Midwest Academy Summer 2002 Internship Program

The Midwest Academy, a 28-year-old national training institute for direct action organizing, will be hiring 50 college students as summer interns in 2002. Interns will work from Monday, June 3, through Friday, August 9 (ten weeks). The stipend is $2500.

Fifteen interns will be placed in Illinois with Citizen Action/Illinois or neighborhood-based organizations, in Chicago and nearby (Elgin/Carpentersville, Bridgeview/Oak Lawn, Oak Park/Franklin Park/Bensenville). The remainder will be placed (in groups) with statewide organizations in eleven states, working on health care issues. States and locations include the following: ME (Lewiston/Augusta), NH (Manchester), NJ (New Brunswick), NY (Buffalo), TN (Nashville), IA (central or eastern), MO (St. Louis), WI (Madison), OR (Portland), WA (Seattle), AZ (Tucson), and maybe Los Angeles. We will not be able to provide housing, so you must be in a location where you can arrange housing! (These organizations will all be USAction affiliates; check their website at www.usaction.org.)

All interns will receive intensive training, including spending the first week of the internship in the Midwest Academy five-day training (see training agenda on the home page of this website). They will learn how organizers select issues, develop strategy, assess their own organizational power and that of their target and opponents, recruit constituents, and move into action. There will be ongoing training, supervision and mentoring. For interns who are interested in pursuing a job in community organizing, we will also provide job placement assistance at the end of the summer or upon college graduation.

Interns will receive a challenging work assignment, which will include serious issue campaign responsibilities and the opportunity to make a real contribution to social change. Summer 2002 interns will work on health care issues with state-wide organizations, and on another issue such as predatory lending in Chicago.

Last summer, 17 interns in Illinois worked with the Campaign To Build Illinois Transit, and were placed with 12 organizations in Chicago, Schaumberg, and the East St. Louis area. They secured nearly 200 organizational endorsements for a dramatic increase in funding for mass transit in Illinois, organized four public hearings, which developed substantial momentum on the issue, and made a major contribution to the transit campaign as well as to local community organizations where they were placed. Comments from last year's interns will be placed on our website soon.

We are looking for people who are ready to work hard and take on responsibility, who have a passion for social justice, and who want to learn solid skills for success in the field of community organizing. We are particularly looking for people who think they may be interested in a career in organizing in the Chicago area for the Illinois internships. We will give some preference to juniors and seniors, but last year we hired a number of sophomores and freshmen.

We will help with transportation to and from the five-day training in Chicago, and room and board during the training. Housing will be your own responsibility; some locations may be able to provide assistance and others may not. Most assignments will require access to a car. If possible, we will accommodate people without cars; this may be more feasible in some locations than others.

Questions? First check the website, then email (preferably) or call Judy Hertz (midwestacademy5@aol.com or 312/427-2304).

To apply: Fill out the application. Likely candidates will be interviewed via telephone. We began interviewing February 26, and expect to begin hiring the second week of March. We will continue until all the spaces are filled. Submit your application as soon as possible.

For more Information:
Midwest Academy (MWA): http://www.mindspring.com/~midwestacademy/
Excellent manual for social change produced by MWA: http://www.mindspring.com/~midwestacademy/Book/page3.html
USAction: http://www.usaction.org
Northeast Action and links to our affiliates: http://www.neaction.org