Results for Résumés : Managing Undergraduate Library Interns

The academic library can play a crucial role in experiential learning for undergraduate students. In 2011, librarians at the University of Dayton built on the idea of student workers and partnered with the University Honors Program to offer customized experiential learning through paid internships. Librarians work one-on-one with students from a variety of disciplines. With experiences tailored to student interests, the library setting becomes a real world laboratory for skills training within the undergraduates’ disciplines or career interests. This article will describe the variety of experiences offered, resources needed, and ways of measuring and assessing for an effective internship program. The authors will articulate how library internships can offer necessary skills for careers outside the library world.


Introduction
Library internships can help develop research skills needed in students' academic careers, while also facilitating career aspirations for students.The practical experience of a library internship appeals to students unsure about how their chosen majors can serve them post-graduation.Much of the literature describes how library internships are focused on students planning for a career in fields related to librarianship or archives.This article will describe how undergraduate internships at University of Dayton Libraries are not limited to undergraduates with such post-graduation plans.This article will demonstrate how the University of Dayton Libraries has successfully provided valuable real-world experiences within the library environment while also addressing the needs of the library.
The University of Dayton is a top-tier, private Catholic University, founded by the Society of Mary (the Marianists) in 1850 with a full-time enrollment of over 7,400 undergraduate students and more than 3,000 graduate and law students.The Libraries has 32 staff members and 21 faculty librarians.The structure is team-based with one team for each of the following areas: marketing and outreach, research, instruction, access services, digital projects, website and religious collections.In addition to university archives and rare books, the U.S. Catholic Special Collection, which preserves records of the Catholic Church and Catholic life in the United States, is part of the Libraries.
The University of Dayton Libraries is one of the campus' larger units employing student workers.Employees spend many hours training students to handle questions at service desks, assist with cataloging functions, help digitize materials, and a variety of other tasks.Student employees are typically assigned to day-to-day tasks and are employed for multiple semesters.Recently, librarians at the University of Dayton built on that idea of student workers to create new positions with project-based responsibilities.Librarians partnered with the University Honors Program to offer customized experiential learning opportunities through paid, semester-long internships.
The University of Dayton Honors Program was founded in 1978 and represents all units of the University: the College of Arts and Sciences, School of Business Administration, School of Education and Allied Professions, and School of Engineering.The University of Dayton Honors Program, with its heavy concentration of academically-minded students, places a strong emphasis on research.Students must complete a minimum number of Honors courses and maintain a certain GPA; many also write an undergraduate thesis.To the director of the program, the library was a natural fit for internship placements.
Internships reserved for honors students are also a recruiting tool for the program, and are publicized on their website for prospective students.Incoming honors students have expressed concern about how their academic major, undergraduate work experience and career opportunities interconnect.Related to these student concerns, there is a growing expectation from parents, employers and the government for colleges and universities to play a more active role in job preparation.Libraries and other academic units have strong potential to address these concerns through internships.Additionally, internship experiences are seen as high impact educational practices.

Literature Review
The literature on student internships in academic libraries mainly focuses on students with an interest in libraries or graduate students doing LIS coursework.Maxey-Harris, Cross, and McFarland found that many professional library staff receive their introduction to libraries as student workers, and the student worker pool is an outreach opportunity for cultivating future librarians.Their paper, however, focused on student employees doing traditional work for their position, primarily shelving, circulation and other routine tasks, and also focused on creating future librarians, not preparing undergraduates for a variety of careers. 1 Much of the literature on library internships for students in MLS programs concludes that internships provide invaluable career preparation not available through traditional coursework. 2 In her article on undergraduate internships in academic libraries, Candice Dahl does address the potential benefits of internships for non-LIS students, but the project she describes was designed solely for English majors, and focuses solely on career preparation and not the broader educational impacts that an internship can have. 3In a later article, Dahl describes the role of a librarian supervisor to non-LIS interns.Dahl suggests flexibility in project selection and timeline for completion for the intern experience to benefit the student in addition to more guidance about library work. 4ternships fit into a newer demand of academic libraries to demonstrate high-impact educational practices.The Association of American Colleges and Universities defines these as practices that engage students in the application of classroom learning to complex problems and projects, which results in greater academic achievement. 5nternships are one of ten specific high-impact educational practices that the AACU identifies, along with first-year seminars and experiences, common intellectual experiences (core curriculums), learning communities, writing intensive courses, collaborative assignments and projects, undergraduate research, diversity and global learning, service learning, and capstone projects. 6These practices increase students' engagement, leading to higher rates of retention and student learning.
