Moving Beyond the Classroom: Summer Internship Experiences

It’s that time of year again. Climate and Society students are moving from the classroom to offices and field sites as they begin their summer internships or work on their thesis. “The summer is always exciting for both the students and the program’s faculty,” said Cynthia Thomson, C+S Assistant Director. “It’s great to see how students apply what they learned during the program to real world problems.”

Students choose whether they write a thesis or do an internship over the summer as part of their year doing C+S. They can work anywhere in the world on almost any type of project as long as there’s a tie with climate. The diversity of the topics students are working on and the organizations they’re working with show just how wide-ranging their interests are. Their work this summer runs the gauntlet from planning and promoting Climate Week NYC to developing innovative ways to fund climate adaptation in small island nations to taking tree ring samples in India to understand how climate has changed throughout history.

Generally students’ internship experiences have only been shared within the program in the past. This year, students will be sharing their experiences with a wider audience right here on the Hot Topics blog. Each student will contribute a post about some facet of their summer work, insights they’ve gained or how their studies have prepared them over the next two months. The first posts will be available on Monday, July 1. Stay tuned!