I plan to use this  space to convey my experience over the next year, and would like to begin by reflecting on the Summer Institute portion of the internship. I hope others who seek information will find my experience useful.

Summer Institute (takes place in the summer before the fall semester)

Where: This summer (2009) interns met at Miramar College and Mesa College.

When: There are six summer sessions. Interns meet for three hours, from 6pm-9pm. Attendance is required, but if necessary, you can make up a missed session by attending a class meeting of ARP 611 or ARP 631 during the fall semester.

Who: All of the interns selected for each campus meet with the director of the program, Dr. Kendra Jeffcoat.

Why: Dr. Jeffcoat’s words (sent in an email to the interns) explain why:
“The program will give you the opportunity to learn more about the community college system, to identify the teaching and/or counseling skills needed within the community college, and to create a network of colleagues within the community college system.”

In addition, interns review important websites, discuss the basic skills initiative, identify the roles of faculty (which extend beyond the classroom), discuss adult learning, review students’ characteristics and needs, review course goals, and practice developing student learning outcomes.

Consider Enrolling in a Ph.D. Program
The Good: Most Ph.D. programs offer full tuition remission, and some, like USC Annenberg (where I intend to apply), offer students a stipend and health benefits for five years. During your studies, you will have opportunities to obtain critical experience in teaching, article writing, preparing and delivering papers for conferences, and original research. Aspiring educators at the community college and university levels will discover that finding work after grad school with their doctorate is much easier than with their masters. Why? Well, that’s the bad.
The Bad: Ph.D. programs are tough to get into. Most universities accept between 10 and 15 students once per year. That’s pretty hardcore. Even with excellent GRE scores, letters of recommendation, transcripts, and a well-crafted letter of intent, there’s no guarantee you will be admitted. Additionally, you must pay for the university to review your application, which can range from $55-$100, and pay for your transcripts, with can run between $5-$20 per college attended. That’s an expensive gamble to make when you’re unemployed or hurting financially. Imagine applying to three or four programs with these fees. It can be discouraging.

Apply for an Internship
The Good: Recent graduates often lack the experience they need to enter their chosen field straight out of college. Internships provide these grads with opportunities to gain real-world experience in an authentic learning environment. For example, I’m applying for the SDICCCA Regional Faculty Internship. If selected for this program, I’ll be partnered with a mentor professor at a community college in San Diego, who I’ll shadow in all of their duties for a semester. The mentor will continue to guide and instruct me the following semester as I teach a section of a course on my own. This experience will makes me more competitive in the community college career market because of the training and the classroom teaching component.
The Bad: Like enrolling in a Ph.D. program, internships, too, are competitive. Not everyone gets selected. You must fill in the application in such a way as to stand out amongst the many applicants. Also, most internships are unpaid. This means you may have to work elsewhere to make ends meet while participating in the internship that will take you to the next level. Balancing work with an internship can be taxing, both emotionally and physically. Long hours and heavy workloads come with the gig, as well as living on meager wages (if working part-time).

Not Your Dream Job? It’s OK to Trade Down
The Good: Pay your rent on time. Pay off your credit cards. Pay down your loans. Really, the most central reason people consider trading down the career totem pole is because they have bills. In my opinion, it’s better to take a lower paying job, or a job you once did but vowed you would never do again (which, for me, is retail), then to fall into debt. The last thing you should want is to compound your problems with creditors, or to damage your credit score (which, incidentally, many employers will check when they run your background to determine if you’re a responsible person).
The Bad: Swallowing your pride. Sacrificing your ego. Postponing a dream. Perhaps, in some fields, damaging your resume. For the most part, though, employers are well aware of the recession we’re in. They know that over 600,000 jobs alone were lost in January. That more people are collecting unemployment now than any time since the government began keeping records in 1967 (Anderson Cooper).

As you can see, there are no easy answers and no quick fixes. The recession, housing market crises, credit burst, and costs for gasoline and health care have placed us all in the line of fire. Job security? Psh. New graduates are lucky to find one to begin with. The best we can do is to think creatively, try new approaches, sharpen our skills, and fight the good fight!

As we walked, I actively tried to defamiliarize myself with the area. I went to City College for five years and worked in Horton Plaza for two, and feel an attachment to the surrounding areas. I wanted to cut myself off from that attachment temporarily, in an attempt to see the streets through the eyes of a homeless teen. All of a sudden, downtown felt very small to me. Surely, downtown does not compare to New York or Chicago in terms of size, but compared to many, downtown San Diego is pretty popping. Nevertheless, when you are homeless and routinely hassled by the police, the area seems to shrink significantly. I imagine being woke up by a blinding bright light, loud siren or bullhorn, having a baton poked in my side, to be told to hurry up and get a move on. To avoid much of this harassment, many of the teens have set up squats in hard-to-reach areas, like in the median area between north and south 163. We didn’t visit the squat, but Bill suggests we should check it out sometime with another counselor if invited by a “resident.”

