(Revised) Undergraduate Intern in Digital Literacy (Fall)

Pay Range: $15 per hour

Work Schedule: Flexible, up to 10 hours/week (150 hours per semester)

About the Role

The Dodge Family College of Arts & Sciences (DFCAS) seeks two OU undergraduates to serve as Digital Literacy Interns for the 2026-2027 academic year. The role brings humanities students into the college’s investigation of how technology access and digital skills shape student success. Interns assist Jeremy Hessman (DFCAS IT Strategist) and work as a research team.

Open to any full-time OU DFCAS student, with hiring preference for majors in the arts, humanities, or interpretive social sciences. While being a Humanities student isn’t a requirement, applicants must be part of the Dodge Family College of Arts and Sciences.

Internships span 15 weeks per semester, with the option to continue across both fall and spring. Internships can be taken simultaneously for credit with appropriate academic scaffolding. Students who wish to pursue this option should contact their department chair as early as possible.

Responsibilities

• Qualitative Research: Conduct interviews and site visits with faculty, staff, and students across DFCAS departments. Surface what digital literacy looks like in practice across disciplines (e.g., chemistry, film studies, philosophy).
• Technology Access Auditing: Map the state of technology access across DFCAS buildings. Identify connectivity gaps, software cost barriers, and computing lab limitations affecting student success.
• Framework Development: Help draft a DFCAS Digital Literacy Framework defining tiers of digital competency, mapping them to existing courses, and identifying gaps. Align national frameworks (NACE core competencies, US DOL AI Literacy Framework, ACRL information literacy standards) with DFCAS programs.
• Written Communication: Produce a Technology Access Audit Report, a Digital Literacy Landscape Map, and contribute to the framework document. Deliverables require clarity, rigor, and audience awareness.
• Stakeholder Engagement: Build relationships with faculty, IT staff, library partners (Stamps Family Reading Room and Bizzell), and administrators. Advocate for digital equity in terms relevant to each audience.

Interns will also gain hands-on experience with software tools common in non-profit, public, and private sectors, including Microsoft Forms, Excel, SharePoint, Outlook, and Teams. Familiarity with qualitative or quantitative research tools (NVivo, SPSS, R, or Python) is welcome but not required.

Skills

We’re Looking For

• Interview craft and close listening
• Ethical reasoning and comfort with ambiguity
• Strong writing skills
• Interest in technology equity as a human-centered question (e.g., access, barriers, and impact)

Humanities students are well-prepared to ask and answer these questions.

You’ll Develop

• Primary research methodology
• Framework design
• Basic data analysis
• Stakeholder communication and presentation skills
• Experience carrying a research project from open question to published deliverable within an organization

Findings produced in this role are suitable for conference presentations and institutional reporting.

Benefits

• Exposure to national conversations on digital equity and AI in higher education
• Preparation for careers in higher education, education policy, non-profit sectors, or fields where technology equity matters
• Deliverables shared with college leadership

Contact Jeremy Hessman (hessman@ou.edu) with questions.