The Yawkey Foundation’s gift to Boston University is the first permanent fund supporting student internships and focuses on unpaid internships at nonprofit organizations. The program is designed primarily for sophomores, with juniors also eligible to apply.
In addition to providing a living allowance stipend, the program is designed to enhance recipients’ learning experiences through program components such as the development of a learning agreement and, upon the internship’s conclusion, the writing of a reflective essay.
Internships may be completed during the fall or spring semester of sophomore year, during the summer following sophomore year, during the fall or spring semester of junior year, or during the summer following junior year.
Applicants for funding must already have secured a qualified internship. Recipients will receive a stipend of $2,000 for fall or spring semester internships and $4,000 for summer internships (with some exceptions; see New: For Spring 2022).
During Summer 2022, the Yawkey Program will have expanded eligibility for students to participate.
In order to facilitate student participation in the Yawkey Program for the summer of 2022, we have made the following changes.
April 24, 11:59pm: Priority Deadline
May 22, 11:59pm: Final Deadline
Final application decisions will be made on a rolling basis
See our calendar for more details and to register to attend, or access a recorded session through the Handshake resource article.
The Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program is a competitive program for which students must apply and be accepted in order to receive funding. In order to be eligible to apply for funding, students must:
A demonstrated commitment to community service is preferred, but not required.
International students who meet program requirements are welcome to apply. Since this award is a non-service based scholarship, international students are not required to obtain U.S. off-campus employment authorization in order to participate.
Any selected student with an internship outside the United States must ensure that they have appropriate visa or employment authorization for the country where the internship is located.
Before the Internship
During the Internship
After the Internship
Eligible students must complete an application, which includes:
Following the application deadline, the selection committee will review all complete applications and notify applicants of decisions by email.
Once the student has been accepted to the program, they will need to complete the Award Agreement linked below. The page is password protected; the student will be given the password once accepted into the program.
Stipends will be paid to Yawkey Interns by the University during their program participation and through a distribution schedule that will be shared via email to participants. If you have questions about the distribution schedule of the stipends, please contact yawkey@bu.edu.
Living allowance stipends are intended to defray living expenses and enable students to accept internships with nonprofit organizations, which are often unpaid. In no instance is a living allowance stipend a payment involving services as it relates to work, and it is not compensation for any work carried out during or in conjunction with the internship.
A living allowance stipend is not subject to withholdings by the University. However, the IRS may consider a living allowance stipend to be taxable income to the recipient student. It is the recipient student’s responsibility to report this income accurately and make payments on any taxable portion of the award.
Federal regulations and Boston University policy require that all student resources—including stipends such as those from the Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program, which are intended to assist with living expenses—be taken into consideration when calculating a student’s eligibility for need-based financial aid. As a result, if a student’s financial aid award includes federal or BU need-based aid, the combination of all need-based aid, merit awards, and Yawkey stipends cannot exceed the student’s calculated financial aid eligibility. Yawkey funding for summer internships will not affect academic year awards but may affect summer awards.
If an adjustment to a need-based financial aid package is required as a result of including a Yawkey stipend in the package, the loan and employment portion of the award is reduced first, before scholarships or grants. Federal Work-Study and need-based student loans (such as the Direct Federal Stafford Loan) are either reduced or cancelled before scholarships or grants are affected. Scholarship/grant aid is reduced only if necessary to avoid aid in excess of calculated financial eligibility. Assistance from all sources (need, merit, or credit-based) cannot exceed a student’s total cost of attendance.
When applying, students are encouraged to contact yawkey@bu.edu with any questions about the potential effect of the stipend on their aid package.
NOTE: For Summer 2022, please see modified requirements and special instructions above.
A qualified internship must be an unpaid experience at a nonprofit organization, which must have official status in the state in which it operates or equivalent if outside the United States. Further, the nonprofit must be organized around a cause, mission, or community need and may only pursue purposes permitted by federal and state statutes for nonprofit organizations. The nonprofit cannot be owned or operated by a member of the applicant’s family and cannot be affiliated with BU.
Internships must be supervised by a full-time employee, who is not a member of the intern’s family, and cannot be for academic credit. Fall or spring semester internships must be at least 120 hours (approximately 10 hours/week), and summer internships must be at least 300 hours (approximately 25-35 hours/week).
Students cannot secure their internship by paying a fee to any third party, including an individual or organization, for placement or participation. Additionally, internships that require fundraising in advance of participation are not eligible for funding.
Fall and spring semester internships must be located in the Boston area. Summer internships may be outside of the Boston area if the organization’s mission is aligned with one of 6 broad areas, the Yawkey Areas of Giving.
Funding through the Yawkey Program is not applicable for government-related internships.
Applicants must submit a letter of intent, on organization letterhead, signed by the employer.
If you have secured an internship and are getting academic credit and/or fulfilling a program requirement, that internship does not qualify for the Yawkey Program.
The Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program focuses on academic, professional, and personal learning objectives.
Academic learning objectives are intended to allow you to further explore or implement, at the internship site, concepts you’ve learned in the classroom. For example, if you are interning in an educational setting, your objective might be to practice a specific teaching technique.
Professional learning objectives are those related to your growth as a professional or to develop a better sense of the particular field in which you are interning. For example, your objective may be to conduct at least five informational interviews with various employees at your internship organization to get a better sense of the opportunities within that field.
