After our pilot of the summer internship programme in 2023, we received great feedback from both interns and colleagues. Our interns felt more confident going into their next professional role and we benefited too, with the interns bringing fresh ideas and perspectives to our teams.
A quarter of the 2023 interns went on to be employed within our museums after the paid internship ended (joining our Curatorial, ICT, Audience Research, Fundraising & Partnerships, and Collection Services teams), helping bring a diverse group of young people into the culture sector.
We recently welcomed a new cohort of interns across the Science Museum Group for summer 2024. Nineteen interns have joined our teams for an 8-week paid internship, through an ongoing partnership with the 10000 Interns Foundation.
Each intern aims to complete a project that supports their team over the course of the internship. They will also participate in a training programme focused on building professional skills.
As part of a three-day induction, we hosted a welcome event for the interns which included a speed mentoring session. The interns met with senior leaders from across SMG to discover more about their roles, their motivations and the lessons they have learned during their careers.
The event started with an insightful and inspirational speech from Iman Tadu about her experience of the 2023 internship programme and the Early Career Development Programme that followed.
Iman told the incoming 2024 cohort that their internships [would be] ‘a vehicle for your career trajectory’ and spoke about how these experiences led to her new role as a Licensing Executive at the Science Museum Group, which combines her interest in our collection with the skills picked up in her law degree. Iman went on to tell the group that ‘the journey is not a straight line and this is part of the wiggle that you will go on to becoming who you want to be.’
The interns are matched within a department which aligns with their interests and experiences, and are also connected with a mentor and buddy to support them through the internship.
Recently Iman spoke to her mentor, Alison Faraday, about the mentoring process. Iman started by asking her mentor Alison about her motivations for signing up to the programme.
Alison: ‘Before I mentored you, I hadn’t mentored anyone. I decided to be a mentor for the internship programme [because] my husband had been mentoring people for three years and I could just see the benefit that his mentees got from simply sharing. I just thought I had to do it… There’s something, particularly with women – if you get to a certain stage in your career, not ‘pulling up the ladder’ behind you, but putting the ladder out to support other people. But I don’t think it is a ladder. I think it is a joint experience. I’ve learnt loads from you,Iman. It’s helped me to reflect on what I’ve been doing as well.’
Iman also reflected on the importance of the additional support: ‘I think that has been something really important in in my professional development because as an intern, this was probably my first office job. It was a daunting experience. I didn’t know how to behave. I didn’t know what to expect. Having a mentor to have that sounding board and just say ‘oh, I did this stupid thing. Help.’
Iman and Alison also discussed the relationship between a mentor and mentee, with Iman saying: ‘Having a relationship with your mentor means being honest and open and transparent.’
Alison added: ‘For me, there’s something about having a safe ear. Trying to be a sounding board for you, so it’s more about having a conversation, suggesting some things that have worked for me, or even…working it out for yourself as you’ve been talking to me. It’s about having that safe space to have some time to reflect. I still haven’t worked it all out. I’m still learning as I go along a lot. I’m still scared of things and I think that helps. I wish I’d known that when I was early in my career because I thought it was just me.’
The images featured in this blog post were taken by Rachael Simoes, who participated in our 2023 Digital Curators of Tomorrow programme and now works in the Science Museum Group’s Digital team.