Internship Spotlight: Rawls College Energy Commerce Student Finds Career Direction at ExxonMobil - Texas Tech University

Storm Shepherd, a student at the Jerry S. Rawls College of Business, interned with ExxonMobil's Surface Land Team and focused on the land side of the oil and gas business. His biggest assignment was building a centralized fee surface database for company-owned properties in the region. He evaluated 407 individual fee surface tracts, pulled information from multiple sources, and organized everything into a single resource his coworkers could actually use.

For Rawls students in the energy commerce program, that kind of hands-on work is the point. West Texas sits on top of the Permian Basin, meaning land decisions made in offices here shape drilling timelines, development plans, and long-term business strategy across one of the most productive oil regions in the country. Shepherd got to see how those decisions play out in practice, working alongside experienced professionals rather than shadowing them.

Students leave with a project on their resume that a hiring manager can actually evaluate. Shepherd evaluated more tracts in one summer than many land professionals see in their first year on the job.