“I will never forget what I learned at Gonzaga as well as the teachers who were mentors to me. I followed my dreams to working with collections and exhibits in a museum.” –Jenni Opalinski, Class of 2006

What is an internship?

An internship provides an invaluable learning experience, an opportunity to explore a potential career field, a chance to learn and teach history beyond the classroom, and a vehicle for gaining hands-on experience that will enchance any resume, graduate school application, or law school application, regardless of the nature of the internship itself.

The details and duties of any internship will vary according to the student, the site, and the site supervisor, but in general an internship will require 120 hours of work related to the site's operations (an average of 8 hours per week over the course of a 15-week semester, or 120 hours over the course of a summer session).

Ideally, an internship will supplement, enhance, and allow you to apply what you've learned in your history classes.  You might work in a museum, at a historic site, in a local library or archive, with a historical organization, or with a local government agency.  You'll enter your internship as a history student, but you'll quickly learn that "history" outside of an academic setting means much more than lectures, books, papers, and grades.

For more information on internships, contact Dr. Veta Schlimgen (schlimgen@gonzaga.edu).

Local

http://www.northwestmuseum.org/

http://www.digitalarchives.wa.gov/StaticContent/volunteers

http://spokanelibrary.org/admin/uploads/files/Policies/Volunteering.pdf

http://history.tincan.org/about/support.asp

http://www.kpbx.org/volunteer.htm

http://web.me.com/anthony.e.clark/Spokane_Diocese_Archive/Welcome.html

http://www.historicspokane.org/

Regional

http://votesmart.org/internships/#.UO8JDaWPURl

http://washingtonbus.org/get-on-the-bus/summer-fellowship

http://www.sos.wa.gov/library/

http://www.cwu.edu/~career/cms/index.php?page=museum-studies

http://www.leg.wa.gov/Internships/Pages/default.aspx

http://www.washingtonhistory.org/wshs/workstudy.aspx

http://www.olympic.national-park.com/job.htm

http://www.nbr.org/About/join.aspx

http://seattleareaarchivists.org/2010/10/12/looking-for-student-volunteers/

http://www.archives.gov/pacific-alaska/seattle/volunteer.html

http://sites.google.com/site/announcementsinthefield/Home/internship-listings/post-a-local-regional-internship

National

http://www.whitehouse.gov/about/internships

http://www.monticello.org/site/about/internships-monticello

http://www.mountvernon.org/more/careers/internships

http://www.nps.gov/personnel/intern.htm

http://www.gilderlehrman.org/historyscholars.html

http://www.archives.gov/careers/

http://www.archives.gov/careers/jobs/student.html

http://www.si.edu/ofg/intern.htm

http://www.nmnh.si.edu/rtp/other_opps/internship_summary.html

http://www.npg.si.edu/education/internships.html

http://cia.jobamatic.com/a/jbb/job-details/352299

Sites to Search

http://www.idealist.org/

http://www.coolworks.com/internships/

http://www.job-hunt.org/interns.shtml

http://www.volunteermatch.org/

Also, consider contacting your local libraries, archives, museums, historic sites, courthouse, diocese, and parks about internship opportunities or to create your own voluntary internship. Most organizations, including the GU Archives, would welcome your labor in exchange for you gaining some work experience. http://www.gonzaga.edu/Academics/Libraries/Foley-Library/Departments/Special-Collections/default.asp