Marcia Findlay
E.S. Internship Coordinator
Email: mfindlay@allegheny.edu
Steffee Hall, Room B200A, Box E, Phone: 332-2725
Office Hours: T
& TH 12 to 2pm or by appointment
Congratulations! You have an exciting opportunity
ahead of you, a chance for you to gain "real world" experience and
exposure, while continuing to gain academic knowledge. It is also a chance to contribute directly to
the community.
You
will also have an impact on the lives of Allegheny students for years to
come. As an intern, you serve as an
ambassador from the college to your internship organization, and to the
This
opportunity requires responsibility and dependability on your part. What you gain from the internship and what
you give to others through it, will correspond to the energy and enthusiasm you
put into it.
Your
responsibilities in this internship include:
Being a prompt, dependable, and conscientious staff
worker;
Having a professional appearance (check with your
internship supervisor concerning appropriate attire);
Maintaining communication with me;
Keeping a log of hours worked and brief description of
activities;
Completing a project and associated research;
Writing personal reflective essays;
Reading your fellow interns’ critical analysis essays;
and
Creating an electronic poster.
You should approach your internship work hours as
seriously as you would a paid position.
If you are unable to work, due to illness, please let your supervisor or
another individual at the host organization know.
Since we do not meet as a class, my chief method of
communicating with you, in addition to this syllabus, is via email. Please check your email at least 3 times a
week in case I need to get in touch with you.
I will try to send reminders
to everyone via email regarding assignments and meetings, but due assignments are your responsibility. I will send an email notice when I return
your graded essays to your campus mailboxes.
I can access my Allegheny email at home, but if you need to get in touch
with me quickly, please do not hesitate to call or email me at home, 7 days a week. The best ways to reach me are home
phone and email (mfindlay@allegheny.edu).
Please do not hesitate to communicate with me about
any aspect of your internship either by dropping by my office informally,
scheduling a meeting, or via telephone or email. My
experience has been that when an internship does not work out well, it almost
always could have been avoided through the student's timely communication with
me. There will, no doubt, be days when I
cannot be present during my regular office hours. I will post these temporary changes outside
my office door and send an email to you
with as much advance notice as possible.
You and I should meet
informally about every 3 weeks over the course of the semester to discuss your
internship. I will contact you to schedule the individual
meetings, which should take roughly 10 to 30 minutes.
Your ES faculty internship advisor, you, and I will
also meet to discuss your project proposal early in the semester. After reviewing your proposal, an ES
faculty internship advisor will be chosen who is best suited to evaluate your
internship project. I will provide
your proposal to him/her and will inform you of his/her identity and ask you to
schedule a time for the three of us to meet.
It is your responsibility to schedule this meeting (for about 15 to 30
minutes) by penciling in a time on your internship faculty advisor’s office
hours and checking with me right away to ensure I can make it (I will be able
to unless I have another student meeting scheduled at the same time).
The key component of your internship is the final
project. Your project may require
anywhere from a moderate to large part of the work you complete for your
internship organization, depending on your supervisor's needs. Please consult with your supervisor early in
the semester to identify a project that will be useful to the
organization. Your project does not need
to be a "research" paper; interns have designed educational programs,
produced pamphlets, fact sheets, and web pages, created nature paths, created
GIS maps, evaluated organization's programs (e.g. animal/plant management
techniques, green design, recycling, educational outreach), and so on; there
are many options. However, since you are
receiving credit for this internship, your project must have an academic or
analytical component, and requires a research component. This research component may or may not be
useful to the internship organization, but is required by the Environmental
Science/Studies Department. As early
as possible, you should start speaking with your internship supervisor about
suitable projects and if the organization has any related research needs.
The elements of your project include:
project
proposal;
project
deliverable;
research, and;
project
analysis.
