Dec. 11. 1991
The Lance • St. Andrews Presbyterian College
Page 7
Internships
Endless Internship Opportunities Available at St. Andrews
“This year is one of the worst
years since World War II to get
a job,” is an often heard phrase
in the media today. The de
pressing facts are that you have
to know someone to get a good
job, you have to have connec
tions. Even if you have some
strings available to pull you
need some experience, but how
can you get experience if no
one is hiring? This turns into a
vicious circle that has no end.
The main way students place
a foot in the door of their fu
ture is by utilizing the intern
ship program, headed yb
Corinne Nicholson, provides
opportunities for interns to
expand their awareness of the
world beyond ca pus. The stu
dent involved in the program
will be able to explore poten
tial careers, gain experience in
maldng decisions and problem
solving and develop self-reli-
ance and a code of values.
Whether or not the intern
winds up using his or her expe
rience towards a career, the
knowledge gained is inevita
bly priceless.
An academic internship is a
form of supervised indepen
dent study with field-work
experience. Internship place
ments are available through
almost every department in Ae
College. They may be arranged
with a wide variety of business,
political and community orga
nizations. In cooperation with*
a faculty sponsor and work site
supervisor, students design the
academic component of their
internships to enhance their
on-the-job experiences.
Students normally must
have a 3.0 cumulative grade
point average, be in good aca
demic standing and have the
recommendation of the fac
ulty sponsor to be eligible for
an internship. Some depart
ments may have addition re
quirements. All internships
must be approved by the
worksite supervisor, the aca
demic department and division
granting credit, and the intern
ship director.
A student may register for
an approved internship in any
term. During the one-month
winter term, an intern works
fiall time and registers only for
the internship. During fall,
spring and summer terms, a
student may work part time as
an intern while taking other
courses at St. Andrews. Full
time internships are also
available through some depart
ments during fall, spring and
summer terms.
Internship placements can
be arranged locally or in other
regions of the country. Recent
interns have worked in North
and South Carolina, Florida,
Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana,
Texas, Arizona, Iowa, Indiana,
Hawaii, Kentucky, Virginia,
Maryland, Delaware, New Jer
sey, New York, Washington
D.C. and Canada.
Student interns earn aca
demic credit in the department
which sponsors the internship
(e.g. History, Business/Eco
nomics, Art, Religion,
Communications, English,,
Psychology, Biology, etc.). De
pending upon the length and
namre of the internship, stu
dents may earn 1-12 lower or
upper level internship credits
during the fall, spring or sum
mer term. Winter term intern
ships are generally awarded
three credits. Each department
determines whether internship
credits will met major or elec
tive requirements.
Internship applications may
be obtained from die intern
ship director or coordinator.
The internship director will
help qualified smdents locate a
faculty sponsor who will work
with the student to locate and
internship placement suitable
for his/her goals and level of
preparation. Students are en
couraged to take an active role
in locating their internship
placements. The completed
application must be approved
by the worksite supervisor, the
faculty sponsor, the depart
ment and division granting
credit and the internship direc
tor before a student may regis
ter for or begin work in an
internship. Deadlines for in
ternship applications arc an
nounced each academic year
and may be obtained form the
internship director. All depart
ments and majors at St.
Andrews may sponsor intern
ships for qualified students.
For more information con
tact Dr. Martha Knight, Di
rector of St. Andrews’
Academic Internship program,
or Corinne Nicholson, Intern
ship Coordinator.
lEditor’sNote: Infbrmatim
in this article in a combination/
compilation of the article, ‘^In
ternships Open a Door to the
Future,” by previous Assistant
Editor Sharon Frain from the
May 9,1991 issue of The Lance,
and information supplied to ITje
Lance by Corinne Nicholson, In
ternship Coordinator.]
Whitehead Interns With Rockwell International and Scotland Memorial
Adam Whitehead
Special to The Lance
“So, what experience have
you had.>” I had worked in
London for a year prior to
enrolling in St. Andrews, and
at times had held two jobs.
