Get Involved! | Internship Opportunities | Carlson Leadership & Public Service Center

Internship Opportunities

What does an intern do?
The primary focus of an internship is to provide students with practical job experience in their field of interest. Students working as interns gain skills and experience over an extended period of time (usually 3-6 months) with an hourly commitment of up to 20 hours per week. Usually, a student begins the internship with prior knowledge in a particular field (marketing, web design, accounting) but without significant applied experience.

Types of opportunities
The Carlson Center cultivates and publicizes internship opportunities in the public sector, including community-based organizations (most of which are non-profit agencies), government offices, and educational institutions.

If you're seeking internships in business or in industry (the "private sector") there are dozens of internships posted on HuskyJobs through the Career Center .

Finding out more about internship opportunities

Public Service Internship Mailing List
To receive information via email about public service internships locally, regionally, and nationally, subscribe yourself to public_service_intern.
Internship Resources
The following web resources are intended to help students begin searching effectively for internship opportunities with a public or non-profit focus. Many academic departments maintain their own listings of internships, so be sure to check with departments of interest to you.

UW Career Center Internships: A guide to help you in your search.

Office of Minority Affairs and Diversity: Internship and Research Opportunities Resource. An extensive list of internships, fellowships, and research opportunities by academic area.

Internmatch.com
InternMatch focuses on enabling nonprofits and small businesses throughout the greater Seattle area to list internship opporunities in a variety of specialization areas (accounting, art/creative design, youth services, science and health, law and government, and more).

Federal Internship Web Sites for Current Students: Click here for a PDF document with links to websites supporting federal internships.

Makingthedifference.org
Explore jobs and internships through the federal government. Federal internships provide an opportunity to gain valuable work experience but often can be difficult to locate. To help you find a great summer or school-year internship, this document lists links to the student employment pages of various agencies in the federal government.

Idealist.org:
A project of Action Without Borders, Idealist includes a searchable database of over 24,000 nonprofit and community organizations in 153 countries, thousands of volunteer opportunities in your community and around the world, a list of organizations that can help you volunteer abroad, and a Nonprofit Career Center on the Web that features hundreds of job and internship listings. Explore the idealist database to find non-profit internship opportunities!

NASPAA Internship Information
A portion of the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration webpage concerning internships. Includes useful tips and a valuable introduction to the process of searching for a public service internship. Also contains links to specific opportunities and searchable databases. Be aware that many of the specific positions are aimed at graduate students or students with specific training in public management.

WashPIRG: Washington Public Interest Research Group
Internship opportunities offered in public interest activism that protects consumers, encourages a fair, sustainable economy, and fosters responsive, democratic government.

University of Washington International Programs and Exchanges
UW-affiliated internships integrate academic credit with on-the-job experience and offer the opportunity for UW students to gain unique professional skills while working toward their degrees. Internships are available in a variety of private-sector companies, nonprofit organizations and educational institutions around the world.

University of Washington Institute for National Security Education and Research
Most of the agencies of the Intelligence Community (IC) offer summer internships for college students.

Washington State Governor's Internship Program:
Overview of the Governor's Internship program. Contains additional information about specific aspects of the program and more detailed positional information via links.

UW DEPARTMENTS OFFERING INTERNSHIP INFORMATION