November 8, 2018
Internships allow St. John’s University students to distinguish themselves as employable professionals through real-world hands-on experience in their field.
Graduate students in the M.A. Museum Administration, Ph.D. World History, and dual M.A./M.S. Public History/Library and Information Science programs secured competitive and prestigious internships for summer 2018 and reflect on the experiences they have gained:
Erum Hadi
Erum Hadi, a student in the Ph.D. World History program, worked over the summer 2018 on the Communities Connecting Heritage program at the Smithsonian Institution. The program is a virtual exchange between the Smithsonian’s Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and its West Bengali staff.
Erum engaged in weekly conversations with the international group of staff members, and wrote three blog posts as a contributor. She also participated in workshops on oral history and interviewing skills and interviewed family members in Pakistan to develop her skills further.
Erum’s doctoral research interests focus on the material culture of South Asia, especially the shared beliefs and cultures of Hindus and Muslims in northwest India. Originally from Karachi, Pakistan, Erum immigrated with her family to the United States in 1990. She completed her bachelor’s degree in environmental science from SUNY Environmental Science and Forestry College, and soon after completed a master’s degree in international health from Boston University. Over the following ten years, Erum worked in several international and local public health departments as a research scientist and epidemiologist. In addition, she taught courses in biostatistics and public health as an adjunct lecturer at CUNY Lehman College. Having completed a second master’s degree in science education at Lehman College, Erum is currently employed as a science research teacher in the Peekskill Central School District in Peekskill, NY.
A multidisciplinary researcher, Erum wanted to pursue further study in history, particularly the history and cultures of her country of birth. She is able to apply her skills in social sciences, statistics, and anthropology to her study of history and her dissertation project.
“I was drawn to St. John’s program because it allowed me to write and do research across multiple fields,” said Erum. “The ability to complete the program part-time also allows someone with a family, like me, to pursue their goals. The faculty are wonderfully helpful, supportive, and respectful, and that makes for a really great experience at St. John’s.”
Richard Jones ‘18G
While enrolled in the dual M.A./M.S. Public History/Library and Information Science program, Richard Jones ‘18G completed an internship at the Queens Library main branch during the summer 2018. He worked on an archival project research genealogical information about Maryanne Shaw, whose 1899 gift of $1,000 constituted the start-up capital for the Flushing Free Library, which stands today as the Flushing branch of the Queens Library. To commemorate the 110th anniversary of Shaw’s donation, Jones created a pamphlet of information about her based mostly on census records and other documents.
“There isn’t a lot of information about Shaw out there, but if she had never donated the money she did, there might not be a library there today,” said Mr. Jones. “It’s amazing how you can trace the history of a community back to just one person, yet most people don’t know she’s the reason the library exists.”
Jones, who hails from Harlem, NY, attended Quinnipiac University with the aim of becoming a history teacher. In his sophomore year, his public professor encouraged him to contact Kristin M. Szylvian, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Director of the Public History program at St. John’s.
“I’ve known I wanted to study history as a child,” said Mr. Jones. “My interest began with reading and a love for stories. My mother read to me all the time. I understood from a young age that all stories come from experience and all experience comes from the past.”
Mr. Jones aims for a career that involves exhibition planning and design, as well as curatorial work, as an institutional level. He finds it important, however, to start building his career in communities, performing ground-level work to preserve local histories.
In fall 2017, Mr. Jones completed another internship at the Weeksville Heritage Center in Brooklyn, NY. There, he gained hands-on experience with archival processing, standardized descriptions and access to materials, cataloguing, preservation, and physical and digital maintenance of materials. The rigorous and intensive training he gained there shaped his approach to archival work. “It set a standard for me going forward,” he said.
In addition to his internships, Mr. Jones also works as a freelance archivist and has been involved in a project since January 2018 working with the personal papers of late Broadway performer Novela Nelson. He is also a student worker at the St. John’s Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Library on the Manhattan campus.
Lalaine Mercado
Lalaine Mercado serves as Assistant Director for Career Development in the St. John’s School of Law. She is also a graduate student in the M.A. Museum Administration program at St. John’s. During the summer 2018, Lalaine participated in a competitive internship program at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City.
