Spills and thrills: internship challenges for learning in epistemic spaces

Abstract

ABSTRACT We examine the challenges and emergent nature of learning during undergraduate internships. Much scholarly inquiry on the latter focuses on internship experiences within traditional professional domains such as medicine, teacher education, and other fields. There is less knowledge about undergraduate interns entering more fluid and recent work sectors such as Public Relations and Communication. In this study, a sociomaterial perspective guided the interest in the situated and emergent nature of learning as an intern in such tool-saturated environments. Specifically, we examined how interns learn to participate in such activities, and how they encounter and appropriate sociomaterial resources used for coordinating and performing work practices. Using a case study method, we examined internship experiences of penultimate undergraduates in communication studies (N = 38). From semi-structured interviews, strategies such as scaffolding, networking and negotiating with colleagues, and technological tools as contingent means for coping with workplace challenges were reported during the initial stage of their internship. By making visible knowledge strategies undergraduates interns employ for learning at the workplace, we call to attention the role of and access to technologies, significant others, and workplace culture in the development of professional learning in such dynamic professional settings.