In a nutshell, here’s what I learned:
If you become an outreach counselor, expect to pair up and hit the streets with someone more experienced than you. Together you will travel to known areas in San Diego where homeless teenagers hang out away from their squat: Ocean Beach (specifically the wall), downtown SD and surrounding areas, Parkway Plaza in El Cajon, and a few other places. Outreach counselors will carry on their person a backpack filled with basic supplies and non-perishable food. It is not the objective of the counselor to advertise the drop-in center, since, for example, the likelihood of a homeless teen finding their way from El Cajon to downtown is very low (in addition to a lack of funds for public transport, the teens usually stay near their squats); rather, the goals are to pass out supplies to some young people who need them, provide information for assistance programs (such as WIC), to show some kindness for no other reason than to show somebody cares, and at times, to provide basic first aid (e.g., bandaids, alcohol wipes, gauze).  Note: Homeless teens come in all different sizes, shapes, ethnicities, levels of cleanliness. Some may be wearing dirty, ripped garments. Others may be wearing trendy fashions. Some (more than you’d expect) will have cell phones. Our trainer suggests approaching teens without preconceived notions. Explain who you are and what StandUp for Kids is all about. Then ask them if they know any homeless teens who could use some help. This way you don’t offend a person, and they know you’re coming from a non-judgmental place.

If you become a center counselor, expect to spend one day (the same day) at the center each week. Your duties could include: signing in the teens as they enter, delegating chores, serving food, doing laundry, and advising teens on everything from public assistance programs to interview skills. The overarching goal of the center is to provide a family-like atmosphere, one in which these teens interact with one another and with the adult staff in a positive way that builds healthy relationships. Many of these kids come from broken, violent homes. Many have never had an adult in their life who treated them with respect. Many have never had a relationship with a male figure who did not want sex from them, or to beat and mentally abuse them. The center, then, is a space where positive relationships thrive, where information is shared, and where, hopefully, homeless teens find the path to getting off the streets permanently.

You may be wondering how one goes about doing this, and truly, there is no guarantee that you will get the answers you are looking for. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. If you’re like me, and learning about the internship (and hopefully, being selected for the internship) are top priority, then it’s worth the extra effort.

First, decide at which community colleges you would like to teach. Then, contact the Chair of the department you wish to intern, and send them an email explaining your situation and interests. Ask if they have the contact information of a current or past intern who is willing to share their experience, or if they know of someone else who might. Now, remember, the Chair may be very busy, and it may take a few trys before you get the information you need. It’s a good idea to do this with each college you wish to teach, because interns will have something different to say at each site, where student and faculty cultures vary. If you were lucky enough to attend a San Diego community college (I prize my education) then you should try contacting a professor you know and who knows you well, before contacting the Chair. They may be able to connect you with an intern, and may even agree to mentor you!

I contacted a current intern to inquire about her experience and to ascertain some pointers. Here’s what I learned:

The Internship is Unpaid
This means that many of us will have to hold down another job while participating in the internship. My source says ”You get out of it what you put in,” and recommends reconsidering the internship if you can’t commit to the hours. If you want to get your foot in the door come hiring time, then you must plan to attend meetings, to participate in more than one class, and to spend time getting to know the faculty. Note: This may not be realistic for people working full-time elsewhere.

Professional, Related, Academic, and then Personal Experience
When filling in your response to the second writing prompt on the application, my source recommends detailing the experience you have (if any) in this order:
1. Professional Experience: Have you taught courses before? Have you worked as a TA or GA? Have you taught courses to diverse or disadvantaged students? Include which levels and what subjects, and be specific about your role and level of experience.
2. Related Experience: Include any experiences you have working as a tutor or as an assistant (say, in a secondary classroom, for example). Explain why this experience has prepared you to work at the community college level.
3. Academic Experience: Highlight any tutoring or teaching-related courses on pedagogy you’ve taken, and if you attended a community college, emphasize that experience.
4. Personal Experience: My source suggests turning to life experience as a last resort. If you lack professional, related, and academic experience, or perhaps have very little of just one of them, then you may include those experiences you feel especially qualify you to work with a diverse population. Perhaps you volunteer at a youth center or drug rehab facility, or perhaps you have always lived in low-income neighborhoods, attended public schools, etc. Be advised, the selection committee is looking for professional and academic experience primarily.

Hope this helps! More to come as I learn more about the internship and as I progress through the application process.

For instance, I applied to work in the UCSD temp pool the first week of January. Last week I finally interviewed with them and had my fingerprints taken. Since when, I wonder, does an administrative assistant need both DoJ (Department of Justice) and FBI clearance? It’s so bizarre, but I honestly wouldn’t really care if it didn’t take so long for the results to return. At least UCSD paid for the checks to be done. That’s not the case everywhere.

