Applicants
Selection Process
BECOMING AN HCC INTERN
Health Career Connection (HCC) attracts talented, undergraduates, and recent college graduates who have a demonstrated commitment to public health, behavioral health, and/or improving access and outcomes in the health industry. HCC has designed a rigorous process to find the best fit between student talents, passions, and goals and host organizations’ needs and learning opportunities. This process has resulted in consistently high satisfaction among both interns and host organizations.
ANNOUNCEMENT: The application for the Summer 2025 HCC Internship and Community Health Leaders Programs Application has closed. The application for the Summer 2026 HCC Internship and Community Health Leaders Programs Application will open in fall 2025.
ELIGIBILITY
HCC supports undergraduate students and recent college graduates interested in:
Public health disciplines
- Health services management
- Health policy and advocacy
- Health education and behavior change
- Environmental health
- Nutrition
- Public health informatics
- Maternal and child health
- Community health
Topical areas
- Health finance
- Health information technology
- Analysis of big data
- Health consulting
- Quality improvement
- Human resources
- Community health improvement
- Building healthy communities
- Medicine, nursing, and dentistry combined with public health
- Life sciences
- Behavioral health (mental health and substance use)
- Health workforce development
- Process and performance improvement
HCC does not provide clinical or research experience though we welcome students with these interests combined with one of our public health disciplines and/or open to exploring health career alternatives. Our placement opportunities provide experience and exposure in the public health, health care, behavioral health and biopharma health fields.
HCC APPLICATION PROCESS
Online Application
Our evaluation team carefully assess applicants fit for both the HCC Program and placement opportunities. The online application includes:
- Application questions
- Resume or CV
- Short essay questions
HCC Interview
HCC staff interview selected applicants to further assess interests, motivations, talents, and fit with local opportunities.
Host Organization Interview
Selected applicants interview with potential placement sites.
Final Placement
HCC will coordinate the placement process and notify you of your final placement based on the post-interview feedback collected from both prospective interns and host organizations.
INTERN SELECTION CRITERIA
HCC’s founders and staff have been placing interns for over 34 years. Based on our experience, we use a combination of factors, in partnership with our host organizations, to select interns using a holistic review process. Some of the key factors are:
- Interest in gaining further exposure, experience, and skills in public health, health management, health policy, and behavioral health
- Commitment to improving health access and community health outcomes
- Alignment with host organization expectations and opportunities
- Quality of applicant’s essay responses
- Educational experience, including health-related major(s) and coursework, and grade point average (no minimum GPA required)
- Participation in pipeline, pathway, or enrichment programs
- Ability to devote full attention to completing 10 consecutive weeks, full-time (40 hours per week), primarily during typical business hours, during the internship
- Demonstrated professional skill set and leadership capacity in areas including, but not limited to, customer service, community support, and health promotion (experiences may include involvement in student organizations, clubs, student government, community organizing, etc.)
- Geographic compatibility with the location of HCC internships
- Interpersonal skills and ability to take initiative, be flexible, adaptable, and resilient
- Lived experience with health challenges or social, economic, and/or educational barriers to overcome
- Relevant experiences working on health-related programs or projects
- Articulated reason and rationale for interest in Health Career Connection
- Language skills and community knowledge relevant to potential internship placements