In their publication on high-impact educational practices, the Association of American Colleges and Universities argues that an internship experience "deepens learning and brings one's values and beliefs into awareness...as a result, students better understand themselves in relation to others and the larger world, and they acquire the intellectual tools and ethical grounding to act with confidence for the betterment of the human condition." 7This type of practice aligns well with a rising trend in higher education to provide experiential learning, generally known as education through personal experience.In their article on academic libraries and experiential learning, York, Groves & Black write that it can add to the traditional college experience by providing venues to observe, conceptualize, apply knowledge and experiment. 8This includes experiences through co-or extra-curricular opportunities like internships, study abroad programs, field experiences and service work.The examples provided pertain to the library acting as partner or host to various class projects and not as the work of individual interns.
Internships facilitated by campus departments can also address pressures felt by higher education institutions to provide co-curricular, skill-building internships.A key finding in The Chronicle of Higher Education's 2012 "Employers Survey" found that employers place more weight on applicable college internship or job experience than academic credentials such as GPA and major. 9Students look for opportunities available to them to be competitive in the job market.Stein writes that colleges and universities need to respond to changing student values and expectations, which increasingly includes providing internships and practical experience that can jumpstart a secure path to employment. 10 The undergraduate internship opportunities discussed in this article are examples of experiential learning using the library as the real-world environment for exploration.Practical experiences through project-based library internships provide a deeper understanding of what the student interns have learned in the classroom.

Student Experiences
The University of Dayton Libraries offers three internships annually.The internship positions are posted on the university job website and include criteria that screen for Honors students.Students go through a standard application process, including an interview.Interns are typically hired at the beginning of the fall semester, work 100 hours and may stretch their time over the course of one semester or two.Internship experiences have been offered in Marketing and Events, Research and Instruction and U.S. Catholic Special Collections.A combination of department needs, librarian interest and student opportunity determines which areas will offer internship experiences.
One librarian supervises each intern.The Marketing and Events intern is supervised by the Communications and Outreach Librarian and typically helps produce marketing materials, helps plan for library advocacy theme weeks and provides content for the library's social media accounts.The Coordinator of Research and Instruction has supervised the Research and Instruction intern work, which has included reference shifts, collection development, creation of learning objects, and data analysis.The Archivist and Collections Librarian for the U.S. Catholic Special Collection has overseen an intern's creation of an exhibit of the collection's vintage prayer cards, processing of archival items and investigating online exhibit software.
The internships are designed to help the students prepare for graduate school or career, and as such, the positions are open to all majors.Students have come from majors such as entrepreneurship, accounting, women's studies/English, psychology, peace studies/business, and history.Projects are defined by the librarian supervisor after an initial conversation about the student's interests, experiences, skills, and future plans.Some projects are similar to previous internship cycles but the majority focuses on new initiatives and needs by the host library department.Links to examples of projects can be found in Appendix A.

Research and Instruction Internship
The Research and Instruction internship description lays out a variety of projects, which include staffing the library information desk, observing and assisting with library instruction sessions, developing online resource guides, and making recommendations for library purchases.These tasks are intended to help develop student research skills while providing the library with necessary help.With the exception of the required weekly information desk shift, the projects are driven by student interest and agreed upon mutually by the intern and librarian.
