The Summer of Student Internships

Thanks to Lewis & Clark’s Career Center and the Bates Center for Entrepreneurship and Leadership, our students have access to a wide range of experiential learning opportunities that give them the skills they need to be successful in a variety of careers.

• The Career Center helps our students find internships for course credit during the academic year and provides grant funding for two unpaid internships in the summer. The center also support students with resume and cover letter assistance, interview preparation, and 1:1 advising.
• The Bates Center matches students with local organizations based on similar interests and skills through internship courses during the academic year and a sustainability-focused internship course in the summer.

Check out the experiences of some of these students!

Tara Elsa BA ’25 (Symbol Design) and Izz Lamola BA ’25 (Grow Portland)

Symbol Design is a design agency in Portland. Tara’s internship was focused on marketing initiatives, mainly around the agency’s new three-day festival called Blend: Art + Culture + Community. The pop-up gallery event featured the art of BIPOC artists from the Pacific Northwest and music from local DJs, plus food, drinks, and community building.

Grow Portland supports schools and communities by facilitating hands-on garden experiences that foster connections to food, nature, and each other. Izz was paired with the nonprofit via the Bates Center Summer Sustainability Internship course. Izz worked alongside Grow Portland’s education team by facilitating programming to K-5 students. They also provided school garden stewardship, data evaluation, communication, grant writing, and other support.

Feya Dawkins BA ’25 (SCRAP Creative Reuse)

SCRAP, a Portland-area nonprofit and donation-based center, inspires creative reuse and environmentally sustainable behavior by providing educational programs and affordable materials to the community. Feya joined the SCRAP team for the summer thanks to the Bates Center Summer Sustainability Internship course. She spent the majority of her time in their education studio, crafting, organizing, and assisting with summer camps and workshops for creative people of all ages.

More about Feya

Daniel Madhavan BA ’25 (Paine Pacific)

Paine Pacific is a transaction advisory firm based out of Portland. Daniel worked as a merger and acquisitions analyst, which consisted of targeted outreach to clients, industry research, data gathering, and reviewing financial reports. He originally obtained this internship through the Bates Center during the academic year and was later able to extend it through the summer. Daniel plans to keep working with Paine Pacific during the upcoming school year.

Harmony McMullin BA ’25 (PepsiCo/Quaker Oats)

Harmony was an environmental health and safety intern for PepsiCo, specifically at the Quaker Oats manufacturing plant in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. This plant is the world’s largest cereal mill and employs nearly 1,000 people. Her primary projects involved conducting large-scale chemical inventory and safety audits. The Career Center has been a great resource for Harmony through resume assistance and interview practice.

Ella Wydra BA ’25 (Center for Renewable Energy and Appropriate Technology for the Environment—CREATE!)

CREATE! is a nonprofit that helps rural populations in West Africa—particularly Senegal—cope with resource shortages resulting from the impact of climate change. It works with communities to identify and meet their needs in water, cooperative community gardens, renewable energy, and income generation. Ella’s internship duties—facilitated by the Bates Center Summer Sustainability Internship course—included grant opportunity research and campaigning with Google Nonprofit and Google Ads, as well as social media campaigning for fundraising and new donor opportunities.

Bates Center for Entrepreneurship and Leadership Career Center