In fact, this next week I have to pay for my own fingerprints and background check for two entities. For StandUp for Kids, which is a nonprofit organization where every employee is a volunteer, I must pay $15 for a background check to clear me to work as a counselor. That’s not too bad. Then, to apply to work as a substitute teacher in San Diego, I must pay $73 for my own fingerprints, and a $57 application processing fee! Not to mention that I’m supposed to obtain official transcripts from the universities I’ve attended and I already paid over a hundred bucks to take the CBEST examination.  How, exactly, is an unemployed, recent graduate supposed to come up with all of this dough? These are the days of a recent grad trying to start her career and make rent…

Ok, so now that I’ve downloaded the application http://interwork.sdsu.edu/courses/cc/application.htm, how do I fill it out in such a way as to make myself stand out among the herd? The first few pages require I fill in basic information: where I’ve earned my degrees, where I live, where I’d like to intern, what kind of teaching experience I have, etc. Then, there are two small paragraph spaces where I’m asked to:

1. Explain briefly why I want to become an intern in the Regional Faculty Internship.

2. Describe any experience which I believe especially qualifies me to work with San Diego’s culturally and ethnically diverse student population.

Now, these two writing prompts are direct enough, but their simplicity masks their importance. This is the place on the application where the persuading happens.  This is where I convince the reader (the reviewer) that I know exactly why I want to intern, that I know, to some degree, what I am being offered. This is also where I let them know what they can expect from me.       

So, what reasons should I provide for why I want “to become an intern?” As I consider this question, five more enter my head. I wonder, ”don’t all of the applicants share the same reasons? What makes mine unique? We all need experience, check, we all want to teach, check, we all want to jumpstart our careers, check, but why do I want to become an intern–specifically?” To explore and prioritize the many possible reasons, I brainstorm ideas and write drafts. Then, to make use of the five years I attended community college (haha, true) and to cover as many bases as possible, I also contacted an amazing professor I know from City College. I took three courses with her, and it was her example that set me on my career path. She was a mentor for me at City, and she’s agreed to mentor me and/or to suggest other potential mentors at the college. But, again, I wonder, does securing my own mentor make me more competitive? Does it increase my chances of selection? There really isn’t a place on the application for me to indicate that I have found a mentor…should I insert that tidbit into my response for the first prompt? 

The second writing prompt asks me to describe the kinds of experiences I’ve had which qualify me to work with a diverse student population. Answering this question feels tricky to me, especially because I don’t have much professional experience aside from tutoring and assistant teaching in a secondary classroom. With that out of the way, does my academic experience take priority over my personal experience (since I lack professional)?  Do they want to know about the courses I’ve taken from a black or Chicano perspective? Do they want to know about which clubs, groups, or associations I”ve been a part of that were multicultural? What about personal experience? Do they care that I’ve always lived in lower-income neighborhoods, attended public schools, ate free-lunch, or that all of my love relationships have been with men from other countries (probably not this last one, I’m guessing)? Do they want to know that I lived in shelters off-and-on during my childhood, that I know what it’s like to stand in soup lines and to wait at the welfare office for eight hours-or does that sound like an appeal to pity? Does my study abroad experience especially qualify me? Living with an Italian family for three months, and attending a major university in Mexico City definitely provided me cultural experience. But is that the kind of experience you put in this little paragraph? Living in San Diego, I’ve grown up around people from all over the world. Why is my study abroad experience all that important? What about my experience volunteering (just started) at a drop-in center for homeless teenagers? Or how about my personal history with overcoming drug abuse and the identity crises I underwent during my teen years (again, probably not)? So, I wonder…What kinds of experience (other than teaching a course from an ethnic perspective) should I include in the small paragraph space on the application?   

As I continue this application process, I will keep this blog updated with my choices, and with the details of my experience. Even if I’m not selected for the internship (which would suck beyond belief, so universe, please align), this blog will serve as a record of my experience: good or bad. There’s not a whole lot of information about the application process available online for people like me, who want the internship and who want to know how others “got it.” I hope my openness and willingness to share how I handle the application process will help others work through their application anxiety (and achieve success!).

SDICCCA stands for San Diego and Imperial Counties and Community College Association. In coordination with SDSU, SDICCCA selects interns from a large pool of applicants (each March usually) to participate in a year-long internship, beginning that same year in August. The interns are paired with a mentor professor at one of the ten community colleges which comprise the SDICCCA consortium, who they shadow in all of their duties for the term; that means, they shadow them during their planning sessions, office hours, lectures, faculty meetings, and so on, to get a feel for what it takes and what it’s like to work and teach at a community college.

If the intern does well in the Fall semester, and the community college where they intern agrees, the intern will be given a section of a course in the Spring semester to teach. Check out the full description and a list of the participating community colleges on the SDICCCA website at  http://interwork.sdsu.edu/courses/cc/index.html.