Finding short-time or even year-long media internships or SIWES placements has always been hard. Media organisations in the country can’t absorb the increasing number of Mass Communication students from Polytechnics and Universities in the country.
While I was the Sunday Editor of The Nation Newspapers, I found it hard to reject applications for internships and would find a way to accommodate applicants, recommend them to other organisations or suggest other options. The Administration Manager once jokingly accused me of smuggling interns into the company because I didn’t usually send some applications through the right channel because I knew they would be rejected due to lack of space. One year, I took on about 20 interns from the Department of Mass Communication at the University of Lagos, where I graduated at once and had to divide them into morning, afternoon, and evening night shifts just to give everyone an opportunity.
I am glad to see many of my former interns excelling in the profession. One of them, who usually spent hours ‘maximizing’ the use of free internet, was recently named acting weekend editor of a national daily newspaper. In recent weeks, I have been getting lots of requests to help get internship placements or take on some applicants in my organisation.
Many, especially those who want to do it for two to three months, have searched endlessly and can’t find a place to intern due to the limited opportunities What we have come up with as a solution at Media Career Development Network www.mediacareerng.org is a hybrid option of physical and virtual internships for interested students ready to abide by our guidelines to ensure they learn the basic practical rudiments of the profession in every area of specialization from accomplished professionals and partner organizations. Institutions and students can no longer have a fixed idea of the kind of internships they want or where to intern. It shouldn’t matter if a student, especially for a few months, can intern with small organisations as long as they can learn any relevant skills and get practical experience. I laugh when some students who have their minds made up to intern with top media organisations look down on my small training organisation, not knowing about my decades of experience and that of our partners. Our model will include orientation, physical and virtual engagements, assignments to work on, which will be published and broadcast on our partner organizations, attachment with interested and available organizations and provision of resources.
Interested applicants should send their applications to mediacareerng@gmail.com with a short essay titled “What I want to learn during my internship/sites” Do your best to get a placement where you want, but if you can’t get it, contact us and be ready to abide by our terms and conditions. Only successful applicants would be contacted and diligent interns would be retained.