As part of her internship, Lalaine worked with the Exhibition Management team and got to see how different departments within the museum work together. She also worked on exhibition budgets and coordinated with other departments to put together the exhibitions. “This was something I had learned about in my graduate courses, and then I got to see it in action at the Guggenheim,” she said. “I got to know the vocabulary of museums during my internship and become familiar with the time frame of how exhibitions work.”
Her role entailed planning and developing exhibitions, maintaining the global exhibition calendar, compiling and updating internal resources about an exhibition, and supervising the installation of exhibitions, and working with designers and installation services. “I learned a lot about future and past exhibitions,” said Lalaine. “It’s one thing to see an exhibition and another to be part of it and know how it came together.”
Summer interns at the Guggenheim spend Monday through Thursday working on assignments in the museum and take field trips on Friday, as part of a museum culture seminar program. These trips include conservation studios, artist foundations, and art galleries. “The program exposed us to other professional positions in the art world and gave us a well-rounded view of the arts,” Lalaine said.
Lalaine grew up in New York City and attended Fordham University, majoring in art history. She subsequently attended Fordham’s Law School and completed her J.D. As a practicing attorney from 2006 to 2013, Lalaine specialized first in corporate litigation and then anti-trust litigation, privacy and information management, and cybersecurity. She continued to nurture her love for art history by visiting museums and, in 2014, began volunteering at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That same year, she left practice and transitioned into freelance recruiting work, identifying a need to help people with their careers. In March 2015, she came to work at St. John’s, and she enrolled in the graduate program in fall 2016.
Lalaine was able to lend her administrative and budgeting experience to the Guggenheim internship, as well as knowledge she gained by taking a graduate course, The Business of Museums. “The internship was a good mix of my skills and interests,” she said. “I saw similarities between my role in practicing law and exhibition management. In both roles, you need to coordinate and make sure everything is working smoothly and everyone’s concerns are addressed.”
She credits the supportive faculty at St. John’s and flexible program schedule with the opportunities she has had as a graduate student. “My professors were supportive throughout the internship application process,” said Lalaine. “Internship programs are most competitive during the summer, so I was lucky to get a summer internship at such a prestigious organization. I’m also glad the M.A. program offers classes in the evening to accommodate working professionals, and I encourage other part-time students to take advantage of internship opportunities.”
Megan Payne
Museum Administration student Megan Payne spent her summer as an intern at the prestigious Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, NY, her hometown. There, she worked closely with the head archivist to create a detailed inventory of the museum’s collection of exhibition catalogs dating from the 1800s to the present. She also worked on cleaning, organizing, and preserving sculptor Marisol Escobar’s extensive photograph and slide collection, which the artist bequeathed to the gallery after her death in 2017.
“I felt like I knew Marisol personally by the end of the summer,” said Megan. “It doesn’t really happen a lot that you get to work with an artist’s actual things and learn about their personal lives to that extent.”
Susan Rosenberg, Ph.D., Professor and Director of the Museum Administration program at St. John’s, encouraged Megan to apply for the internship. After a phone interview, Megan was accepted. “It’s a big and prestigious museum and it’s close to home for me,” she said.
When she began her graduate program, Megan knew she wanted to work in museums, but wasn’t sure what area to focus on. “After this internship, I know I want to work in archives and collection management,” she said. “I really looked forward to going to the museum every day during the summer, and I haven’t experienced that with anything else. I loved being able to do hands-on work with the collection and get behind the scenes of an exhibition.”
After attending the State University of New York College at Cortland with a major in history and minor in anthropology, Megan looked at graduate programs all over the country. She eventually chose St. John’s because of the opportunities afforded by the University’s proximity to Manhattan and the biggest and most prestigious museums in the world. She was also attracted to the program’s small class sizes and supportive faculty members with a wealth of expertise in the field. “Dr. Rosenberg was so welcoming,” Megan said. “And I got to talk with museum professionals right away in my first semester.”
Megan intends to pursue another internship in the spring 2019 semester and continue to build on the experience she has gained.