Internship Portfolio Guidelines
Any portfolio is a creative product, but these guidelines should spark your imagination and help you
develop a complete and user-friendly final product.
Think about your internship portfolio as a collection of artifacts that thoroughly document the work
you have done and the knowledge and skills you have acquired as an intern. It should also help
you:
Assess your learning
Connect your work experiences with your knowledge
Reflect on your personal, academic, and career goals
Provide evidence of your performance
Document your acquisition of specific skills or knowledge
Record your intellectual and personal growth
Your portfolio can also provide potential employers with evidence of your work experience.
Although not all employers want to take the time to review an entire portfolio, you may have an
opportunity to refer to items in your portfolio during interviews and will probably find yourself
mining your portfolio for material to incorporate into cover letters
1. Collect your materials in a loose-leaf notebook. You may want to use plastic sheet
protectors for some of the items, especially original documents. You should also use
tabbed dividers where appropriate.
2. On the outside front cover and on the spine, display your name, semester, and internship
site.
3. The first page should be a title page including the same information as well as the course
number (HIST 489), number of credits, and faculty sponsor.
4. The second page should be a table of contents with page or section numbers.
5. The third page should be a letter from your internship site supervisor, verifying that you
completed the contracted hours and evaluating your performance
6. The fourth page begins your introductory essay which should:
* Explain why you planned this particular internship
* Describe the job or internship duties
* Describe the organization, agency, or internship site
* Include your internship contract
* Comment on your internship contract, explaining any ways that your work
diverged from your plan as outlined in the original contract
* Include your revised resume, reflecting your newly completed internship
7. The next section should document your learning with the following:
* Internship log—list of dates and times worked and tasks engaged in
* Samples of internship work—each of these should be preceded by a summary
sheet that explains the activity the item documents
Examples: Reports
Brochures
Agendas
Databases
Proposals
Photographs
Memos
e-mail messages
Other forms of documentation:
Newsletters
Certificates
Newspaper articles
Thank-You notes…
8. Reflective Essay
In this 5-7 page essay, you should reflect on the meaning of the internship experience for
your intellectual development and career planning. You might consider the following
questions (But do not simply provide answers to each one. Rather, let them spur your
thinking.):
In what ways did I meet my learning objectives?
In what ways did I fall short?
How can I interpret these successes and failures?
How did this experience influence the way I understand the world?
What new insights did I gain into the practices and problems in this line of work?
What contributions did I make to this site?
What classroom experiences prepared me well for this internship?
What coursework or experiences do I need to continue my career preparation?
What were the best aspects of this experience?
What were the worst aspects of this experience?
What do I intend to do differently as a result of this experience?
9. Sample Cover Letter
This letter should model how you would present yourself for another internship or a job.
10. Internship Placement Site Assessment
Provide a candid evaluation of the internship experience as it relates to the site and the
site supervisor. Would you recommend this internship to another student? (This is a
document that I will keep in my files. Your identity will be kept confidential.)
