Working With the Experiential Education Office

As you know, faculty and staff are the voice of the university with the ability to change policy and procedures or strengthen established programs. As members of the university, please consider hiring an intern for a semester to help with marketing, research, organizing, event planning, writing, etc. Internships are a tried and proven benefit to all parties involved, what with their ability to link learning and life. Some of the following suggestions may already be being practiced by you; others are innovative.

• Class presentations. Our office has ready-made presentations in increments of 5 to 45 minutes that a member of the Experiential Education Office can present in your classes.
• Link your department internship website with the Experiential Education Office web site.
• Advertise Study Abroad as a draw for students.
• Use your department’s academic advisors to help encourage student participation.
• Issue an ‘internship of the week’ or ‘internship of the month’ e-mail with an internship opportunity that would be applicable to many students.
• Maintain a list of department-specific internship opportunities.
• Post internship success stories on a faculty information board or through well-placed and –timed emails.
• Offer an internship presentation at faculty meetings that includes success stories and well-researched statistics about the benefits of internships.
• Stay abreast of campus presentations by outside presenters or other departments regarding internship opportunities and encourage your students to attend the presentations.
• Encourage students to seek out companies that may not have previously worked with UNH or considered an internship program.
• Prepare your students by addressing their role as a university representative.  Stress the importance of performing well as their actions can encourage or discourage a company’s future participation in UNH’s internship program.
• Alert your student to the necessity of informing the Experiential Education Office of where s/he is interning and his/her contact information so that the appropriate Experiential Education Office employee can follow up to schedule an on-site internship visit.
• Obtain student testimonials with specifics about how the internship and classes worked together to enhance learning.
• Issue pre- and post-tests gauging how prepared a student feels about transitioning into the professional field, how applicable s/he felt the internship was to his/her academic training, or whether the internship helped her or him to see the connection between learning and life.
• Consider issuing the same test to students who have not interned and compare the results of the two groups (be sure both groups are at the same level of study, i.e. seniors about to graduate).