• Self-direction

• Application

• Work Experience

• Letter of Recommendation

• Personal Essay

• Grades

• Verification Statement

• Additional Material or Portfolio

• Telephone Interview

SELF-DIRECTION
The committee will give a separate score for evidence of self-direction.  This score will be based on answers to the Personal Essay, Letters of Recommendation, work experience, phone interview, and additional materials submitted. 

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APPLICATION

The new ADA application form only asks for dietetics-related experience in the last 5 years.  We are interested in all of your experiences whether they are related to dietetics or not.  Either add all jobs into the application form, or send a resume or separate list of your jobs and volunteer experiences.  Include you major tasks/responsibilities, dates you worked and the number of hours you worked.  If you have significant work experience prior to the last 5 years, feel free to include that as well.

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WORK EXPERIENCE

Paid and volunteer experiences in any area will be considered.   You may include work experience prior to the last five years.  Please be as specific as possible regarding dates and hours/week worked.  More weight will be given to positions requiring leadership, creativity, flexibility, and self direction, so be sure to include in the description of the key responsibilities if appropriate.

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LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION

At least three letters of recommendation are required, one of which must be from an instructor in a major subject and at least one from a work supervisor.  Work recommendations do not have to relate to dietetics, but you should include any experiences where you had a leadership role, were required to work independently or display flexibility.  Please ask your references to address these areas in their letters.  LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATION MUST BE SEALED AND THE WRITER'S SIGNATURE MUST BE ACROSS THE FLAP.

NOTE:  THE SODEXO RECOMMENDATION FORM MUST BE USED.  While we will not disqualify you if the standard form is used, it will hurt your score on this portion of the application.

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PERSONAL ESSAY

In place of the standard letter of application, we are asking you to answer the following questions.  There is no minimum or maximum number of pages.   However, please be clear and concise in answering each question while being complete enough to fully answer each question.  We encourage you to use creativity in your writing.  If you have other information that you feel is important for the selection committee to know, separate it out from the answers to the questions.   Address each question separately.  Please address each of the following questions--examples you use DO NOT have to be work or school related:

• Describe something you have done that you consider truly creative.  (NOTE:  This does not have to be work or school related.  you may want to describe an event, a surprise, a vacation that you planned/coordinated.)
   
• Describe your professional goals for the next 5 years after completing the internship and explain how you think this internship will help you achieve your goals.
   
• Describe your most rewarding experience--work, school or personal life.
   
• Describe one of the most difficult obstacles you have had to overcome.  How did you handle it?  How do you feel this experience affected your personality or abilities?
   

• This last question is a little different.  List 5 people you admire and 3-5 characteristics you admire about them.  This can be put in table format (see example below).   Then write a short paragraph explaining why you chose the people on your list.  People you admire can be personal friends, family, public figures, characters from a book, dead or alive.  An example of how you might set this up is:

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GRADES

Submit transcripts from all post secondary schools attended.   Total GPA and GPA in DPD required courses will be evaluated.

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VERIFICATION STATEMENT

All students must submit a valid DPD Verification Statement prior to starting the internship.  Those students who have not yet completed their DPD requirements will submit a Declaration of Intent to Complete form with their application and a DPD Verification Form prior to starting the internship.   These forms would be obtained from the student's DPD Director and must be an original copy signed in ink other than black by the Director or other authorized individual.  Plan IV Verification Statements are no longer valid.  Students who have this verification should contact their DPD director to discuss requirements for obtaining a DPD Verification.  STUDENTS MATCHED TO THIS PROGRAM WILL NOT BE ABLE TO START THE INTERNSHIP UNTIL A VALID DPD VERIFICATION FORM IS SUBMITTED. 

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ADDITIONAL MATERIAL OR PORTFOLIO

We strongly encourage you to submit any additional information that will help the committee to better evaluate your strengths, what you are like as person, and how well you will fit with this program.  Examples of items you may want to include are: papers or projects completed for any of your classes, articles written by or about you, special projects completed at work or for volunteer organizations, special experiences or talents, certificates or awards.  We are not looking for a large volume of materials, but we are looking for variety--demonstrating the breadth of your experiences.   We are also looking for an explanation of what each piece of the portfolio is and why you included it.

While we will not disqualify you if you do not include any additional materials, you need to be aware of the fact that we do use it in the initial screening and subsequent evaluation of the applications.  Your score will be affected by this and can mean the difference between making it into the group that will be interviewed and ranked or not.  (In this past selection process, no one who did not submit portfolio materials scored high enough to receive an interview).

A good website that might help you in preparing your portfolio is http://www.aag.org/Careers/UW/Profportfolios.html. 

IMPORTANT:   Portfolio materials WILL NOT be returned. It is recommended that you keep your originals and put copies in your portfolio.  

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TELEPHONE INTERVIEW

Once the applications are screened and evaluated, some of the applicants will be called for a telephone interview.  The purpose of this interview is to give the selection committee more information about your personality, your philosophy and your work habits.  You will not be quizzed about your clinical knowledge.  The program director will interview you alone, but will tape the conversation for the rest of the selection committee listen to.  A time will be arranged that is convenient for both you and the program director.

SOME WORDS OF ADVICE FOR COMPLETING YOUR APPLICATION

• We DO value creativity and a sense of humor in this program.   We encourage you to answer the questions for the personal essay and to put together your portfolio in a way that will show us what your personality is like and what your talents are.  It will help us in our decision if we can get a better feel for you as a person.  We are most interested in finding candidates who would be a good match for this program.  When you are completing your application, think about what makes you unique and a good match for us.  Adding creative or humorous touches to your application will help you to show your uniqueness and help you to stand out from the other candidates, not to mention the fact that it will make our review of the applications much more enjoyable!
   
• A well-organized, neat and easy-to-read application makes a good first impression for any program you are applying to.  It tells us that you are serious about your application to our program and are interested in showing us your best.
   
• Please read everything over carefully.   (For example, make sure you spell Sodexo correctly!)  While we expect you to write your personal essay yourself, it is certainly permissible to have someone else read it over to catch any spelling or grammatical errors.  We prefer that the essay be typed.
   
• While we would prefer to have all of the pieces of the application included in the packet you send us, we understand that sometimes you have difficulties getting all your recommendations and/or transcripts in time.   If you are having anything sent separately, please let us know when you send your application so that we will know you have not forgotten it.
   
• Please have all application materials sent to the address in New Boston, NH (133 Hooper Hill Road, New Boston, NH   03070).  If you send it to the Waltham address, I will get it, but it means the staff at the office will have to forward it on to me and it will be delayed.
   
• The Tufts University Interns have developed a website devoted to giving applicants to internships some guidelines.  It is a great site and may be helpful to you:  http://www.dieteticinterntips.com 
   
• While we have set our deadline to coincide with D&D Digital's deadline, we get a large number of applications at the last minute and sending it early would be very much appreciated by the selection committee.
   

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