One project that has been successful several times over is tasking student interns with the creation of library webpages, such as a poetry page, using the Springshare (LibGuides) platform.The poetry page was created by an intern interested in building a literature-related page.The interns are excited by the challenge of locating resources on a topic of personal interest as well as constructing a tangible product that can be listed on a resume or portfolio.Besides developing familiarity with discipline-specific sources, students also learn about basic web authoring software and writing.Not every intern created a LibGuide page, however; this year's intern created a PsycINFO screencast using Screencast-o-matic software.One unintended consequence has been to extend the effort to a library student employee who has plans to attend library school.He has created research guides for two of his classes.
Another project enthusiastically received is the opportunity to help the library's leisure reading collection.All of the Research and Instruction interns are asked to conduct a small collection development project where they articulate a theme, include book descriptions and supply relevant book ordering information.This project offers experience evaluating book titles, while giving rationales for purchasing decisions.All of the Research and Instruction interns have gravitated towards fiction, selecting titles that relate to magical realism, the chick lit genre, and most recently, psychological thrillers.The imaginary budget they are given is small, roughly $200, and the lists run about 10-20 books.The library actually purchased most of the titles from the last intern's collection development project.As a follow-up assignment, the intern wrote a book review about one of the purchases for the library's blog.
In addition to these experiences, the Research and Instruction interns also work on projects that have a direct relationship with their major or course of study.For example, one intern conducted an in-depth analysis of the psychology faculty research publications.This project not only helped the psychology librarian understand the research habits of the faculty he supports, but it also helped the intern, who was a senior and applying to graduate programs in psychology.The multi-faceted project started as an inventory of faculty publications.She then identified library access to the titles, created a list of subject headings and finished up by using Web of Science and Scopus to analyze the journal impact factors.She compiled the data and provided analysis using spreadsheet software and Wordle.The project culminated in a presentation to the psychology librarian and a psychology faculty member.
The most recent Research and Instruction intern also completed several projects that were tailored to her disciplinary interests.This intern, also a senior majoring in psychology, expressed an interest in usability studies.She was assigned to a library team reviewing the layout of the library course guides and helped conduct usability surveys with undergraduates.She also played a valuable role in analyzing the University of Dayton's writing center's logs of student-to-student writing consultations.This project was set up in response to an upcoming service integration of the writing center and reference services.After transcribing the contents of the writing logs, she then utilized spreadsheet software to analyze who sought help at the writing center, how long consultations took and what kinds of help students were seeking.The results were then shared with the library administration and the writing center staff.This data has proven key to the library's understanding of the functions and services provided by the writing center and highlighted areas of overlap.
Student interns can play an active and important role within reference and instruction.It is fairly easy to assign work related to LibGuides and other instruction support, reference shifts, small collection development projects, as well as in-depth analytical projects that require data entry and excel skills.Interns gain writing, analytical, presentation, and project management skills, plus a greater familiarity with disciplinespecific resources.

U.S. Catholic Special Collections Internship
The U.S. Catholic Special Collections internship description lists such potential responsibilities as assisting patrons in the Special Collections reading room, photocopying materials in response to reference requests, creating metadata for digital collections, and contributing to the library's social media accounts.In addition, the intern is expected to write biweekly entries for the library's blog and produce a written narrative of his or her experience at the conclusion of the internship.Beyond these routine duties, a major project was selected for each intern based on the student's interests.
The first intern, a peace studies and business double major, curated an exhibit of holy cards and other ephemera from the library's special collections.The student selected the items to display, performed background research to provide didactic context and designed an exhibit which was featured in our gallery cases.Because of her major in peace studies, the student intern chose to focus the exhibit on ephemera related to social justice issues.A photograph of her exhibit was featured in the honors program newsletter, which helped promote our internship program.
