BRIDGET O’BRIEN/Daily Bruin Senior Staff The UCLA Career
Center is one of the places on campus which provides students with
an array of resources, including reading material about possible
jobs and internships in fields they may have never considered.
By Nitin Dhamija
Daily Bruin Contributor
As students face graduation, many look to internships to steer
them toward getting job experience in subject areas that already
interest them.
But sometimes, they find opportunities in less likely
places.
Dennis Tan, a graduate student working for UCLA’s EXPO
Internship and Study Abroad Services, uncovered an intrigue for
politics through an internship in Sacramento ““ though working
at the state capitol was not his first choice. Initially, Tan
wanted experience in business consulting.
“Getting that political internship was something that I
fell into because it wasn’t my top choice,” he
said.
Nonetheless, he decided to pursue the political internship in
Sacramento, a step that furthered his interest in politics.
“Midway through the internship, I realized now that I have
a taste for state politics,” Tan said. “I wanted to
experience politics at the national level.”
Tan’s experience parallels that of many interns and study
abroad students, who with the help of the counselors at the EXPO
Center acquire a first-hand experience in their field of interest.
After a consultation, students can choose 10 possible internships
to apply for.
Dario Bravo, assistant director of the EXPO Center, said
students can apply for internships at the local, national and even
the international levels.
“Almost any field ““ entertainment, business,
accounting, media, public relations, non-profit, educational,
political ““ we have them here,” he said.
Internships available through the EXPO Center, however, are not
for everybody, Bravo said. Science students and those interested in
attending medical school would not find jobs at the center, which
is geared towards business and public relations experience.
He said students looking for internships nearby, which include
job experience in such fields as law, accounting, business and
management, and public relations, usually attend school as
well.
“They have to balance both their academic and internship
life,” Bravo said.
He recommended that students attending school in addition to
doing an internship devote about 12 hours a week to the job.
“Locally we have more internships than interns,”
Bravo continued. Â “The local program is our biggest
program.”
Within the national level, students can gain experience by
studying or volunteering in their specific fields in cities like
Sacramento, Washington D.C., and New York.
From his experience in both Sacramento and Washington D.C., Tan
said he saw real-life politicians at work, a dimension unavailable
to him in textbooks or college lecture halls.
In Washington, he worked with Congressman David Wu, D-OR, and
eventually, wrote speeches and press releases.
The UCLA Center for American Politics and Public Policy also
sends students to the Capitol through its Quarter in Washington
Program.
Still registered as UCLA students, CAPPP participants intern,
take classes and conduct research while receiving UCLA course
credit.
Although most internships are not paid, students can finance
their internships in various ways, such as through scholarships,
stipends and loans.
But despite the resources available, Bravo said there is more
competition in international than national or local
internships.
“On the international level, the students are actually
paying for all their expenses,” said Bravo. “They can
be a little more difficult to get in.”
International employers examine students’ applications
vigorously, often creating competition among possible
participants.
“Make sure you’re taking the right courses for the
field you want to do the internship, make sure you know a second
language, if you want to go abroad,” Bravo added, for
students interested in international internships.
Although most international programs have foreign language
requirements and no pay, certain internships offer cultural and
basic language education as well as money for students unfamiliar
in the national tongue.
Denise Easley, a 2000 UCLA alumna who currently works at EXPO as
an administrative assistant, had the opportunity to work in Finland
although she never spoke the language.
Easley took part in a work abroad program she found while
searching at the center.
In Finland, she worked at a hotel as what she termed an
“international trainee,” performing work in a
restaurant, bar, working at the front desk and housekeeping.
“I was never really alone,” she said. “The
town I lived in had a program where all the international students
would take trips together and do all the activities
together.”
Although Easley was paid for her work, she said students working
abroad really need to monitor their spending because many
don’t receive scholarships or loans while they work.
For Easley, the time she spent in Finland motivated her to
return and work for the Expo Center, giving her the chance to
encourage other students to study abroad.
“They place you and set you up and take care of you,
that’s why it was unique,” she said, describing the
work-abroad program at the EXPO center. “The biggest
benefit from working abroad was you test who you are.”