Employing Humanities for Community Partners

Humanities EXCEL Fellowships help students students explore the humanities in action in a professional setting, clarify their career goals, develop a professional network, and gain relevant hands-on experience that builds their resume.

Hosting interns can provide several benefits for your organization:

• ➡️ Fresh Perspectives: Undergraduate students bring new ideas, perspectives, and insights to the organization. Along with sharing their academic expertise, they may offer innovative solutions to challenges and contribute to a dynamic and creative work environment.
• ➡️ Increased Productivity: Adding an intern on staff increases your bandwidth to accomplish more. Interns can take on specific tasks and projects, which allows full-time employees to focus on more complex or strategic responsibilities. This can particularly be beneficial for short-term or project-based work.
• ➡️ Community Engagement: Hosting interns can be seen as a way for organizations to contribute to the community by providing student learning and development opportunities. Partnership with UCSC Humanities fosters positive collaborations between the campus and community, demonstrating the value of a Humanities degree for a range of careers.
• ➡️ Mentorship: Serving as an internship supervisor is a rewarding way to develop and enhance one’s professional growth. Mentoring involves guiding, coaching, and supporting the intern, which contributes to the supervisor’s leadership capabilities.
• ➡️ Diversity and Inclusion: Hosting interns can contribute to diversity and inclusion initiatives within your organization. Bringing in interns from different backgrounds can foster a more diverse and inclusive workplace culture.
• ➡️ Brand Ambassadorship: Positive internship experiences can turn interns into brand ambassadors. Satisfied interns may share their positive experiences, contributing to a positive employer brand and making your organization more attractive to future talent.
• ➡️ Talent Pipeline: While there is no expectation of a job offer at the end of an internship, the opportunity may serve as a talent pipeline for future part-time or full-time employees. It allows your organization to identify and nurture potential candidates who align with your culture and values.

How the Humanities EXCEL Internship Program Works

Your organization works with the program coordinator to develop a paid internship opportunity for students with a major or minor in the Humanities Division. We handle the hiring, and if eligible, the internship may be funded by the Employing Humanities grant.

To qualify as a rich learning experience, internships must provide meaningful work for students to contribute to research, programming, communications, or other activities that will nurture their career-readiness skills.

• 📅 Length: 6 or 9-month internship terms
• 🕐 Hours: 10-20 hours/week
• 💰 Paid: $20/hour
• 💻 Hybrid or Remote Internships Are Possible

As community partners, mentors:

• ✅Provide intern(s) with an orientation that includes, but is not limited to, an overview of the organization's programs, policies, procedures and clients served; the service or work the student will be performing; placement expectations, including norms surrounding communication and professional conduct; specific training on tools, technology.
• ✅Provide student supervision and mentorship; meet with the student weekly for at least 30 minutes one-on-one (or 60 minutes in a group) to check-in and provide feedback.
• ✅Review the student’s learning goals for the experience.
• ✅Evaluate the student's performance at the end of the internship, and submit program feedback via survey.

Email Assistant Director of Experiential Learning Kylie Rachwalski at hum-experiential-learning@ucsc.edu with questions, or if you'd like to host interns at your organization.