The second Special Collections intern, a history major, is interested in pursuing a career in public history, and has a strong interest in digital humanities.For her major project she researched available online exhibit platforms, compiling information about their features, opportunities for customization and usability.She then used material from special collections to create demonstrative exhibits using four different platforms.The intern presented her findings to members of the library's Digital Projects Team, Web Team and administrators.Based on the intern's presentation, one platform was chosen for future library online exhibits, and at the conclusion of her internship she was hired to create an online companion to a significant library exhibit.
These student interns assisted with the day-to-day operations in Special Collections and also made major contributions to the library through their exhibits and presentations.Outreach through physical and online exhibits is a popular approach to publicizing special collections holdings that requires a large investment of time.As library staff often lack the time to work on these kinds of projects, the contribution of student interns was invaluable.Their work not only benefited the library; it also developed the students' skills in the areas of research, critical thinking, oral presentations, design, and writing.

Marketing and Events Internship
The Marketing and Events internship description lists possible responsibilities as producing marketing materials, managing social media and other web applications and assisting with exhibits and related programs.The intern also becomes a member of the Libraries' interdepartmental Marketing and Outreach Team and is expected to attend meetings.Student applicants must have a strong interest in two or more of the following: event planning, project management, new media, marketing, social media, graphic design or photography.This requirement ensures that at least two ongoing needs for the library will be met.Projects vary for each student, depending on their interests, career aspirations or skill set.One intern was an entrepreneurship major and the other majored in finance and accounting.
A project that is ongoing for the internship is assisting with social media account management.The Libraries use the building name, Roesch Library, as its social media handle.Roesch Library is active on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.The intern is responsible for developing at least one content item for social media per week, which could also be a post on the Libraries' official blog.Additionally, the intern is asked to track mentions of Roesch Library on Twitter using a Google spreadsheet.The finance and accounting major used her expertise with spreadsheets to find patterns within the social media data, tracked since 2011.Her analysis provided insight to trends of the library's social media interactions such as peak times of mentions and the ratio of positive to negative comments.
The entrepreneurship major was interested in gaining experience with starting accounts and increasing followers.She started our Instagram and Pinterest accounts and maintained both channels collaboratively with the librarian supervisor.She also planned an Instagram contest for the State Library of Ohio's Snapshot Day, with the intent to increase followers and also increase student participation on Instagram within the library.The supervisor continues to apply Instagram strategies used by the intern.
Another social media channel that saw a boost from intern involvement was YouTube.One intern was tasked with creating promotional videos for the Libraries.She used the easy-to-use movie trailer function within Apple's iMovie software and a Flip video camera to create short and humorous videos which were uploaded to the Roesch Library playlist on the university's YouTube account.One video featured a group of students meeting and working at the library's Tech Table, a table with a large screen monitor and plug-ins for laptops.The second video addressed the noise levels for each library floor, showcasing the different types of study spaces available within the building.The video projects allowed the intern to experiment with technology that she had previously not used and also built upon storytelling and project management skills.Each video shows a student's perspective of the library by highlighting aspects that are important to a student and her peers.
Student interns can also play a creative role in developing and executing library theme month activities, such as promotion and events for Banned Books Week.By using signage and programming the Banned Books Week goals of educating the campus about censorship and raising awareness about books challenges were realized.Both interns planned unique and engaging activities.One posted photos on the library's Instagram account, featuring students holding Banned Books with captions that described when, where and why the book was banned or challenged.Another intern designed a bulletin board display that invited people to write their names on small tags that read "I Read Banned Books."Then, participants posted their tag next to their favorite challenged book.At the end of the week, one tag was randomly selected and the winner received a university bookstore gift certificate.Planning for Open Access Week and National Library Week were also part of internship activities.Delegating library theme month activities to interns invites them to research an advocacy issue and develop a creative strategy to engage the campus community.
Regardless of major, students looking for experience in marketing end this library internship with tangible results.Students in the marketing and events internship position build upon skills such as writing, program planning, creative thinking and content creation and analysis strategies for social media.Project parameters that have the student work individually at times and collaboratively for other assignments also add to the experience and benefit the students.

