Welcome to the Gould Library Internship homepage. Carleton College’s Library Internship is a partnership between the Career Center and Laurence McKinley Gould Library. The internship is year-long, part-time, paid, non-credit bearing work experience for sophomores, juniors, and seniors who are interested in a career in libraries. Interns may be pursuing any major and may come to the internship with or without library work experience. Interns work 10 hours per week, with those hours spent one-on-one with staff in the library, reading library scholarship in connection to the curriculum, working on independent projects, or writing reflective blog posts.
The Library Internship provides interns the opportunity to experience every department of the library, with attention given to the following departments: Technical Services, Reference and Instruction, and Loan Services. The intern may also have the opportunity to work in Archives and Special Collections, Exhibitions, and Collection Development. Students may have the opportunity to participate in the internship for a second consecutive year, in which they would focus their work on a specific library department and participate in mentoring and training for new first-year interns.
Library Interns:
- Build mentoring connections with library administration and staff through individual training and collaboration
- Learn library and information science concepts through readings and discussions with their supervisors
- Gain valuable library work experience through specialized projects such as building research guides, cataloging books, curating book exhibits, processing archival material, or managing inventory processes
- Build their professional skills through structured reflective practice and professional development activities through the Career Center
- Attend professional library conferences or tour other nearby libraries
- Cement their knowledge through this written blog and through giving presentations