You
shall prepare a written proposal for your project due early in the semester (date specified on page
6). The
purpose of the proposal is to ensure that it is suitable from an academic
perspective, to ensure that the work load seems appropriate, to clarify the
project expectations for all parties (you, your internship supervisor, your
internship faculty advisor and me), and to help you identify tasks and organize
your work schedule in order to complete the project. Your project proposal should indicate:
·
a discussion of
why your project was selected, how will it be used, and what will you learn
from it;
·
a description of
the tasks you will perform;
·
the types of
information it will include (a rough outline or bulleted items);
·
a description of
your deliverable (what will you create and turn in to your supervisor and Allegheny
faculty);
·
a description of
the research you will conduct;
·
a list of some of
the resources you're planning to use;
·
the number of
credits you're receiving and an estimate of the percentage of time you expect
to spend on it; and
·
the approximate
date a first draft of your project will be provided to your supervisor.
After reviewing your proposal, an ES faculty
internship advisor will be chosen who is best suited to evaluate your
internship project. I will provide your
proposal to him/her and will inform you of his/her identity. At that time, I will ask you to arrange
a meeting with him/her and me so that the three of us may discuss and clarify
your project. To arrange this
meeting, please look at your faculty internship advisor’s available office hours
posted outside his/her door. Pencil in
our meeting then contact me to determine if I can make it (I probably can). Depending on the results of our meeting, we
may ask you to revise your proposal.
The project deliverable is
defined as what you will create and turn in to your internship organization as
agreed on between you, your internship supervisor, ES faculty internship
advisor and me during the project proposal stage. In addition to providing a draft of your
deliverable to me, plan to also provide a first draft to your internship
supervisor, even if you have been working closely on it with him/her. While you should fulfill the wishes of your
internship supervisor with respect to the content and format of your project, a
significant portion of your grade will be decided on by Allegheny faculty.
If your project deliverable
includes a significant research component, you need not conduct additional
research. If your project does not
include a research component, you must conduct limited research that is germane
to your project. When discussing
possible projects with your internship supervisor, you should inquire whether
the organization has any related research needs. When you, your ES faculty internship
supervisor, and I meet to discuss your project proposal, we will also discuss
possible research topics.
Your research should be
summarized in a text discussion and fully cited. A draft of your research summary is due
around the middle of the semester (date specified on page 6). The purpose of giving students an interim
deadline is to help you see how useful a bit of research can be to one's
understanding of an issue. Your research
should broaden your understanding outside your internship organizations’
view. Gaining additional insight midway
through a project rather than at the end may help your final product.
The most relevant sources
you use, either for your project deliverable and/or your research should be
annotated (at least five or ten annotations [for 2- or 4-credit internships,
respectively]). A draft of your annotated
sources is due around the middle of the semester (date specified on page
6). Each annotation consists of a five or more sentence description that summarizes
the scope of the source and assesses its relevance to your project. The purpose of annotating your sources is to
give readers and future researchers a better understanding of how and the
degree to which each source was useful.
Please go to http://www.library.cornell.edu/olinuris/ref/research/skill28.htm#what
for more information on writing annotations.
In conjunction with your completed project, you shall
prepare a project analysis to be provided with the project deliverable to Allegheny faculty. It is a brief, written, critical analysis
explaining your project’s connection to the goals of your internship
organization and its relevance to the field of environmental science. The content should include:
·
the development
of the project, i.e., its importance, usefulness, how you came to be involved;
·
the
implementation of the project, i.e., how you conducted all aspects of your
work,
·
how the project
may have evolved over the course of its lifetime; and
·
relevance, i.e.,
how your project relates to trends in the community and world.
For projects that have a significant academic
component (for example, research papers), the project analysis should be
relatively brief, or its elements may be included in the deliverable. For
projects that do not have a significant academic component (for example
brochures, newsletters, web pages, and so on, targeted for the general public),
the project analysis will most likely be the vehicle for your research
discussion.
Because every internship is
different, the format for your all of your project-related work cannot be
stipulated in advance. If, later in the
semester, you have questions about how best to present it, please consult with
me. Nonetheless, your work should have
identifiers as do reports written in the professional world. For example, the introduction should be
written assuming the audience has no prior knowledge of your internship
organization or specific project. It
should include a title, for and by whom it was prepared, date, and headings
such as Introduction, Background, and Project Scope of Work, Results, Analysis, and so on.
Over the course of the semester, you shall write three
critical analysis essays about your experiences (due dates specified on page
6). The purpose of this exercise is not
to document your activities, but to reflect upon your experiences so that
you may gain a broader view and insights to environmental science perspectives
and professional work environments.