Assessment and Feedback
The three internships at University of Dayton Libraries show how the librarians collaborate with students to produce results, benefitting the students and the library.In addition to the tangible results of the internships, such as a LibGuide, exhibit or promotional video, other assessment and evaluation was needed as supporting evidence to continue the internship program.
Librarians used several methods to gather feedback and assess student work during and after each experience.Students wrote project memos, end of semester reports to supervisors, blog pieces, and in some cases, the supervisor also wrote an evaluation.Each librarian supervisor was responsible for submitting a portfolio of student work to the Dean of the Libraries and the Honors Program Director.In the past, interns were also asked to complete an online evaluation form (Appendix B) that included questions about their favorite activity, suggestions for the supervisor, and what the intern learned about academic libraries in general.Although the evaluations yielded great insight, their use dropped off as the project memos and end of semester reports grew more detailed.
Intern feedback has been very positive.Within the written semester-end reports, many students reflected on their favorite aspects of the experience.The Marketing and Events intern wrote, "I really enjoyed working on the videos because I was able to use a great deal of my own creativity.It made me realize how much I miss using my creative side during the school year."Because each internship project is tailored to a student's interests and career goals, they often feel a stronger connection to their work.One Special Collections intern wrote in her reflection: "My semester in the USCSC has been more than just a job for me.It's been a way to gain experience in a field I'd like to spend the rest of my life in." These experiences are clearly valuable for both the supervisors and interns, even after the internship ends.Supervisors have maintained contact with most of the interns, even after graduation, whether it is to write letters of recommendation, serve as a reference, or just to find out how they are doing.For example, both Marketing and Events interns have reported that the Twitter analysis, content creation and tracking responsibilities gave them real-world projects that demonstrated proficiency using social media.Partly because of this experience, one intern received a co-op offer from a local company and another completed a social media internship out of state.The social media responsibilities, particularly the Twitter tracking and analysis, gave both interns advantages for internship, co-op and job opportunities.One of the Research and Instruction interns now attends graduate school, where the research skills she acquired during the internship have been beneficial.She noted, "The library internship made the transition to grad school a lot easier.I was able to find articles for class without a problem while some of my classmates were struggling with the databases.I was able to be more independent when preparing for class and if I did have any trouble researching something I could eventually find it on my own." The Honors Program has some assessment criteria, but it remains vague.In the short term, the Honors Program judges internship success by how happy the library is with the student work.Longer term, however, the Honors Program would evaluate the success of the internship program by the extent to which the experiences are seen as an important credential for graduate school or a job.
Interns and supervisors alike appreciate seeing tangible results.During this past cycle of internships, librarian supervisors used the new library blog as a venue for interns to write about their projects, a library resource or a particular library initiative.The Marketing and Events Intern, for example, wrote blog posts about the theme weeks such as Banned Books Week and Open Access Week.Within her reflection she wrote: "The most rewarding part of my internship with Roesch Library was seeing the tangible results of my work.My blog posts were published on Roesch Library's website, where potentially hundreds of people could view them.I love to write, so the blogs let me do something I enjoy while further developing my writing skills."This intern later won the Libraries' Brother Frank Ruhlman, S.M., Award of Excellence for Literary Achievement, which provides a scholarship to a UD undergraduate who demonstrates excellence in writing that has been published in University publications.Some interns presented their projects at the end of the semester to administration, library staff and other stakeholders.The Research and Instruction intern presented her findings about the writing center to three different audiences.Attendees included both library and writing center administration, library staff and the writing center student consultants.The second Special Collections intern also presented her research on online exhibit platforms to the library administration, web team and digital projects team.

Resources Needed
The University of Dayton Libraries' experiences with Honors interns have been very positive for all.Working closely with these interns has been very productive, and the supervisors are careful to document and review each intern's progress.In order to replicate this kind of program, several factors and resources must be in place in order to be successful.