However, my resume still
looked rather thin. I needed to
gain experience in an area that
interested me in terms of a
possible career with a com
pany that would add credibil
ity to this experience. I have
since spent a month with the
Scodand Memorial Hospital,
eight months with Rockwell
International, and three
months with The Lance. (Yes,
The Lance carries as much cred
ibility as Rockwell!).
Scodand Memorial Hospi
tal provided my first in-depth
experience with Lotus 1-2-3 in
a business setting. The time-
saving capabilities and power
of its different fiinctions be
came more important as they
enhanced my productivity and
were directly related to my
performance. Working at the
hospital exposed me to the type
of reports that are used by up-
per-level management to as-
marize statistics from each de
partment. It was to provide an
accurate summation of the cur
rent month’s productivity and
compare it to the prior months
and the budget. I found it to be
quite a challenging and enjoy
able experience. Unfortunately
though, due to changes in man
agement, I was unable to com
plete the project.
Rockwell International is an
extremely large company with
interests from aerospace (they
built part of the shuttie) and
defense to truck components.
The Laurinburg plant is con
cerned only with manufactur
ing transmissions and has no
connection with the aerospace
section.
Although Rockwell Inter
national and Scodand Memo
rial Hospital have such different
interests, the accounting and
finance sections were similar.
Once again, Lotus 1-2-3 played
an extremely important part in
my work. Much of my time
was spent sorting through rel
evant data to compile monthly
reports for the heads of each
department. This exposed me
to the different facets ofa manu
facturing concern and allowed
a detailed overview of how the
sess productivity, variance from
budget and facilitate planning, plant was run. All those with
Initially I had to simply locate whom I worked were patient
and enter statistics. Once I be- and encouraging, which was
came more familiar with Lotus very helpful while trying to
1-2-3 and the requirements of leam new skills,
dieir CFO I was assigned to As a business major it w^
create a report that would sum- encouraging to see what I had
Bogas and Jones Intern at l\I.A.S.A.
i:;nn. Jones novcl polyimides_ The extta to be com-
Special to The Lance trammg we both received
“ will be extremely bcneficial
Kathy Bogas and I partici- to us in graduate schwl. I
pated in a volunteer program have applied to graduate
witiiN.A.S.A. atLangleyRc- schook that have strong poly-
scarch Center in Hampton, mersciencc departments due
learned in class being used in
practice. Of course it was not
always as obvious, easy or effi
cient as the texts made it ap
pear. As this plant is still in the
“start-up” mode it was the per
fect place for an intern to see
how difficult it is to implement
the theoretical strategies. I did
enjoy watch
ing how sev
eral different
approaches
were tried
before an ac
ceptable so
lution was
reached.
The eight
months with
Rockwell
were quite
an eye-
opener out
side of the
accounting
field too. I
learned that
every job has
an element
of tedium to
it, and
should be al
lowed for.
Rather than
blaming
your job,
you have to
take this fac
tor into ac
count and
work with it.
Simply hav
ing to work from 8 a.m. to 5
p.m. was a different discipline,
especially when “punching a
clock” and punctuality is im
portant. One also learns about
the particular environment that
they prefer to work in and how
to relate to superiors.
If you have read this far I
would sincerely recommend
undertaking an internship in a
field that interests you. You
will make contacts, gain valu
able experience and definitely
enhance your employment
chances after college.
Virginia for our internships.
We worked in their Material
Science DivisionunderTerry
St. Clair. I studied the reac
tion rates of co-polyimidcs,
while K«!:hy synthesized
to my experience atN. A.S.A.
Kathy is planning to pursue
synthetic chemistry in gradu
ate school. Our research at
N.A.S.A. showed us that St.
Andrews has prepared u»
petent re-
search
scientists.
It boosted
our confi
dence in our
education.
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