What if your study abroad experience could also become your first international professional experience?
That question sits at the heart of Molise Italian Studies’ Summer Internship + program. Rather than separating classroom learning from career preparation, the program intentionally weaves them together, inviting students to spend six weeks living in Italy while completing a professional internship and a research-backed intercultural citizenship curriculum designed to transform both their professional skills and their perspective on the world.
Participants earn seven academic credits over six weeks—four credits through a professional internship and three credits through a course focused on Intercultural Citizenship—creating one of the most comprehensive values in short-term study abroad. Along the way, they develop professional experience, strengthen intercultural competence, improve their Italian language skills, and become part of the daily life of the communities that welcome them.
Learning Through Professional Practice
Every internship begins with a simple question:
What kind of work inspires you?
From there, Molise Italian Studies works with its extensive network of community partners to create placements aligned with each participant’s academic background, career aspirations, and Italian language experience. While many internships require at least one year of college-level Italian, opportunities also exist for students with little or no previous language study.
Past placements have included organizations in agriculture, education, communications, tourism, museums, nonprofit organizations, environmental sustainability, public service, and business. One recent summer intern apprenticed with Nazario Fania, a passionate beekeeper whose integrated, sustainable approach extends far beyond honey production. Working alongside Nazario, she learned every stage of the process—from caring for hives in the hills and mountains of Molise to understanding how biodiversity, healthy ecosystems, and responsible stewardship shape both the landscape and the local economy. She also collaborated on marketing initiatives, helping share Nazario’s story and connect consumers more directly with the people, places, and practices behind his honey. His philosophy of a circular economy, which invites customers into the fields and the honey house to witness the production process firsthand, offered a powerful example of how environmental sustainability, entrepreneurship, transparency, and community education can thrive together.
Unlike many internships, participants do not spend their evenings disconnected from the communities they serve. They return home to host families, practice conversational Italian, volunteer within local organizations, meet regularly with language partners, and become active participants in village life. Professional development continues long after the workday ends.
Designed for Intercultural Growth
International experience alone does not automatically produce intercultural competence.
Research consistently suggests that meaningful growth occurs when immersive experiences are paired with intentional reflection, guided learning, and structured opportunities to process cultural difference. That philosophy shapes every aspect of the Summer Internship+ program.
Alongside their internship placement, participants complete the three-credit Global Competency, Health and Identity course. The curriculum combines the Intercultural Development Inventory® (IDI®), individualized Intercultural Development Plans®, the AFS Global Competence Certificate, mental health and culture-specific training, the Difr Thrive reflective workbook, and a culminating digital storytelling project that encourages students to translate their experiences into lasting personal and professional growth.
Rather than asking students simply to experience another culture, the program challenges them to ask deeper questions:
- How do I understand difference?
- How do my own assumptions shape my interactions?
- How can I become a more effective collaborator across cultures?
Those questions become just as important as the internship itself.
The Results
The outcomes have been encouraging.
Across our first three internship participants—two semester interns and one Summer Internship+ participant—students demonstrated an average increase of 34.95 points on the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI®).
While our sample remains small and every participant’s journey is unique, these results compare favorably with several well-known international education programs. Published findings from the former AUCP program in France reported average gains of 18.4 points for participants completing its language pledge program (approximately 10.2 points without the pledge), while Purdue University’s highly respected GEARE engineering study abroad program has reported average gains of approximately 13.65 points.
Although no two programs are directly comparable, these early outcomes reinforce what we have long believed: intentionally designed intercultural learning experiences—grounded in meaningful work, authentic relationships, and guided reflection—can produce remarkable personal and professional development.
More Than an Internship
Professional growth is only one part of the experience.
Participants spend weekends exploring medieval villages, hiking mountain trails, visiting archaeological sites, attending local festivals, sharing long dinners with host families, and discovering the rhythms of everyday life in one of Italy’s least-visited regions. Conversations continue over espresso in village cafés. Italian improves around the dinner table. Neighbors become mentors. Colleagues become friends.
These experiences cannot be scheduled into a syllabus, yet they often become the moments participants remember most.
The internship becomes more than a resume builder.
It becomes an exercise in curiosity, adaptability, humility, and belonging.
Partners
Programs like Summer Internship + exist because of the generosity and trust of our community partners throughout Molise and beyond. Local professionals welcome students not simply as observers, but as emerging colleagues, opening their workplaces, sharing their expertise, and investing in the next generation of globally minded professionals.
Whether preserving cultural heritage, supporting local businesses, advancing environmental sustainability, strengthening nonprofit organizations, or contributing to public service, every internship reflects the same commitment: meaningful work rooted in authentic community relationships.
In Molise, professional development does not happen apart from community.
It happens because of it.