Students in the major or minor program are encouraged to seek out internship opportunities in the area of their concentration of film, television or radio. Internships are available from many production companies, as well as television and radio stations. Our faculty have many contacts with practitioners in these media and often help qualified students arrange internships for credit. Fairfield's proximity to New York City (just an hour away) makes dynamic options a real possibility. In recent years, for example, our students have held internships at NBC, ABC, ESPN, The Daily Show, MSG, Speedvision Network, Outdoor Life, CNN, Comedy Central, The Conan O'Brien Show, WFAN, ESPN, WEBE 108, National Geographic Film and Television, and numerous independent film production companies.

Our current list of internship opportunities is available for printing in PDF format. New Media Internship Listings

What are the QUALIFICATIONS?

Credit-bearing internships in film, television and radio are only available to declared junior and senior major and minor students in the New Media Film, Television and Radio program, who have taken NM10, FM11, TL11, RA11, and at least one history/theory course and two applied production courses in your respective media track. Exceptions to these requirements can be appealed to the director of the New Media Film, Television and Radio program. The internship counts as an elective course within the major and minor program.

Internships are meant for students who have some basic understanding of the media, enabling them to both better appreciate the work in which they intern as well as to make them more useful to the company in which they intern. Because of the demands that an internship places upon a professor in the New Media program, we cannot accommodate students who are not in the major or minor program.

WHAT SHOULD I EXPECT (and not to expect) FROM AN INTERNSHIP?

Internships are designed to give you a real-world experience of a particular field of work. At the least (or the most!), you should have an experience of "trying on the clothes" of the field, to see if they "fit" your talents, interests, and your sense of who you might be in the future.

Most internships at larger companies do not allow you the chance to do much else, and often give you pretty basic work to do - sometimes not even related to the field. If you work for MTV, for example, DON'T EXPECT to be learning about how to shoot or edit a segment: your main job may be to control the crowds outside the studio windows in Times Square. It's not because they don't like you, it's just that they do not have the time to teach you any particular skills (and the union contracts do not allow you to even touch the equipment). If you intern in a smaller, less sexy place, you may indeed be taught some real skills that will advance you in some area of the media. Smaller companies usually have greater needs than large ones, and often rely on interns to an amazing degree.

YOU SHOULD ALSO NOT EXPECT to be offered a job sometime in the future at your internship company, especially at the larger companies. They simply don't have that many jobs available, and often have many interns, whom they mainly use for drudge work. Again, there is a better chance at a smaller place that they may like you so much - and appreciate your skills - that they will offer you a job upon graduation. It happens, but donít walk into the internship with that expectation. Your internship will be successful if you get a good look at how the professionals practice their crafts and how good a fit working with them feels to you. The requirements for the internship are designed to help achieve that end.

What are the REQUIREMENTS ... and what do I NEED TO DO?

First you need to contact the director of the New Media program - James Mayzik, S.J., Xavier Room 2, 254-4000, ext. 2697, or by e-mail at jmayzik@mail.fairfield.edu. He will help you begin the process, but first, take a good look at the requirements for an internship:

1. You will need to get a full time New Media faculty member and/or the director of the New Media program to sponsor your internship, sign off on your internship application (available at the Dean's office) and work with you on your required e-mail journal and paper (explained below). That faculty member will be the one who will evaluate your internship and submit a grade for it.

2. The internship needs to be at least 15 hours for 13 weeks, or 195 hours.

3. You will need to have a supervisor at your internship company for the internship, who will write a one page evaluation of your performance and progress. This evaluation will be sent to the sponsoring professor or to James Mayzik, S.J., Director of the New Media program, Fairfield University Media Center, Fairfield, CT 06824-5195 at the end of the internship. Note: there is no form for the evaluation. The supervisor simply sends a brief letter confirming your work and its quality.

4. You will need to maintain an e-mail journal, send once a week to your sponsor or to the New Media program director (jmayzik@mail.fairfield.edu) detailing the internship experience that week. We will be looking for at least a full page (single-spaced) of reactions each week (not just a paragraph or two). The journal entries should not be a detailing of the work as much as your reflections about what you are seeing and hearing and experiencing all around you. (For example, "I listened to a conversation between two people on the staff who were talking about how competitive the job market is in the industry. I couldn't believe how little they were getting paid." That kind of thing.) This is to get you to reflect on how you "fit" in that media world, and how you might see yourself there (or not) in the future.

5. You will need to write a paper at the end of the experience. The subject will be determined for you towards the end of the semester by your sponsor or the director of the New Media program. This paper is not meant to regurgitate your e-mail journal experience, but to give you the opportunity to learn something deeper about a project or task with which you were involved in the internship during the semester. For example, the paper assignment might ask you to present the history and details of a production on which your worked, with interviews of writers, directors, editors, etc., hopefully revealing an inside look at the challenges of a particular professional production.

6. You will need to sign a contract (before you begin the internship) with the professor and/or the director of the New Media program, in which you acknowledge and agree to the above-noted requirements. If you have agreed to all the requirements, we will send a letter to your internship company, indicating to them that you will indeed receive credit for your internship with them upon completion of all requirements, including a letter of evaluation from them about your work at the end of the internship.

Internships should be arranged several weeks before the beginning of a semester - ideally in the semester or summer prior to beginning it. Summer internships are possible, and should be arranged some weeks prior to the end of the semester. Do not expect to have an internship which you have privately arranged and/or completed without consultation with the director of the New Media program to be honored by the program. You will not receive credit for it.

HOW DO I GET AN INTERNSHIP?

While we encourage you to take advantage of the many internship opportunities available in the metropolitan area, it is up to you to research the places that offer such internships. The program does not make arrangements for you. We do have a list of places that have offered Fairfield students some very good experiences, and you can consult that list for your own possible internship. Majors and minors also regularly receive MediaOPS, which is an e-mail newsletter that alerts students to new internship (and job) offerings. Most large media companies have internship information on their websites, often with online applications. You are encouraged to consult these resources early, since you may be competing with hundreds of students in other media programs at universities in the area. For more information about internships within the New Media Film, Television and Radio program, contact James Mayzik S.J. Xavier, Room 2, 254-4000, ext. 2697, or by e-mail at jmayzik@mail.fairfield.edu.