Before starting an internship program it was important for the Libraries to consider the resources needed, particularly which area had the most need and who was available to supervise.The commitment from library staff to supervise interns was critical.As with any supervisory position, training and managing employees takes time and effort, and even more so with undergraduate students who are completely new to the field.The interns were hired with no direct library experience, although they had some degree of library research skills as their coursework demanded.These internships involved training, ongoing communication and feedback, plus time management for both the supervisor and the intern.
Another consideration for an internship program is workspace.In many cases the intern needed to work closely with the supervisor, such as the Special Collections intern who worked with archival materials that could only be used within the Special Collections reading room or processing area.The Research and Instruction intern was also based in the library, and a workspace was created in the reference area.However, the Marketing and Events internship typically includes writing and social media projects that can be done outside of library space.In this situation, communication and scheduling was facilitated with Google Drive.
Library administration support was likewise vital in hosting an internship program.Supervising an intern and managing intern projects requires time and attention, usually in addition to normal job responsibilities.It was critical to at least secure supervisor support before assuming such responsibilities.Team members assisted with intern training, when possible.For example, the Research and Instruction intern has worked closely with other team members on specific tasks and service desk training.Library administration also directed project opportunities; for example, the Marketing and Events intern created the short promotional videos at the behest of the Libraries Dean.Tangible results of the internship were shared with library administration, such as the final reports or presentations mentioned above.
Finally, funding for the internship program was a major consideration.At the University of Dayton Libraries, the University Honors Program generously supports the internship program by subsidizing the $10 per hour wage, for up to 100 hours per internship position.The fact that these experiences are funded by another campus unit is unique and may be hard to replicate.However, there are other funding opportunities to consider.Perhaps the library student worker budget might have sufficient monies to create an internship or perhaps there is an opening for credit-based internships via academic departments.Another option would be designating additional responsibilities to experienced students, which is the current model in the Libraries' access services department.The University of Dayton Libraries internships have not been limited to students with plans for a library career.By demonstrating the value of library internship experiences, libraries could be well-positioned to advocate for an endowment to cover the costs of future internships.Libraries could also consider grant funding for specific programs; for example, a campus-driven library initiative could include internships in the funding requirements needed to implement the initiative.

Benefits
Some of the benefits to the library are obvious.Since the Honors Program funds the internship experiences, the library realizes more productivity with fewer direct costs.The interns are highly motivated.Not only are they curious and eager to work, but they can also work independently on more complex tasks than are usually assigned to student workers.The projects are not busywork or simple tasks, as the work done is meaningful and valuable to the library.In comparison to student workers, who assist with the day-to-day functioning of the library, interns work for one semester and work on unique and often time-sensitive projects.
Indirectly, the internships enhanced our partnership with the Honors Program.As two units that strongly support scholarship, the library provides additional benefits and customized research help for Honors students.This internship program was another indicator of the value the Honors program has seen in our work.These internships also serve as recruiting tools for the Honors Program, which publicizes the opportunities on their website for prospective students.
Library administration also sees the benefits.The Libraries Dean stated, "The honors internship program provides benefits in both directions.The students have an opportunity to help with research or get real world work experience and the Libraries' benefit from their perspective and talents."Communicating internship project results to administration has ensured understanding of the positive benefits to students, librarians and the Libraries.
Additionally, the program is a resume building and training experience for librarians.Entry-level librarians have the chance to gain supervisory and managerial experience, an aspect often missing in starting positions, but which is often a prerequisite for jobs in the next stage of a librarian's career.Within the University community, these experiences can be shared as examples of directed student learning, language that teaching faculty may better understand, and help articulate our value to campus.
The student interns are also great library ambassadors.Just as our student employees have a clearer understanding of the library's role on campus, so too, do these student interns.Intern contributions to the library are discrete and often more obvious.They manage parts of our social media, organize displays, make book recommendations, help conduct usability studies, and more.As library ambassadors, they are able to effectively market the library to their peers.
