Columbia students meet with Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and other Columbia alumni during summer internships in Washington, D.C.

Each summer, the Office of Public Affairs runs a Summer in Washington program for Columbia University interns in Washington, DC, giving students opportunities to meet with and receive career advice from prominent political figures and alumni and to interact with interns from other universities. The program is run through Public Affairs and all programming and coordination is done by the Summer Congressional Intern Coordinator and Ellen S. Smith, Assistant Vice President and Director of Government Relations. This summer's coordinator was Jessica Huang (BC'03).

A record number of more than 100 Columbia interns participated in this year's activities and events. In addition, social activities such as weekend softball games, weekly happy hours and the Fourth of July party on the Mall were coordinated with 12 other schools with similar summer intern programs. The social activities are coordinated to facilitate situations in which students from various schools can meet and interact.

The participating schools included Berkeley, UCLA, University of Chicago, Cornell, Harvard, MIT, University of Michigan, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton, Rutgers, Stanford, and Yale, with a total of over 1500 student participants.

Students placed in Congressional internships through the Office of Public Affairs automatically became part of the summer program. Other students received notification of the program through emails from class centers, career services or by word of mouth.

This year's 12 speakers, all Columbia and Barnard alumni, including Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH) and Steven Law, Chief of Staff of the Department of Labor, among many others, gave their insights to life in Washington and government-related careers. The speakers discussed their careers, their current work and the impact that Columbia has had on their lives in small-group, low-key settings over breakfast or lunch in order to give students an opportunity to interact with the speakers.

The Summer in Washington program provides a supplement to the Washington internship by giving students insights on lives and careers in Washington, DC and the opportunity to interact with students with similar interests.

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