Child life internship

Thank you for your interest in our Child Life Internship program. We are accepting applications for fall and spring internships and currently accepting only one intern per semester. We do not host a summer internship.

Our child life team provides a robust 600-hour, unpaid internship that utilizes the Association of Child Life Professionals (ACLP) curriculum. Interns rotate through the following units as staff are available:

• Medical/surgical unit
• Intensive care unit
• Surgery
• Sedation and radiology
• Emergency department
• Hematology/Oncology
• Outpatient clinics

Our goal is to support interns in mastering the foundational skills of becoming a certified child life specialist. Through clinical experience and in-depth supervision and reflection, our students put theory into practice to be job-ready at the end of their required hours.

Candidate requirements

A signed contract agreement between MultiCare Health System and your university must be established before the start of the internship. (Mary Bridge Children’s is part of MultiCare.) Internship candidates must meet the following requirements to apply:

• Be affiliated with a university
• Have a minimum of 100 hours of volunteer experience in a pediatric hospital or outpatient setting; a child life practicum counts toward the minimum volunteer requirements

While not required, we encourage candidates to gain experience working with children in non-health care settings, such as day cares, schools and camps, before applying.

Application and interview process

We align with the ACLP’s updated internship application process and will only accept online applications. Please complete the Internship Readiness Common Application and email the completed application to [email protected] by the deadline for each semester.

Please refer to the ACLP website for the Internship Readiness Common Application, as well as application deadlines, offers and acceptance dates, as we follow the association’s recommendations.

Once applications are received, we will begin the review process and communicate with candidates via email. If selected for an interview, it will be held via video conferencing. In-person interviews are not required.