Many people find that the process of writing forces them to think more
clearly and/or deeply about a subject, thus helping them to greater
insight. Providing detail makes the
piece more interesting and the ideas easier to grasp. I recommend that instead of waiting to work
on this assignment until it is due, you jot down your impressions and thoughts
as they occur to you over the course of the internship.
To help give you an idea of what I am looking for, I
have attached examples of a few good essays.
To further help you in this endeavor, I have provided a list of topics
that you may wish to address in your essays.
Please note, other than the first item under essay 1 below, you are not
required to address the essay topics; the goal is for you to reflect on your
internship experience and critically examine it and how it compares with your
environmental course work, your personal views, and other experiences. You are welcome to address other topics if
you wish, as long as you engage in reflection and critical thinking. I recognize that you will have to provide
background material in order to comment on your experiences. Each essay should be 4 (full) to 6 pages in
length, using double-spaced line format with 1-inch margins.
To allow this semester’s ES interns to learn about the
other interns’ experiences, I will post everyone's essays on a private web page
where I will ask you each to read the other interns' entries after each due
date. I ask each of you to respect your
fellow interns' privacy by treating their essays as confidential, to be shared
only within our group of interns. In
essays 2 and 3, you may use the other interns’ essays, comparing your
experience with theirs.
Although these essays are personal reflections, your
writing style should be formal. Pretend
your pieces will be published. There
should be no slang nor casual expressions, unless in quotes or appropriate
to your intended meaning. Keep your
audience in mind (other ES interns), providing a few background sentences
describing your internship organization’s purpose and the work you are doing
this semester. As this internship places
you in the professional world, I will expect the quality of your writing to
be professional, too. Please consult
the "Writing Tips" page for help (http://webpub.allegheny.edu/dept/envisci/internships/writingtips.htm).
Please proofread your submissions carefully.
In the professional world grammatical errors, typographical errors,
spelling errors, missing words and extra words in a final document ARE UNACCEPTABLE! I will hold the quality of your writing to
this standard and grade it accordingly.
Please submit your critical analysis essays to me in
the following manner so that they may be posted on our web site:
· Save each of your submissions as a Microsoft Wordä file, named according to the following convention: essay number (1,
2, 3 or 4), hyphen, the first six letters of your last name, your first
initial.doc. For example, my
second essay would be saved in a file called 2-findlaym.doc.
· Please send your essay to me
as Microsoft Wordä file email attachment. I
will convert the files to the html format and post them on the internship web
page.
Essay Topics
·
How
is your organization funded? If you’re unsure,
ask your supervisor. (Required discussion topic)
·
Your expectations
for the internship
·
How your
coursework has prepared or failed to prepare you for the internship
·
The professional
environment at your internship organization:
Is it busy or slow? Formal or
casual? Do co-workers talk of non-work
related matters or limit themselves to work-related ones? How comfortable are you in it and how do you
think your internship co-workers and supervisor perceive you?
·
Are you getting
more experience in the technical or administrative realms of endeavor?
·
Are you working
with people of different educational backgrounds, goals and perspectives? If so, has it changed your views on
environmental matters?
·
Has your
internship revealed any connectedness with other issues, environmental or not,
that have surprised you?
·
What sorts of differences are you finding between your internship and
coursework (collaborating with others with different perspectives, getting
feedback on drafts)? Are these
differences welcome or unsettling?
·
What has been
your best Allegheny environmental science experience (such as a course, field
trip, particular lecture, book, or personal epiphany) and how does it relate to
your internship?
Possible Essay 2 Topics
¨
Read your fellow interns’ first essays.
What differences to do you see between your and your fellow interns’
organization type (government vs. private sector for profit vs. non-profit) and
how do the organizations' genesis affect their success in implementing
programs, meeting goals, workers' attitudes?
¨
What affects, if any, do you see related to your and the other
internships’ funding sources?
¨
What constitutes
and causes environmental problems? Do
not list problems, but provide a broad definition.
¨
How does your
internship organization define or view environmental problems as compared with
your definition?
¨
What is your
internship organization’s approach to benefiting the environment?
¨
How are policies
developed by your internship organization?
Who does your organization serve?
