English Department Internships

Professor: Martha Nell Smith

Join a research team of senior scholars, graduate students, and undergraduates working across the university and with institutions of higher learning across the country, as well as with the Emily Dickinson Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts. In collaboration with the Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities, the Dickinson Electronic Archives (DEA) project is offering internships for up to 3 credit hours in humanities computing theory and practice. Interns will work in areas of new media and can specify which of the many DEA’s publishing initiatives they would like to spend at least 8 hours per week. Projects currently available are publications of Dickinson family papers that have not been available for the past century, and research exploring the significance of erotic expressions that is part of NORA, a data mining and visualization project in collaboration with HCIL, and the Universities of Alberta, Illinois, Nebraska, and Virginia. Interns will be asked to write a short progress report or research paper at mid-term and another at the end of the semester. Besides working on cutting-edge humanities projects, interns will acquire skills increasingly necessary for graduate study and advancement in today’s workforce and will be trained in high-quality text encoding and scanning techniques. NO ADVANCED TRAINING IS REQUIRED, just a willingness to learn and become part of a research team.

To apply, please consult your advisor and/or contact Professor Martha Nell Smith, mnsmith@umd.edu.

Professor: Perdom Lindblad

The Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH) is a leading digital humanities center that engages in collaborative, interdisciplinary work at the intersection of technology and humanistic inquiry. Current projects open to interns include the Shelley-Goodwin Archive and the Deena Larsen and Bill Bly Electronic Literature Collections.

Through a digital humanities internship at MITH (ENGL388T/MITH388), students join a research team of senior scholars, graduate students, and undergraduates from across the university. Besides working on cutting-edge humanities projects, interns will acquire skills increasingly necessary for graduate study and advancement in today's workforce and may be trained in high-quality text encoding and scanning techniques.

To apply, please email Purdom Lindblad the following:

1. Letter of interest, including a skills assessment identifying your current skills and past relevant experience;
2. CV;
3. Major GPA, Overall GPA; 
4. Contact info for one reference

MITH Undergraduate Interns can expect to work 6-9 hours per week in the MITH offices, including a weekly cohort meeting. MITH Interns will write 1 or 2 blog posts per term, with editorial assistance from MITH Staff. For more information please visit the MITH website.

Can good writing make the world a better place? We think so! ENGL292/ENGL388C, “Writing for Change,” takes writing into the world outside the university to give a voice to local high school freshmen. The 9th graders will create written projects to advocate for positive change in their school or community. Your role will be to mentor these students as they explore ways that writing can really make a difference. Twice a week you will meet on campus in a writing and pedagogy seminar. One afternoon a week you will travel with the class to Northwestern High School for a collaborative work session. At the end of the semester, your students will offer presentations that advocate for social change.

 As an English major, you can take ENGL292 for 300-level credit by signing up for 388C (Writing Internship: Writing for Change) through the English Undergraduate Studies Office. You can count ENGL388C credits as part of your electives within the major. The readings are the same as those for 292 and address topics such as multicultural literacy, educational equity, writing as performance, and genre as social action. The writing assignments range widely and include reflections, interviews, multi-genre projects, and literacy narratives. 

If you register for the 300 level credit, there will be a requirement for 15 additional hours on-site, or an alternative as assigned by the instructor. 

We invite you to consider this opportunity to use writing as a tool for social change!  Click here to read an April 2014 article about the class written by the Capital News Service.

Please email Justin Lohr at jlohr@umd.edu if you have questions or would like to enroll.

ENGL 388V is a four-credit Scholarship in Practice course designed to guide students in their experiences as Undergraduate Teaching Assistants in English courses. The course has two distinct but integrated components.  Three-quarters of the UTA’s time (approximately eight-ten hours a week) and evaluation will take place in and related to the writing course, while the other quarter (approximately two-three hours a week) will take place in the supporting seminar that meets weekly. 

To be eligible as UTAs, students must

• have 30 credits by the semester of the internship
• have earned an A in the course in which they will work (students who were exempt from ENGL 101 are still eligible to work as UTAs for that course)
• have a 3.0 GPA overall

Learning Outcomes

By the conclusion of the course, students will be able to do the following:

• Select, critically evaluate, and apply relevant areas of composition scholarship and the scholarship of teaching and learning to the teaching of writing;
• Articulate the processes required to bring about a successful outcome in the classroom;
• Demonstrate an ability to collaborate in order to bring about a successful outcome in a composition course;
• Analyze how classroom applications of scholarship can or should account for differences in the gender, class, racial, ethnic, linguistic, and sexual orientation of class members and instructors;
• Produce and deliver lesson plans and teaching artifacts that reflect research relevant to composition and pedagogy

For the weekly seminar, students will read materials in composition theory and writing pedagogy, make connections between the scholarship and their classroom experiences, participate in weekly online and in-class discussions, and create a final course portfolio featuring the work they have done in the writing classroom and their reflections on that work.

Responsibilities of UTAs may include

• Keeping track of attendance and participation
• Managing ELMS site
• Suggesting/selecting readings for a lesson
• Helping instructor plan class activities 
• Designing and facilitating in-class lessons
• Leading peer editing sessions online or face-to-face for small groups of students
• Overseeing student participation on the discussion board
• Designing and grading quizzes
• Preparing brief digital resources for the course
• Holding office hours
• Meeting weekly with instructor
• Other duties as negotiated with instructor

UTAs are expected attend all meetings of the writing course they are assigned to, meet regularly with the course instructor for planning, give in-class lessons, and hold office hours for students in the course.

This class requires permission for enrollment. To apply, please click the link below.

SUBMIT AN APPLICATION

If you encounter technical difficulties with the application, please email all materials, including the text field responses on the application form, to Lyra Hilliard at lyrahill@umd.edu.

Professor: Tom Earles

Peer tutoring in the Writing Center (offered for 3 credits under ENGL388W).  Earn three hours of upper-level elective credit toward graduation or your English major by participating in an internship where you will:  enhance your own writing, grammar, and interpersonal communication skills through training and experience; read, discuss, and write about the writing process and tutoring; explore tutoring techniques through a variety of activities; and tutor students in the Writing Center to help them improve their writing.

This internship offers you: an opportunity to increase your knowledge about writing and become a better writer, as well as the satisfaction of helping others to improve their writing.  Students in ALL majors are invited to apply. To qualify, you should: enjoy working with and helping other people; possess good written and oral communication skills, and have good academic standing.  Interns attend a weekly class and tutor several hours each week in the Writing Center.

Applications are available in the Writing Center, 1205 Tawes Hall, or you can apply by submitting the internship application and required materials.  If you have questions or wish more information, please call (301) 405-3785 or email us at writadmin@umd.edu.

Professor: Tom Lowderbaugh

The Maryland General Assembly Program, is an internship opportunity that places up to 15 students with Maryland Senators and Delegates during the spring legislative session in early January. To prepare for this internship students are required to take a writing seminar in the Fall, either ENGL381 or HONR368A.

For the application and further information about this internships please visit the MGA website.
 

Professor: Karen Lewis

Our most flexible internship, this program provides students with academic credit in a placement of their choice as long as at least fifty percent of their work is in writing-related activities. Students find their internship placements and then apply for academic credit through this internship course. 

For further information about this internship and the application, please visit the 388P page.