Internship FAQ

The Tech Comm faculty believe that hands-on experience is essential in preparing you to be a professional communicator. The internship is an opportunity to practice the skills you learned in your courses, develop new skills that we may not include in our curriculum, and refine your career interests, and contribute to your professional portfolio. We support substitution requests only when students have prior experience in technical/professional communication. We do not accept financial hardship or scheduling limitations as the reasons for the substitution, but we are pretty flexible in terms of what we accept for internships.

• We do not require the title “intern." Some students have found formal internships. Others have have used experience (volunteer or paid) at these types of organizations, too.
• We do not require that you work at a specific type of organization. Students have worked at for-profit, non-profit, and governmental organizations. Some students have even worked with their existing employers to take on new responsibilities related to tech writing.
• We do not require full-time work. To earn 3 credits of internship, you must work 135 hours. Some students find full-time jobs. Others find part-time jobs. Some have worked as little as 5 hours per week and gradually accrued the 135 hours they needed.
• We do not require you to complete the internship all at once. It is possible to register for one credit at a time. Each credit is 45 hours of work.
• We do require experience directly related to technical or business communication. This part is non-negotiable. To earn academic credit, you must be doing work related to your studies in the Tech Comm program. Keep a log to document the time you're working on professional communication-related tasks (as opposed to non-internship tasks like answering phones, processing billing orders, etc.)

Students are responsible for finding their own internships. Need help with your job search? Contact the Career Development Center. Even though the jobs they list are usually around Mankato, the website has lots of great resources, and you can also schedule a one-on-one consultation for help with resumes, cover letters, interviews, and job search strategies. http://www.mnsu.edu/cdc/

Once you find an internship experience, pick an advisor to help you register. The internship advisor will be a subject matter expert who can answer questions or point you to resources related to the theory and practice of technical communication. You will also need a supervisor at work who can answer questions and point you to resources that will allow you to do the job.

Submit an internship contract to get permission to register for ENG 498 (undergrad students) or ENG 698 (grad students).

Submit a reflection narrative, a timesheet or journal of your work, and an employer evaluation to close out the internship and receive credit on your transcript.

The forms for the documents are available at http://english.mnsu.edu/techcomm/faq.html

Do you think that you have enough experience to substitute an elective for the internship? Write a petition that describes your reason for requesting the substitution, your professional experience and career goals, and how an additional elective will help you achieve them. (Do not identify a specific course.) Attach a copy of your resume and send it to me. I will forward your petition to the faculty for a vote, and if the request is supported, we will recommend it to the department chairperson for approval.