ENG 491: Internship
Course Description:
Practical experience in appropriate work position at an approved site, correlated with directed study assignments, during either fall or winter semester. In the semester prior to enrollment, the student will plan the internship in conjunction with the Internship Coordinator and with the approval of the department chair. Students are required to email the Internship Coordinator every week during the semester they intern, and also to turn in a final paper, due the Friday of the last week of classes. May be repeated once in a different setting for elective credit only.
Prerequisites: 16 credits in English, of which at least 8 must be at the 300-400 level, and permission of the instructor and the department chair. NOTE: Does NOT count as a 400-level seminar, required by all majors as the capstone course for their degree.
Students who are interested or have further question about internships should contact:
General information
Internships offer students valuable skills and work experience, and make these skills compatible with the English Department program of study. Most students enjoy and learn from their internship experience; they also find that in this economic market, the experience they gain from interning gives them an edge that can make a difference when they are up against stiff competition for jobs. For more information on the financial benefits of doing an internship, please see Straight Talk on Internships, Financing, and Careers
(download PDF).
Internships for credit are available during fall and winter semesters. Students should apply for an internship for any particular semester at least one-to-two months before that semester begins. Students are free to make their own arrangements to intern with an organization or a business not on the PDF list, but they still must fill out the paperwork in the semester before the anticipated internship in order to receive credit. In addition to filling out the forms (which are also available on the door of 542 O'Dowd and in 544 O'Dowd, the English Department main office, as well as PDF files), students must register for the course. Do so by contacting Annie Gilson. Please provide her with an unofficial copy of your transcript pasted into an email, as well as the names of two OU English professors with whom you have studied.
Students’ Responsibilities During Internship
You are required to perform the duties included in your internship job description (if these aren’t perfectly clear to you, it is your responsibility to ask your faculty and on-site sponsors for clarification.) Aside from faithfully reporting for work and performing your duties, you have other responsibilities during the internship period as well. Though you will be working at the site of the business or non-profit you are interning with, you are required to maintain contact with your faculty sponsor. This consists of sending weekly emails that describe in a detailed summary the work you’ve done that week and confirm your presence at the internship site. Weekly reports are required of every intern, even if the work the intern is doing does not change substantially. Please note that this enables the English Department to ensure that you are doing the work you agreed to do. The emails provide a record that will help you when it is time to write your paper; the faithful execution of this duty will be figured in to your final grade.
Final Paper for Internship
Each student must also produce as a final summarizing exercise a paper that describes his or her experiences as an intern. This paper will focus on exploring the ways in which the skills that the student developed in English classes were utilized in the internship.
Please feel free to talk at length about the expectations you had going in to the internship, and the ways in which these expectations were or were not met. Discuss the ways in which you felt your work as an English major prepared you for your work in the “real” world, and the ways in which you found yourself having to adjust or modify the skills you learned in classes to apply them to the tasks you performed in your working environment. Please also talk at length about the work itself, the analytical and research tasks you were asked to perform, and even the interpersonal dynamics or challenges you were confronted with. In other words, this paper needs to be a comprehensive analysis of your work experience, and needs to detail the ways in which the internship helped you to make the transition from the realm of school (the realm of preparation), to the realm of work (the realm of application).
The paper is due at the end of the semester (by the beginning of the exam period) and should be 10 - 15 pages in length, double-spaced, proof-read, etc. Please be aware that the paper will go into a permanent file on internships; this means that your work will be available to students, professors, and administrators to read, and will aid us in assessing the effectiveness of the intern program generally, as well as your particular internship.
For a list of internships set up by the English Department,
click here:
Opportunities include:
- Non-profits
- Publishing
- Corporations and Businesses
- Media
- Education
For students interested in working for the federal government, OU is partnering with a new federal program, entitled "Call to Serve." Information can be found on
makingthedifference.org. Students should also contact the Career Center, which has more detailed information on the Call to Serve program, opportunities it offers, and application procedures