Calvin has partnered with the Chicago Semester since it launched 50 years ago. When the project was initiated in 1974, the Chicago Semester had only six colleges participating and little connections within the city. It has now grown to accommodate 29 colleges and has over 1,700 connections with Chicago businesses. Chimes sat down with recruitment coordinator Averie Wright to learn about the internship opportunities and cultural experiences the program offers that have propelled this growth.

Internships

“We really tailor to what students’ interests are. So there are a lot of really great internships that are really just great for specific students,” said Wright. The Chicago Semester aims to help each student find an internship that complements their specific interests. The Chicago Semester started off connecting with local Chicago businesses, but as the program has grown they now partner with large corporations as well.

For instance, several students worked with BP, a multinational oil and gas company, in the summer of 2022. These students were a part of a team participating in risk management and international work. Wright told Chimes, “BP is really cool in that students are getting a front seat in the team and the organization.”  

Another popular option offered through the Chicago Semester is interning for nonprofits, like Healthcare Alliance, a Chicago-based nonprofit that supports refugees . “Students are really getting involved with the journeys and lives of the people within the city, and one of the interesting populations that not a lot of people get to encounter is refugees,” Wright said.

Wright said he is especially supportive of this organization because students can be a part of refugees’ entire settling in process. “I think that’s a really amazing one [Healthcare Alliance] where students really do get to take the front seat in important experiences within the city.”

The Chicago Semester program also provides opportunities for networking that are not as readily available in smaller cities. 

“Coming to Chicago, you are going to be in a larger job market, and the people you connect with will have larger connections than the people you may connect with at an internship site in a smaller city … the level of access you will have just by connecting with your intern supervisor on LinkedIn is going to be significantly more impactful,” Wright told Chimes. The Chicago Semester has helped students find a company that they work for years after the program ended, according to Wright.   

Culture

The Chicago Semester combines educational and career opportunities with community-based experience. Chicago has 76 neighborhoods, and throughout the semester students explore, visit and talk about them and their diversity. Participants in the semester program take a class titled Art in the City, in which students get an opportunity to experience a variety of city art. 

“Students will visit high art and go to the lyric opera house and see a ballet or opera performance. As well as going to a smaller venue where they get to see a local performer perform something maybe culturally relevant to the area,” Wright said.

Experiencing a variety of neighborhoods in the city is important to the program because of the diversity within Chicago. Wright said, “The North side is going to be completely different than something happening on the South side.” According to Wright the program aims to keep emphasizing the educational aspect with the community. 

The semester program also offers courses on vocation, social entrepreneurship, social justice, urban planning, diversity and inequality and cross-cultural engagement in Chicago.

Participating in all aspects of life in Chicago can provide perspective for the students involved. Wright said, “There are student teachers that are on the same bus as the students they are teaching at some points of time, and so they are able to realize they are partaking in the city that their internship placement is placed in.” This real life experience combined with education is what has drawn many students into the Chicago Semester program and has contributed to the growth of the program since 1974, according to Wright.