The University of Alabama’s Disaster Relief Internship Program (DRIP) continues providing internship opportunities for students, Joseph Cheney, the program’s coordinator, said.
After placing nearly 70 students in local relief organizations during the summer months, the program is looking to have around 25 students placed in internships by the end of the year, Cheney said.
Students are interning for organizations including the West Alabama Chamber of Commerce, Tuscaloosa Emergency Services, the city of Tuscaloosa and Project Blessings.
DRIP interns are given a broad range of responsibilities, Cheney and faculty director Norman Baldwin said.
“The work students are doing ranges from administration, to active reconstruction work, to in one instance running a warehouse,” Cheney said. “It is truly amazing the amount and different types of work student interns are doing.”
“We’re putting students in very responsible jobs – they’re not just sorting clothes and unloading trucks,” Baldwin said. “They’re directing warehouses, giving out aid to people that have lost everything.”
Cheney said the nature of the work students did in the summer differs from the work they are doing now as the needs of the community change – but there is still a need.
“Everyone should be aware that there is still work to be done and there will be work for some time to come,” he said. “It is my sincere hope that we will be there providing interns to agencies throughout the city until the day that Tuscaloosa is back to where we were on April 26.”
Baldwin said this summer that while students work on a volunteer basis, most are able to receive academic credit by finishing their experience with an academic exercise like a term paper.
While the opportunity to receive credit for this semester has lapsed, there are still internships available for interested students this fall, Cheney said. New internships in the spring will be available for credit as well.
“There will be opportunities for internships in the spring,” Cheney said. “I am working actively to expand the number of our partner agencies such that our interns have more options to chose from and to ensure that every single student interested in aiding in the recovery is placed in an internship.”
Cheney encourages any students to apply, regardless of their field of study. The program is designed to match the student to the internship to best utilize their specific skill sets, he said.
In addition, he said he believes it is an opportunity to get involved with the Tuscaloosa community and rebuilding process rather than just a resume builder.
“It directly links students to the goal of rebuilding the city and the lives of those affected by the storm,” he said. “This interaction not only helps those in need, it helps build valuable resume experience for the interns. Further, it reflects well on the character of the University of Alabama that students have a continuing and active interest in rebuilding Tuscaloosa.”
For Henry Joe, an international studies major, his summer internship provided much more than academic credit and work experience.
“The people who came to the warehouse to receive supplies had every reason to be dejected and filled with a sense of hopelessness, yet they remained steadfastly upbeat about their plight,” Joe said. “Hearing their stories gave me a new perspective on the important things in life and reaffirmed my belief that the people of this state are some of the toughest in the world.”
Cheney said the work done by DRIP can part of the healing process for the student interns – not just the people they are helping.
“Though I am a political scientist and not a psychologist, I have noticed in myself that participating in an internship is in a way therapeutic,” Cheney said. “For me, it has been an opportunity to work-off some of the shock, loss, and grief of living through the storm.”
