The Washington Center - Academics | Wartburg College, Waverly, Iowa USA

The Washington Center

Washington Center Internships help you:

- Discover the diversity of occupational choices available
- Earn academic credit
- Develop specific knowledge and skills
- Apply the academic classroom knowledge in a real-world work setting
- Define future career path decisions
- Meet and learn from top professionals
- Live independently in apartments
- Establish a circle of friends and contacts
- Become a part of The Washington Center alumni mentor network

Do you dream of representing your state in the United States Senate, arguing a case in front of the Supreme Court, or reporting on social issues and injustices for a nationally-acclaimed magazine? With the right experience, your dreams can become reality, and The Washington Center for Internships and Academic Seminars will help make it possible.

From arts to zoology, The Washington Center can place you in an internship designed to provide you with the opportunity to learn more about your chosen field, and develop specific knowledge and skills. This is where careers are born!

Contact Jo Dorrance for more information.

Special Programs
As part of an aggressive outreach program for college minority students, The Washington Center has designed the Minorities in Congress program and the Minority Leaders Fellowship Program. MIC places minority students in congressional offices. MLFP is a competitive program offered to only 25 students each semester. MLFP students receive a full fellowship to cover The Washington Center's program and housing fees.

For those students who did not have a chance to do an internship in college, The Washington Center has developed the College Plus One program for college graduates looking to gain practical experience before heading for graduate school or into the work force.

Do your interests lie specifically with environmental issues or in working in the independent sector? If so, The Washington Center also has special internships in these areas.

In addition to semester long programs, The Washington Center offers one and two-week academic seminars designed to give student leaders a chance to share ideas while being challenged by journalists, policy makers, and administrators.

More Than Just an Internship

Students participate in the 12 or 15-week program and work at their placement site 4 days a week. Students are required to take a class one day a week. Classes take a closer look at a specific issue or develop a particular skill. The program is enhanced with The Washington Forum - a variety of lectures, congressional breakfasts, White House briefings, tours, site visits, workshops, and information session. The Forum is designed to link together for the students their substantive learning, professional development and sense of civic responsibility to the people, places, and politics of Washington, D.C. Students are also required to keep a journal of their experience and put together a portfolio of their internship at the end of the program.

Internship Samples:
- U.S. Department of Defense
- Amnesty International
- Office of Management and Budget
- American Civil Liberties Union
- American Red Cross
- United Way of America
- Africare
- U.S. Senate Offices
- House of Representatives Offices
- Republican National Committee
- Democratic National Committee
- CNN
- U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services
- American Assn. of University Women
- Federal Bureau of Prisons
- Environmental Protection Agency
- Federal Trade Commission