¨
How is your
internship organization’s approach to solving environmental problems similar to
or different from what you have been exposed to through your Allegheny
courses? How does it compare with your
personal experiences and opinions?
¨
Has your
internship exposed you to new concepts or a new focus on familiar concepts
¨
Your internship
organization, no doubt, works on the local level. What connections, explicit or implicit, does
the organization have to global issues?
¨
What role does
education/educated person have at your internship organization regarding
environmental problems?
q
Are your
co-workers or supervisor critical of any aspect(s) of the internship
organization?
q
What changes to
your organization’s operations or structure would you recommend?
q
With regard to
making a true environmental impact has your internship made you feel more or
less hopeful?
q
Have you had any time management problems as a result of the less
structured semester?
q
What are the most
and least interesting/fulfilling aspects of the internship?
q
What is the most
surprising aspect of your internship?
q
Would you like a
career at this organization?
q
Would you like
your future work environments to be similar or different?
q
Has this
internship helped you better define or revise your interests in the
environmental field? How?
q
Has your
internship experience played a role in altering any future plans such as your
comp topic, future Allegheny course registration, career plans, or graduate
school plans?
q
How did your
experience differ from your initial expectations?
You are also expected to keep a log of your activities
at the internship. This log should be
submitted to me every 2 to 3 weeks and at the end of the semester (dates
specified on page 6). This log should briefly mention, in a sentence or two,
how you spent your time each day. I have
provided an example log for your clarification.
I will also attach it electronically (internshiplogform.doc) if you wish
to use this format. Please total the
hours for each report period. I
recommend that you complete the log form after every internship
workday. It’s easy to forget activities
from one day to the next!
This summary of your activities helps me understand
the demands of each internship, helping me to better gauge the value of the
internship and more accurately inform future students about it. By the semester’s end, you must complete the
minimum internship work hours of 70 (for 2 credits) or 140 (for 4 credits),
which averages to 5 or 10 hours per week.
In order to provide future prospective interns with an
idea of what your internship was like, I would like you to prepare an
electronic poster about your internship.
The poster will be posted on the ES Department internship web site and
print copies will be displayed in the department. Your poster should include these elements:
·
an image (photo,
drawing, logo, etc.) displaying an important element of your internship
·
the title of your
organization
·
your name and the
semester in which you interned
·
a brief summary
of your organization's mission and your role as an intern, including your
project
You can create your poster using any number of
programs such as Microsoft Wordä, Microsoft Publisherä, Power Pointä, and so on. Please provide me with an electronic copy
which I will convert to web format. If
you have access to a
color printer, please provide me with a color print
copy.
Your supervisor will be asked for a written evaluation
of your work at the middle and end of the semester, and you will be apprised of
his/her comments. In addition, you must
complete a self-evaluation on a form I will provide you. You must complete the
self-evaluation in order to receive a grade.
I will send the evaluation questions via email approximately one week
before it is due. Don't worry, I
won't have access to your responses until after I have submitted your
grades.
Your faculty internship advisor and I will determine
your grade on the basis of your supervisor's evaluation, your project, essays,
and poster. Sixty percent of your grade
will be based on your work with the organization and your project; 40 percent
will be based on your essays, project proposal, log of hours, and poster.
Late assignments lose one letter grade per
24-hour period, including weekends. If
you anticipate missing a deadline, please inform me in advance.
|
Assignment Due |
Due Date |
Due Time |
Due To |
|
Project proposal |
Tuesday, September 16 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
Project meeting |
You schedule a date between Sept 18-Oct 3
|
|
with faculty advisor and M.F. |
|
Research discussion draft |
Thursday, October 23 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
Annotated sources draft |
Tuesday, October 28 |
12 pm |
|
|
Project deliverable draft |
Thursday, November 20 |
12 pm |
Internship supervisor & M.F. |
|
Project analysis draft |
Thursday, November 20 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
Final project (includes project deliverable,
research, annotations, and analysis) |
Thursday, December 4 |
12 pm |
Internship supervisor & M. F. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Essay 1 (and Log 2) |
Thursday, September 25 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
Essay 2 (and Log 3) |
Thursday, October 16 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
Essay 3 |
Tuesday, November 11 |
12 pm |
M. Findlay |
|
|
|
|