Summer Field Internship

The summer field internship program is an essential component of the MPA in Development Practice curriculum and is designed to provide students with practical work experience in sustainable development practice.  This three-month program provides a holistic learning experience, deeply grounded in the local environment.  Students have worked in teams of 2 to 5 at the following sites:

Intended Learning Outcomes
The MPA-DP field internship aims to provide a challenging real-world experience for aspiring practitioners, with the following core learning outcomes:

• To gain a first-hand understanding of key interconnected sectors of education, agriculture, environment, health, nutrition, energy, infrastructure, water, gender and community development;
• To demonstrate effective use of project cycle management through problem identification, analysis, design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation;
• To integrate knowledge of cross-sector issues, local insights and community participation into field training projects and activities;
• To identify effective strategies for policy interventions to advance sustainable development (at the local, national and global level);
• To demonstrate a critical use of self-reflection and inter-personal skills and dynamics to analyze attitudes, perceptions and biases;
• To communicate important achievements and challenges in implementing a multi-sectoral project (through videos, multi-media presentations and project reports).

The field internship program includes a comprehensive orientation program, site visits to local development projects, mentorship programs including local faculty and students, an immersion experience in the host project, and a reflective and analytical exercise to allow students to share and present their findings and observations.  The proposed activities can be divided into five parts:

1. Orientation
2. Clinical Rotations
3. Mid-training Retreat
4. Project Design and Implementation
5. Debriefing and Project Presentations