Personal learning objectives are intended to help you develop skills for personal growth and enrichment. For example, your objective may be to learn how to better manage your time in order to balance school, your internship, and involvement in student groups. Another personal objective might be to overcome shyness and become better acquainted with colleagues at your internship site.
Source: Hamline University, adapted with permission.
Students are eligible to participate as early as the fall semester of their sophomore year (for which they would apply prior to their sophomore year) and as late as the summer semester after their junior year (for which they would apply during the spring semester of their junior year).
Summer Yawkey stipends are available to students in the summer after sophomore or junior year. Fall and spring semester Yawkey stipends are available to students in their sophomore or junior year.
Application deadlines will be announced as soon as dates are set.
The following list outlines the steps students will need to take to apply for the Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program.
1. Check your class standing
Will you have sophomore or junior class standing at the time of a fall/spring semester internship? If applying for a summer internship, will it be the summer after your sophomore or junior year?
2. Check your GPA
Is it 2.0 or above?
3. Attend Funded Internship Programs 101 if you haven’t already
Check the calendar for the upcoming sessions. Make sure you sign in so that your attendance is recorded.
4. Secure a qualifying internship
5. Get a letter of intent from the organization
Once you have secured a qualified internship, you’ll need to get a letter of intent from the employer. A pdf or scanned copy is recommended so that you can upload it easily as part of your application.
6. Secure a faculty recommender
In order to have a letter of recommendation that helps your application, you want to ask a faculty member who can speak positively about you on the specific points that are requested (see instructions).
Once you have identified someone who you think could write a strong recommendation, ask if they are able to do so. Make sure that you share information on the program (including the recommendation instructions) and be sure to give them enough time.
The faculty recommender must email the letter of recommendation directly to yawkey@bu.edu.
7. Prepare your application responses
The application form is not one that allows you to save your progress; you have to complete it in a single session. Therefore, we strongly recommend that you prepare your responses, especially for the essay questions, in a separate document. This way, you can take your time to prepare thoughtful responses that you can simply copy and paste into the application form when you are ready to submit it.
8. Complete and submit your application
9. While you are waiting to hear about application decisions…
Review the learning agreement form and consider your goals, objectives, and action plan.
Each Yawkey Intern will have their own spending needs. The stipend is intended to help defray the cost of living, meaning some students may need it to pay rent, utilities, food, or other regular bills (cell phone, internet, car insurance). Whatever your plans are, it is important to think about a budget. There are several free or low-cost resources to help you manage your budget around your spending needs and habits.
BU’s Office of Financial Assistance offers a host of resources with their SmartMoney 101 initiative including workshops and budgeting tools such as CashCourse, a money guide to all things financial.
Additional public resources include:
BU and the CCD are not responsible for any of the financial decisions you make using these or other tools.
Students are encouraged to tell prospective employers if they are planning to apply to the Yawkey Program and to share information about the employer’s responsibilities.
Your recommendation must come from a BU faculty member who teaches a for-credit class (3 or more credits, not pass-fail). It is important that you choose your letter writer carefully. You want to have a conversation with them to make sure that they can write a strong letter of recommendation for you.
Remember, it doesn’t have to be a professor for a class that is related to the internship. It can be any faculty member who is able to write a strong recommendation for you, and be able to speak to your classroom contributions, leadership potential and/or project commitment, character and maturity, and how you will benefit from participating in the program.
Keep in mind that many non-faculty teach classes at BU, including graduate students, staff members, postdoctoral fellows, and others. These individuals do not qualify as a faculty recommender, but could be a second (optional) recommender. If you’re not sure if the person you want to ask is a faculty member, please contact us at yawkey@bu.edu.
Take a look at your schedule and make time to get to know them. Visiting office hours, participating and answering questions during class, and talking to them before or after lecture are great ways to build a relationship.
You can ask them additional questions about readings you have done, ask for help on areas that are confusing in class, ask for additional information or recommended reading on topics of particular interest, or ask for career advice.
No, the letter of recommendation must be from a faculty member, not a TA/TF. Although you may feel more comfortable asking your TA or TF, you really should make an effort to get to know your professors. Talk to your TA or TF about speaking with your professor, he/she knows that professor well and may be able to provide you with some advice.
You can also ask your TA/TF if he/she would be willing to help. Tell them that you need a faculty recommendation and are aware that the professor doesn’t know much about you since it is a large lecture class. Ask if they would be able to provide information and/or help write the letter given their knowledge of your work in the class.
When you meet with the professor, provide him/her with a sample of work that you did in his/her class, your current resume, and your answers to the essay questions for the Yawkey application. Have a discussion about your performance in the class and (if the TA/TF has offered to help) that the TA/TF knows you well and would be willing to provide relevant information for the letter, but that the letter does indeed need to come from a faculty member.
Ask as early as you can. You should not be asking a few days before the deadline. As soon as you know that you are going to apply, you should visit your professor to discuss their ability to write the letter for you, including if they have the time to do so.
Give the faculty member as much material as possible (resume, sample class assignment(s), and application essay responses), and be sure to provide both the recommendation guidelines (pdf) and the deadline for submission. You might also share information about the Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program more generally. You will also want to check in with a reminder or two in the weeks leading up to the deadline and to see if they need any more information.
Make sure that you thank your professor by sending a thank-you note. You should also let him/her know if you receive funding and how your internship went.
Your recommender should email the letter of recommendation directly to yawkey@bu.edu. We do not email your listed recommender to ask for this letter of recommendation, so please be sure to give them the correct email address and recommendation instructions.
