23 in Gavett Hall’s recording studio.

Grace Stensland ’23, a Syracuse, New York, native, grew up loving movies, photography, and Broadway shows. When it came time to choose a college, she was drawn to Rochester for its open curriculum, which she knew would give her many opportunities to explore her broad interests. Working as an intern in the summer of 2022 helped her hone those interests, too, and find her niche—an experience made possible by the Class of 1981 Internship Endowment.

Stensland found her internship by tapping into her network, which she learned how to do at her work-study job at the Gwen M. Greene Center for Career Education & Connections. “Working at the Greene Center during my sophomore and junior years gave me insight into the importance of networking, interviewing, and professional communication,” she says. “So, when it came time for me to look for an internship, I reached out to my audio engineering professor, Stephen Roessner. I knew he had a friend in Los Angeles who worked in the entertainment business, and I asked him to connect me, which he did.”

Roessner’s friend is Rob McIntyre, an Emmy Award-winning supervising sound editor who cofounded Sound Rebels, LLC, a Burbank, California-based audio post-production company that provides sound design and mixing services for animated television, movies, and reality TV. McIntyre and his business partner, D.J. Lynch, interviewed Stensland over Zoom and she aced it, securing the summer-long internship.

The internship was a great fit. Every day, she worked on such projects as Nickelodeon’s Middlemost Post, a kids’ comedy series; Paramount+’s Big Nate, a kid’s series created by Nickelodeon; and Netflix’s Inside Job, an adult-oriented science fiction series. Her primary responsibilities included editing sound effects, creating ambient sounds, and maintaining client services.

Sound Rebels even tasked Stensland with a special project: to sound design eight minutes of an episode of Inside Job. “I’ve been a big fan of this show for a long time,” she says. “It was such a thrill to go from watching it to actually creating sound for it, especially for such a big segment within an episode.”

Toward the end of the summer, McIntyre and Lynch approached Stensland about coming on board full-time after graduation as a sound editor. “I loved every minute of my internship, so being offered a full-time job left me speechless,” she says. “I did manage to say yes, though, and I can’t wait to start working there full-time.”

Stensland adds, “Even though many internships pay an hourly rate, it’s often not enough to cover other expenses,” she adds. “That was certainly the case for me. Los Angeles is expensive, and I never would have been able to afford housing and food without the assistance of the Class of 1981 Internship Endowment.”

This experience led to my dream job right out of the gate, which is incredibly rare for people graduating and hoping to work in film and television. The funding support I received gave me a head start on my career, and I couldn’t be more grateful.”

Learn more about how funded internships open doors to graduate schools, career paths, and personal growth.