How to set up your Internship
(Seattle/Puget Sound Area)
I’m glad that you are deciding to pursue an internship. In many areas, employers are solely hiring
students because the professional experience that a student has gained because of an internship, so it’s
good that you are getting on top of it now.
The first thing I want to do is explain some parameters around what an internship is designed to do. It’s
pretty much a three-tiered relationship between Faculty Internship Advisor, the Internship Site Supervisor
(someone at the company who keep track of your progress on the internship and make sure your learning
is maximized), and lastly, the Internship Coordinator here at the university, Me. Your Faculty Advisor is
already assigned to you based on your major, so look on the second page of the Internship packet to see
who your Internship Advisor is. Between the three of us, we all try to work together to ensure that you
have the best internship experience.
LOGGING ONTO HANDSHAKE
First thing you want to do is login to Handshake by going to http://ewu.joinhandshake.com, and enter
your NetID into single sign-on. If you don’t know your Net ID, go to www.accounts.ewu.edu and answer
the questions regarding your login information. You can use Handshake to make appointments with us,
manage your online portfolio, to find internship opportunities.
FIND AN INTERNSHIP SITE
Some companies may already have an internship program that you can apply to, so don’t hesitate to
contact them and ask them if they have any available. Another way is to search many of the online search
engines. You can always use our “Jobs & Internships” section within Handshake to search for
internships, but aside from that, some popular ones are: www.indeed.com, www.internships.com,
www.simplyhired.com, www.Internmatch.com, www.IMDiversity.com,
For Federal jobs/internships go to www.usajob.gov. For State Jobs go to www.careers.wa.gov.
For Seattle-based job sites, you can go to www.centralcityconcern.org, or www.campuspoint.com
To get the latest trends and hear commentary about various job experiences, a good site is
www.glassdoor.com or www.idealist.org
For a great list of non-profit organizations, you can go to the United Way of King County at
http://www.uwkc.org/, the American Red Cross at www.America.redcross.org. Also, Volunteers of
America Western Washington at www.voaww.org/.
The Puget Sound Journal of Business is a good place to get familiar with the business in your area. Go
to the “business directory” at www.bizjournals.com/seattle.
SEARCH FOR NETWORKING OPPORTUNTIES IN YOUR AREA.
80% of jobs are never uploaded to search engines, so it’s good to always to network and search for ways
to meet people in other capacities. For Seattle, a good way to find out about events is to go to Event Brite
to see their list of their upcoming events www.eventbrite.com. For Google, I usually like to type "Seattle
Conferences" and see what comes up. Adding your major can get you events related to your fields.
GENERAL EVENTS COMING UP:
Seattle Career Fair, Seattle Career Fair - June, August, and October
CREATE YOUR LINKED IN ACCOUNT
Romeal Watson, MSW, MPA
Career Services – Internship Coordinator
114 Showalter Hall • Cheney, WA 99004-2445 • 509.359.4637 • [email protected] • www.ewu.edu/careerservices
Eastern Washington University is committed to equal opportunity and affirmative action in employment.
86% of recruiters us LinkedIn to find talent, so start getting in the habit of using it. There you can create
your professional profile, and join professional groups in the “group directory.” This is a great way to
have access to professionals long after the business hours have set in. www.linkedin.com
DOING A GOOGLE SEARCH TO FIND AN INTERNSHIP
The cool thing about Google now is that you can literally type in “Counseling Internship Spokane” and it
will scan all the web pages with that direct verbiage. This is a good way to filter through many of the
websites and look for names, emails, phone numbers or anything that you can use to follow up with that
employer directly. Phone conversation is always best because you can answer many of your questions in
30 seconds that could take 30 minutes or even 3 days. They can see the determination in your voice if
you have properly practiced on what you want to say and researched the company.
Contact those companies directly and say: “Hello my name is _____ and I am a [state your major]
student at Eastern Washington University. I was calling to see who I might best talk to about an
internship at your company.”
COMPLETE AN INTERNSHIP LEARNING CONTRACT
Once you find an internship you must contact that Site Supervisor again to arrange an appointment with
them so that you can fill out the initial two pages on your Internship learning contract. You must do this
before you can start your internship. You can fill out the first page yourself, but for the second page, you
want to sit down with your site supervisor and go over the objectives of the internship. Once you do that,
you are to send me a copy of that, whether it’s scanned in an email, faxed, or mailed to me.
GET ENROLLED FOR CREDIT
You must be enrolled for credit in order to have an internship. To do that you need faculty approval to
enroll, which is why you cannot enroll online using Eaglenet? Attached is the “Special Approval
Registration Form.” Fill out this form to get enrolled for credit. You can however use Eaglenet to find
out the course numbers and write them onto the form.
(Based on an 8 to 10-week period)
1 credit = 4 hours per week = 32-40 hours per quarter
2 credits = 8 hours per week = 64-80 hours per quarter
3 credits = 12 hours per week = 96-120 hours per quarter
4 credits = 16 hours per week = 128-160 hours per quarter
5 credits = 20 hours per week = 160-200 hours per quarter
TURN IN YOUR EVALUATIONS WHEN IT IS TIME
At this point you are ready to begin your internship. Go to the company and do your tasks as assigned by
your learning contract and your site supervisor. When the midterm (4th week) period comes up, you must
schedule a meeting with your site supervisor and have them fill out the 4th week evaluation on your
progress. Once complete, have them fax, scan-email, or mail that document to me. During the final (8th
week) period, have them repeat the process using the 8th week evaluations.
GRADING
Your grade is determined by you effectively turning in your Learning contract, 4th and 8th Week
evaluations. I will make copies of the forms you send me, and send it to your Internship faculty advisor.
Your faculty advisor may have additional writing assignments for you to complete as part of your
grading, so be sure to check with them about what needs to be completed.
Romeal Watson, MSW, MPA
Career Services – Internship Coordinator
114 Showalter Hall • Cheney, WA 99004-2445 • 509.359.4637 • [email protected] • www.ewu.edu/careerservices
Eastern Washington University is committed to equal opportunity and affirmative action in employment.