The Benefits of Criminal Justice Internships at a Historically Black University: An Analysis of Site Supervisors’ Evaluations of Interns’ Professional Development

Abstract

There are numerous studies on the benefits of internships in the extant literature, although many of these studies focused on the views of students and professors/instructors. These studies were also conducted mainly in predominantly White institutions. The present study makes an important contribution to the literature by being the first to examine site supervisors’ evaluations of criminal justice interns at a historically Black university (HBCU). It is also one of the first studies to examine the role of internships in professional development at an HBCU. We used ordinary least-squares (OLS) regression to examine data collected between 2015 and 2018 (with an overall sample size of 352), and found that good communication with clients, a professional appearance, and punctuality predicted interns’ professional development. Contrary to expectations, gender and internship length did not predict professional development. The implications of our findings for student professional development and benefits of internships, especially at HBCUs, are discussed.

Keywords:

• Internships
• supervisor evaluations
• professional development
• historical black colleges and universities (HBCUs)
• punctuality
• workforce development

Acknowledgments

We thank the journal's editor and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback on an earlier version of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 According to Tabachnick and Fidell (2007), skewness and kurtosis will not substantively affect the analysis of the data if the sample size is larger than 200, which is the case in the present study. Thus, multivariate regression analysis is an appropriate methodology for analyzing the data.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Tameka Williams

Tameka Williams, M.S., is a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at North Carolina Central University, Durham, North Carolina. She is currently pursuing a doctorate of philosophy in Leadership Studies at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Her research interests include organizational leadership, experiential learning, student retention, minority female mentorship, academic barriers for doctoral students, and probation supervision outcomes. She has presented at the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education conference on the interconnectedness between leadership and adult education. She can be reached at [email protected].

Daniel K. Pryce

Daniel K. Pryce, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology & Criminal Justice at Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia. His primary research interests include police–citizen relations, police–immigrant relations, immigration studies, fear of crime and victimization, internships, innovations in policing, and research methods. He was the recipient of the 2017 Dean’s Excellence in Research Award and the 2018 Chancellor’s Award for Research at North Carolina Central University, his previous employer. His scholarly publications have appeared in Journal of Crime & Justice, Criminal Justice Review, Criminal Justice Policy Review, Criminal Justice & Behavior, Security Journal, African Identities, Social Science Quarterly, The Police Journal: Theory, Practice and Principles, and Police Practice and Research: An International Journal.

Tyler Clark

Tyler Clark is pursuing a master’s degree in criminal justice at North Carolina Central University, Durham, North Carolina. Her research interests include open education resources for college students, the effects of discrimination on employment, and the impact of internships on preparation for the workforce. She is also currently working on research for the Department of Homeland Security in which she is working to certify a FEMA course that mobilizes faith-based community organizations in preparing for disasters.

Hydeia Wilfong

Hydeia Wilfong is pursuing a master’s degree in criminal justice at North Carolina Central University, Durham, North Carolina. Her research interests include experiential learning for criminal justice students, higher education, and law enforcement–community relations. In the future, she plans to research policies and standards that can positively impact the criminal justice system.