Ask the Career Counselor: Tips for Strengthening Your Career Services Summer Internship Grant Application

Today's question: I'm thinking about applying for a Career Services Summer Internship Grant; what advice would you give for creating a strong application?

Answered by: Donna Esposito, Tufts Career Services

Through generous donations from alumni, foundations and the Tufts Diversity Fund, Career Services is able to provide funding for up to 39 internships for the Summer of 2011. These grants offer students in AS&E the opportunity to explore career fields and gain experience through full-time, unpaid internships. Students must work a minimum of 350 hours (i.e. 35 hours/week for 10 weeks). Because the awarding of these grants is a competitive process, the following tips are provided to help make your application a strong one!

• Remember the basics: prepare a neat and well written application. We have to read yours, and many others...so please make it easy for us!

• Read the directions thoroughly and make sure you submit all components of the application (4 hard copies) by the deadline—April 1, 2011.

• Check with Career Services to make sure that both of your recommendation letters have arrived by the deadline. Ask people to recommend you who are familiar with your professional and/or academic strengths and skills. Two letters are required!

• Contact Career Services for alternative application procedures if you are studying abroad this spring and will not be here to submit hard copies of your application. Applying from abroad is absolutely possible for many students; however, it often takes a bit more time and planning.

• Have your resume critiqued in Career Services before submitting it as a part of your application.

• Spend some quality time on the learning contract! Identify what you would like to learn from the internship experience and how this relates to your career, and possibly academic, goals. Contact your internship site supervisor to discuss what his or her goals are for you, and how this learning will be accomplished throughout the internship. Be as specific as possible.

• Please include details on the type and amount of supervision you will receive, and from whom.

• Contact Career Services if you have any questions or concerns about your grant application. We are here to help!!

FOR AN APPLICATION & ADDITIONAL INFORMATION VISIT OUR WEBSITE - Good luck!

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Ask the Career Counselor: Internship Funding

Today's question: I applied for a great internship, but it's unpaid and I need to make some money. Where can I look for alternative sources of funding?

Answered by: Susannah Krenn, Tufts Career Services

This is an issue that comes up frequently in my conversations with students. Ideally, every internship would offer some form of compensation! Unfortunately, we know that this isn't the case. For starters, I encourage students to meet with a career advisor to talk about their individual questions related to internships and funding.

Important reminder: Before you commit to an unpaid internship, think about how you'll navigate the funding issue. Assuming you'll be able to find funding after you've accepted a position may result in disappointment.

Here are a few strategies to consider when looking for internship funding:

• First, check with your prospective supervisor to see if he/she knows of any funding opportunities offered by the organization. You could also ask him/her to put you in touch with past interns so that you can contact them about strategies for managing an unpaid internship.
• If possible, think about accepting an unpaid internship on a part-time basis. Many students adopt this "hybrid" plan: working part-time as an unpaid intern and part-time at a paying job. Internships, activities, and volunteer positions positively add to resumes and self-knowledge, whether they're full-time or part-time.
  
• Talk to your department at Tufts. Sometimes departments offer funding for research or other work experiences.
• Network! Talk to family, friends, supervisors, and professors to get ideas for how you could obtain funding or raise funds on your own.
  

As you may have guessed, funding providers (especially those external to Tufts) generally expect their recipients to work with a certain organization, for a specified number of hours, etc. Thus, it is doubly important to think about this issue in advance, since you may not be able to choose your own internship placement outside of what the funding dictates.

Tufts offers a number of resources for funding internships, individual research, and projects abroad. Here's a list of opportunities:

Career Services Summer Internship Grants
Summer Scholars Program
Tisch Active Citizenship Summer Fellowship Program
Undergraduate Research Fund
IGL Empower Program for Social Entrepreneurship
Anne E. Borghesani Memorial Prize
Dean's Student Grant Program for Engineering Projects

Other helpful websites:
Scholarships, Fellowships, and Post-Graduate Internships (through Career Services website)
Diversity Resources

External funding websites:
Fastweb
College Scholarships and Grants, Grad School Fellowships, and Post-Graduate Awards

Have questions or want more advice? Come see us!

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Internship Spotlight - Kimberly Kennedy, A09

Kimberly Kennedy, Class of 2009, Majors: History and Political Science
Internship: San Juan Historical Museum, Friday Harbor, WA

The San Juan Historical Museum allows visitors to learn about the history of San Juan Island, archives historical material for the use of researchers, and runs a lecture series on subjects relating to the town and island history. As an intern, Kimberly trained as a museum docent, learned to apply for grants, catalogued historical documents, and assisted in the planning and publicizing museum programming.

Q. How did you find this internship?
A. I emailed the President of the Board of the museum and asked if the museum would be
interested in having an intern over the summer, and it turned out that they actually had
plenty of projects for me to work on.

Q. What did you enjoy most about your internship?
A. My favorite part of the internship was the sense of accomplishment I felt after
finishing projects. For example, I was responsible for digitizing the photograph
archives, which took several weeks, but after I completed it I felt that I had made a
real contribution.

Q. How does this internship relate to your future career goals/plans?
A. This internship showed me that I would enjoy working in a museum someday, although I
would probably choose to work in a larger institution.

Did you know?

Kim was a recipient of a Career Services Summer Internship Grant, a source of funding that allowed her to complete an internship that would have otherwise been unpaid. Interested in getting funding for your summer internship? Check out the Career Services Internship Grant info: http://careers.tufts.edu/students/internships/TCSIG/

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