Finally, the University of Dayton implemented a new curriculum in 2013, the Common Academic Program (CAP).The courses within this curriculum focus on grounding students' educational experiences within seven learning outcomes; including scholarship, practical wisdom and vocation.CAP recognizes that learning happens outside the classroom and is working to document co-curricular experiences that meet the new learning outcomes as well.Traditionally, the library has always supported scholarship, but the library can now help meet the practical wisdom and vocational outcomes, thanks to these internships.

Future Goals and Conclusion
The library intern supervisors have identified several short-and long-term goals for the internship program.In the short term, some administrative tasks need better coordination, particularly as the internship program becomes established and shared among more library departments.For instance, the internships are assessed through written end-of-semester reports from the student; however, there is no consistent use of a common prompt or evaluation form used by all of the internship supervisors at this time.The intern supervisors have standardized some of the common practices, like hiring and student work hours, but the supervisors are also planning to review their own procedures and identify other tasks and procedures that are common to all.This framework could easily be transformed into a training manual or toolkit for new intern supervisors.Another short term goal includes documenting the co-curricular impact of these internships, especially as the University moves toward officially recognizing the value of such experiences within the new curriculum.
There is also more opportunity to involve the respective academic departments of the interns.Since the internship is funded by the Honors Program and does not count for any credit hours, most of the focus has been between the library and the Honors Program, with involvement by a faculty member only sporadically.There is potential to involve the departments on a larger scale, whether by more information sharing, more faculty invitations to intern presentations or department feedback on the internship quality.
The Honors Program director has expressed hope that the internship experience would facilitate or supplement a student's thesis topic, a goal recently realized by a U.S. Catholic Special Collections intern.Inspired by her library presentation, the intern will be expanding her research into a thesis during the coming academic year, with the librarian internship supervisor also supervising her thesis.In the future, supervisors and the University Honors Program director would like to see interns and supervisors collaborate on writing for publication.The Research and Instruction internship has included a presentation component to relevant campus stakeholders, but the next challenge is to take such work to a larger audience.

The internship program collaboration between the University Honors Program and
Libraries provides opportunities and benefits to all involved.Students work on projects customized to their interests and goals and finish the experience with tangible results.They also leave with better research skills and a deeper understanding of library services.Several interns report that the internship experience proved invaluable in securing job interviews or graduate school preparation.Librarian supervisors receive assistance with projects and gain a student's perspective on library initiatives.
A formal internship program offers cross-campus collaboration opportunities, management experience for librarians, and skills training for undergraduate students.The word internship on a resume signals to prospective employers that the student has spent a discrete block of time learning new skills and completing projects.Experienced library student workers may be able to likewise complete special projects, but they are potentially constrained by library student worker budgets.Student workers are needed for traditional library tasks, like staffing a circulation or information desk, shelving books or copy cataloging records.Many of these tasks are desk-bound and have specific scheduling needs.Internships or special projects often need mobility and flexibility, which run counter to those traditional library service needs.Creating special projects for experienced library student workers helps both the library and the students, but an internship can yield even greater benefits across campus and into a student's future.
Internships that consider all undergraduate students, with or without an interest in libraries or archives, allow the library to serve as a real world laboratory.Through these internships the students experience project management, committee membership and presenting project results, all skills needed in many of today's work environments.In offering the internships to a variety of majors, the library benefits from a diversity of undergraduate skills and becomes an integral component of experiential learning right on campus.With the right kind of planning and ingenuity, library administrators elsewhere may be able to capitalize on their campus connections to implement a similar program at their library and experience the same kind of energy and contributions that these motivated students have produced at the University of Dayton Libraries.
Katy Kelly (kkelly2@udayton.edu) is Communications and Outreach Librarian at the University of Dayton Libraries.Colleen Hoelscher (choelscher1@udayton.edu) is Archivist and Collections Librarian at the University of Dayton Libraries.Heidi Gauder (hgauder1@udayton.edu) is the Coordinator of Research and Instruction at the University of Dayton Libraries.