The Challenges and Measures for Internship among Fourth-Year Students in the Department of Lifelong Learning and Community Education at the University of Namibia

Abstract

Internship is practice-based learning that forges a close relationship between universities and workplaces. The aim of this study was to investigate the challenges and measures for internship among fourth-year education students in the Department of Lifelong Learning and Community Education (DLLCE) at the University of Namibia (UNAM) . The study embraced a mixed methods approach because it sequentially employs quantitative and qualitative research procedures. According to the interns, academic challenges that they face are the lack of support from the internship agency and lack of materials to do assignments from the academic supervisors. The logistical challenges pertain to lack of transport and accommodation facilities. Interns expressed need to develop their skills for writing, leadership and management skills as some of the measures to make internship an effective learning path. They also put forward four categories of measures that can be applied to ensure that internship becomes a valuable path of learning for students in the DLLCE. The categories relate to the orientation of students, enhancing student knowledge, developing agreements with agencies and procedures relating to the internship process. Based on the testimonies of the interns, it is recommended that fourth- year students be adequately orientated before they enter an internship and that the internship process be made explicit. Moreover, according to these testimonies, there is a need to give assignments that integrate how to transfer learning pertaining to leadership and management skills into places where student interns undertake their internship and that lecturers must teach the skills of minute taking, report writing, formal letter writing and proposal writing. Finally, the DLLCE should use the UNAM’s office of External and International Relations to enter into formal agreements with the agencies of attachment. This would help students to identify the agencies that relate to the DLLCE and hence have enough time to address the academic and logistical issues of interns.