On Wednesday evening, March 19th, Mitchell Feld, Emily Tamilin, and Dylan Schweers of Council for Children’s Right met with students to discuss their summer internship programs. The Council is a non-profit, comprehensive advocacy program for children and provides services such as representation in court and the school system, community planning and policy work, and advocacy in high conflict custody cases and crimes involving children under the age of sixteen. The goal is to affect systemic chance for the 242,000 children in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area.
Mr. Feld is the Director for Strategic Initiatives and runs the internship program; in fact, he began at Council for Children’s Rights as an intern. His primary work within Strategic Initiatives involves work on policy changes that benefit Charlotte children. Mr. Feld noted that he was drawn to the Council after being pleasantly surprised by the amount of responsibility he was given as an intern—he emphasizes that interns are responsible for seeing projects through from start to finish. “We are excited by our mission,” Mr. Feld says. “We want our interns to be, too.”
As a Research and Planning Associate, Emily Tamilin is responsible for getting organizations together to implement best practices and decide the best use of communal resources. “Research entails building the capacity of child-serving agencies to do what they do better and implement programs and procedures that work,” says Ms. Tamilin. This includes synthesizing literature, pulling and analyzing data, and articulating findings to companies.
Dyan Schweers began at Council for Children’s Rights as an intern, but after only three months, he was brought on full-time. As an intern, Mr. Schweers’ was involved in researching exclusionary discipline in schools and working with advocacy attorneys to fight for the rights of children. Mr. Schweers explained that because of the fluidity of the organization, an intern can expect to gain exposure in multiple aspects of the company. Those interested in law school, research, public policy, social work, government work, and variety of other fields can gain valuable experience from the Council.
The Council for Children’s Rights generally accepts about ten interns in the following fields: Advancement, Children’s Defense Team, Community Planning, Custody Advocacy, Individual Advocacy, Policy, Research, and Social Work. Mr. Feld explained that students are welcome to express interest in multiple branches of the company, and an internship can be divided to accommodate this interest. The internships last ten weeks and applications are reviewed on a rolling basis. Visit Council for Children’s Rights to learn more about each position and WildcatLink to apply.
Thank you to Mr. Feld, Ms. Tamilin, and Mr. Schweers for taking time to speak with Davidson students about Council for Children’s Rights.