What is Field Experience?

One of the most unique opportunities we provide our students involves the required completion of a four-credit, 200-hour summer field experience. For Health Science, it is a 320 hour summer field experience.  This internship allows HES majors to experience hands-on training in an organizational setting, under the supervision of highly qualified professionals in their chosen field of study. Students usually complete the internship during the summer between their junior and senior year. With the exception of students following the Physical Education/Health/Coaching Pattern, all Exercise Science and Health Science majors are required to complete the internship as an undergraduate, at an off-campus agency/organization within their specific pattern area. (Physical Education/Health/ Coaching students will complete a more intense teaching internship as part of their graduate degree requirements after they have been accepted into the MAE program.)

Eligibility Requirements

In order to be eligible for the field experience, the following must occur:

• Attend two mandatory meetings (one in the fall, one in the spring, prior to summer enrollment). You must sign-up to attend one of the fall meetings.  Sign-up for the spring meeting is not required. Health 460 students will attend one spring meeting, which is mandatory, and follow the guidelines outlined in the Health 460 Field Experience in Health Education Manual (pdf). You will need to send the following link for this orientation session to your agency supervisors.
  
  Fall 2009 Mandatory Meeting Dates for Summer 2010 enrollment

  Must attend one meeting
   

  Tuesday, December 1, 2009
  8:00pm, Pershing Building 325
  
  (or)
  
  Wednesday, December 2, 2009
  5:00pm, Pershing Building 325

• Junior or Senior status (minimum 60 hours completed)
• Consent of Advisor and Program Director
• Major GPA 2.5 or above
• Cumulative GPA 2.0 or above
• Health Science majors must have successfully completed HLTH 366 prior to enrollment
• Declare pattern at least one semester prior to enrollment, and successfully complete any courses that fulfill pattern course prerequisites
   

How to Find an Internship

Ultimately, it's up to you to find your internship location. However, to assist you, we've put together a list of internship locations (pdf) that have been used by former students. For your convenience, this list is divided into sections by location and pattern. We also list internship positions from off-campus agencies that have contacted our office looking for applicants. You can find this on our Find a Job page.

If you are concerned with housing arrangements, and desire to do your internship at a medical center, we have information about 7 centers in Missouri which offer free or very inexpensive housing for students doing internships at nearby medical centers.  The houses include computer labs and medical facilities for the students with staff to assist them in research, etc.  Please contact Mary Lou Cole (coleml@health.missouri.edu) for more information about these Missouri Area Health Education Centers (MAHEC).

How to Enroll

In order to enroll in the ES/HLTH 370 Field Experience course, you must follow the procedures outlined in the Field Experience Manual (pdf). If you are a Health Science major, you will also want to print the National Health Educator Competencies Update Project (CUP) to be used when preparing your objectives and modified objectives for Field Experience. The Field Experience Checklist (page 17) outlines all the steps required before you are allowed to enroll.

Your very first step is to attend a mandatory meeting, usually held in November prior to the summer you plan to complete your internship. After you attend a second meeting in April, meet all eligibility requirements, and complete all the steps in the checklist, you will be provided with permission to enroll in the class during summer regular registration/add drop.

Submitting Assignments

After you have enrolled, you will be able to start submitting assignments through BlackBoard. For complete instructions on using Blackboard to submit your assignment, access the Field Experience Manual (page 8). Feel free to use our APA Guide to assist you in completing the assignments that require APA format.