Internship Assignment Descriptions and Requirements

Students must complete these assignment to fulfill course credit requirements for internships.

All assignments must be well written, typed, free of typographical errors, and single-spaced. All hours and assignments MUST be in hard copy form. (Only interns who are out of town at the time of the due date may submit their hours and assignments through email.) The hours and assignments are due the first day of final examinations week.

Documented hours

Using the department's Internship Form Cover Sheet, state the total number of hours you worked for the internship company, and have your supervisor sign it. Also, supply your supervisor's contact information so that Dr. Virginia Hamilton, our internship director, can verify the accuracy of the hours listed.

Internship Assignment Number One

Download the Internship Assignment 1 PDF file and follow the instructions on it. This is the only assignment that is due within one week of your enrolling into the course.

Conclusion paper

In two pages, describe what you learned about the career or industry in which you interned. In particular, focus on what you learned about the relationships between communication and workplace effectiveness.

Communication challenges assignment

Please describe and analyze five communication challenges (1/2 to 1 single-spaced page) that you either observed or faced directly. What happened? What ideas or concepts that you learned in your classes could be applied to these situations, and what advice can you give regarding approaches to resolve obstacles or problems?

Concept application paper

Compose a four-page, single-spaced paper that applies accurately relevant concepts you learned in your coursework to the real-life activities you experienced during your internship. You can take either a breadth or a depth approach in this assignment by applying one concept to a specific situation, or by applying a variety of concepts to a situation.

Career profile

Answer the following questions through research and interviews with people who work in your chosen career:

  • What is or are the names for the particular career?
  • What educational level, academic major and skills are typically required?
  • What workplace competencies are necessary to be effective on the job?
  • What are the primary activities of people engaged in that role?
  • How many hours do people in that position typically work per week?
  • What does "a day in the life of a _________________________" look like?
  • What are some of the most renowned companies that employ people in these positions?
  • Roughly, what are the pay, benefits and other forms of contingent compensation that people in these positions receive?
  • What are the "high points" and "low points" of this kind of work?
  • What makes you interested or disinterested in pursuing this type of career?

Research paper

Prepare a six-page paper in which you report in depth on research you conducted investigating an important leadership or management theory. Some possible topics include:

  • diversity in the workplace
  • emotional intelligence
  • time management
  • sexual harassment
  • leadership styles
  • delegating
  • networking
  • consultative selling
  • training design

You must cite at least five sources and write the paper in APA format.

A concluding note

Although the CMN 136 course, Organizational Communication, is not a requirement for graduation with a CMN degree, our internship director, Dr. Virginia Hamilton, highly recommends it for anyone who is planning on serving an internship, particularly 6–12 units of internship. The course is chock full of concepts that can be drawn upon to write all of your various assignments. The course also teaches extensive leadership principles and advice that will guide you in being the "star" intern we know all UC Davis students can be. The course typically is taught during the fall quarter and summer session 1.