One of my most important roles as a professor in Rowan’s RTF Department is my work as internship coordinator — helping students get real-life experience to further their careers.

While internships are not required for the RTF major or graduation, they are highly recommended as they are critical opportunities to apply learning from the classroom to a real-world situation under supervision.

In RTF, internships are critical to:

• Evaluate interest & aptitude in a career
• Apply theory to practice; develop new skills & techniques
• Develop professional references and improve marketability for employment

Much of the following information is also posted on the RTF website.

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Prerequisites

Everyone who wants to secure an Internship must satisfy these general pre-requisites. You must: be an RTF major, have 75 earned credit hours, and you must have a 2.5 GPA.  Next, you must have taken or be currently enrolled in the following courses

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Process

1. Find an internship that suits your career aspirations (and that meets the RTF requirements)
2. Apply to the company, interview, and be offered the position
3. Complete the RTF Internship Approval Form and email to Prof. Nicolae.  Here is the link to the form.
4. Register for the RTF Field Experience course.   To receive 3 credit hours for your internship, you must complete at least 120 hours of work.  During summer sessions, it is also possible to earn 6 credit hours, for which 240 hours of work must be completed.
5. Many internship sites require a verification letter prior to the formal acceptance of your offer.   Please contact Prof. Nicolae if this is requested.
6. Complete your internship and related assignments — generally consisting of a daily log of activities, a self-reflection paper, and a portfolio of work with links

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Finding an Internship

You are responsible for finding your own internship.  Before you begin your search you should take time to think what you want to gain out of an internship. With RTF Department approval, you can take up to 9 credits of internships over your academic career.

Define your career goals — Where do you see yourself as you embark on your media career (TV station, radio, ad agency, corporate media department, etc.)?  What experience do you need to acquire to get there?  Evaluate your skills honestly. Evaluate your personality honestly. A lot of internships unfold in high-pressure environments. Hard deadlines, working with others, punctuality, positive attitude, and a strong work ethic are required.

Identify your constraints — Where you live determines a lot.  Do you have adequate transportation?   Do you want an internship in the Philadelphia area, NYC/North NJ area, or something further afield like Los Angeles?  Do you want to do a Fall/Spring internship or Summer internship?   Will you be able to manage the workload of a full slate of production courses at the same time as an internship (and the other things in your life)?

Update your resume and cover letter — Seek out career services for help in refining your resume and cover letter.  Here are some links to some examples of successful Rowan RTF student resumes.  Always make sure you are highlighting your most impressive accomplishments — great projects, awards, scholarships, high GPA, etc. — and always proofread to make sure there are no spelling or grammatical errors.

Internship search — there are many ways to pursue a successful internship search, just as there are many ways to ultimately find the perfect job.  Research companies that produce the kind of work that you want to do — find their website or social media and explore a path for applying for an internship.  Talk to seniors who have taken successful internships and pick their brains.  Research LinkedIn for RTF alumni working in the field.

As a thought-starter, here is a short sampling of some of the companies that have hosted multiple Rowan interns over the past few years:

• • Center City Film & Video
  • JTWO Films
  • SNJ Today
  • Townsquare Media
  • Fox29
  • NBC Sports Philadelphia
  • IHeartMedia
  • PHL17
  • 93.3 WMMR
  • NFL Films
  • Rittenhouse Filmworks
  • Nancy Glass Productions
  • WPVI ABC 6
  • WCAU NBC 10
  • Beasley Media Group
  • All That’s Good Production Company

This is by no means an exhaustive list of the dozens of different companies all over the country that Rowan students have interned in the past few years — just a representative sample to help you start your search.