Internship Information

Internship Information

Prerequisites
All Core Courses or 30 hours of coursework must be completed before enrolling in the internship. 

Students may get permission to begin their internship hours prior to registering for the course if they (1) meet the course’s prerequisites and (2) have filed an approved Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the CNCM Internship Coordinator. 

MOU Guidelines
After the internship has been approved, students need to develop a clear understanding of how they will be spending the 150 hours of work devoted to their internships. e best way to do this is for students to discuss the matter with their primary internship supervisors.  Ideally, this discussion will be an open exchange of ideas about both student and  supervisor expectations. Questions that might be considered could include: What does each expect the student to achieve during the internship period? What tasks will the student work on? Are there particular deadline dates for the completion of those tasks? 

What kind of learning about or exposure to conflict management learning activities does the student expect?  Remember that before starting the internship is the best time to avoid or clarify any misunderstandings about expectations or to negotiate any specific learning needs. 

Once a mutual set of expectations has been established, they should be written up (the student should probably offer to do this unless the supervisor prefers to prepare an initial draft), reviewed by both student and supervisor, discussed and modified as appropriate, and finally signed by both as a type of “memorandum of understanding” or contract. This document can be used by the student as a point of reference if further discussions about internship expectations are needed and by the organization to measure the student’s work and learning. 

Finally, provide the CNCM Internship Coordinator with a copy of the memorandum of understanding you have reached with your internship supervisor. 

Course Requirements
Students must spend a minimum of 150 hours attending the internship. Each student’s sponsor/supervisor must complete an Internship Evaluation form, including a certification that the student has completed the requisite 150 hours of internship. The Internship Evaluation form is available here: Internship Evaluation Form. Students should keep a journal or diary on every time period spent at the internship—recording the time they have spent and what they have done, learned, or thoughts while devoting time at this venue. The journal is mostly kept as a reminder of their reflections so that they have them when they write the reflective paper described below, but it also has to be turned in with the Internship Paper to indicate the time spent on internship activities. Unless students make regular, timely and thoughtful journal entries, it will be exponentially more difficult for them to write an evaluative and incisive paper. 

The final product of the internship is a reflective paper on the internship experience, length 10 to 15 pages or 3,000 to 5,000 words. This paper should address the following questions, at a minimum, but may also include any additional reflections the student wishes to offer: 

1) Describe your goals and expectations with regard to this internship. How did you establish these goals and expectations? Did you meet your goals? Modify them? If so, why? 

2) Describe five significant people with whom you had contact during the internship and their roles in relation to your internship. Interview each of these people and get feedback from them with regard to how they think your internship fits into the field of conflict management. What are their attitudes and beliefs concerning the value and practice of conflict management? 

3) What kind of internal conflict management system, if any, did the organization or group with whom you interned have? 

4) Did your internship experience reinforce or alter your own views of the value and practice of conflict management? 

5) Did the internship experience illustrate in practice any particular theory or
theories of conflict and conflict management that you have learned in the
program?

6) Did the internship experience generate new knowledge about the nature of
conflict, conflict management, and your potential role in the field?

7) Did the internship help you to formulate any goals for your future as a conflict management professional? 

8. What concepts of the theory, research and practice of conflict management did you find most useful and applicable to your internship experience? In which courses did you learn them? 

9) What skills did you find to be necessary to do your internship work effectively? Were you sufficiently prepared to exercise and apply those skills? 

10) What were the best parts of your internship experience? The worst parts of your internship experience? Why were these experiences the best and the worst parts? 

11) What criteria would you use to evaluate your performance? Based on those criteria, how would you evaluate your own performance in the internship? 

12) How did the internship assist you in integrating your conflict management
knowledge and skills into your future professional plans? 

For evaluation purposes, the overall weights for each of the written components of the Internship are as follows: 

1) Internship Completion Documents 30% 
a) Memorandum of Understanding 
b) Internship Journal/Diary 
c) Internship Evaluation Form

2) Internship Reflection Paper 70% 

Be sure to check-in with the CNCM Internship Coordinator regarding the deadline(s) for submitting all of your internship material.