Media Relations Intern

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

Unit/ Project Background:

Media Relations team / Communications & Advocacy Section / UN Women Headquarters

Learning Objectives:

1. Increased understanding of UN Women’s work and the UN system;

2. Improved understanding of internal workings of Communications & Advocacy division of UN Women;

3. Increased awareness of media relations, tracking and news data management;

3. Learning about the work of gender and humanitarian action in an international environment;

4. Meeting and networking with UN Women colleagues in other units;

5. Work as a team member in a multicultural setting.

Duties and Responsibilities

This internship focuses on MEDIA RELATIONS i.e. dealing with the traditional media/ press. It does not include working on social media, editorial work, photography, or video-production. In this team, our work focuses on developing and managing relationships with reporters and editors, giving them easy access to UN Women story ideas and sources, and working with them to increase coverage of UN Women’s work and gender equality in the traditional press. As an intern you would:

• Assist the team in the abovementioned work
• Provide support during the 16 Days Campaign for the Elimination of Violence against Women in November-December 2018 as well as the Commission on the Status of Women conference in March 2019.
• Actively expand and maintain the media contact database; research and add media contacts to UN Women’s database, as well as updating existing contacts, as needed
• Support media outreach; Research and support for media interviews and materials
• Keep abreast of relevant news and UN Women activities or programmes in the field, suggesting topics for news or feature story coverage
• Fact-checking, analyzing, and drafting material for external communications; this includes providing support in the production of communications materials such as factsheets and press releases.
• Assist in preparing weekly news coverage reports and monitoring daily news; working with our media monitoring vendor on editing reports and providing feedback
• Collaborate with colleagues from various other teams within the Communications Division (e.g. social media, editorial, audio-visual, multimedia).
• Other tasks as requested by the Communications Team

Competencies

• Experience in communications, advocacy, public relations, journalism, media and press relations;
• Experience in not-for-profit communications and advocacy work;
• Keen interest in gender equality/ women’s issues;
• Proficiency in communications, teamwork, planning and organizing, creativity and technological awareness.

Required Skills and Experience

• The candidate MUST have studied communications, journalism, public relations, media or any other similar subject at the master’s level;
• The candidate must show relevant experience in the work of communications and preferably, public/ media relations.
• Be enrolled in a graduate school programme (second university degree or equivalent, or higher); be enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (minimum Bachelor's level or equivalent); OR have recently graduated with a university degree and, if selected, must commence the internship within a one-year period of graduation.

AVAILABILITY

You must be available for six months, from 1 Nov 2018  to 1 May 2019. Please indicate in the application form (full instructions on how to apply below), which dates you are available for. Candidates who are available on a full-time basis (40 hours a week) will be given a preference.

LANGUAGE

• Fluent in spoken and written English (Spanish, Arabic or French is a plus)
• Excellent communication skills (written and oral) in English are required;

Interns are not financially remunerated by UN Women.

INSTRUCTIONS TO APPLY – PLEASE READ CAREFULLY:

Please click on the APPLY NOW button on this page and fill out the form when prompted. On the last page of the form, you will be given the option to upload your CV. Please read on for instructions on what to upload:

IMPORTANT: When prompted to upload your CV, you must compile and upload the following as ONE single document (print out the separate documents (if needed), and scan as one single PDF) in the following order:

1. Internship Programme Application Form [please do not hand-write the answers, we recommend downloading this form onto your computer] – Link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/v1thhovia57735q/Internship%20Programme%20Application%20-%20downloaded.docx?dl=0
2. Resume
3. Cover letter
4. 2 writing samples (ideally of your own coverage of women’s issues/ or an example of a communications material you have drafted e.g. press release)

NOTE: Your application will NOT be considered if you do not upload ALL the above listed elements. UN Women will only be able to respond to those applications in which there is further interest.

Once the candidate has been selected, the following additional documents need to be submitted:

• Letter of enrollment from school/ college or diploma certifying completion of undergraduate degree
• Scanned US visa document and scanned passport document (if no visa is required)
• Scanned medical insurance document/ proof of health insurance
• 2 letters of recommendation (with contact details of referee)

NOTE: Candidates are responsible for obtaining their own work permit for the United States of America.

UN Women Internship Policy:

• Applicants to the United Nations internship programme must at the time of application meet one of the following requirements:
  • Be enrolled in a graduate school programme (second university degree or equivalent, or higher);
  • Be enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (minimum Bachelor’s level or equivalent) or;
  • Have graduated with a university degree (as above) and, if selected, must commence the internship within one year.

• UN Women internship programme does not provide a salary or remuneration for the internship;
• All the expenses connected with the internship will be borne by the intern, sponsoring Government or institution;
• UN Women accepts no responsibility for costs arising from accidents and/or illness or death incurred during the internship;
• The intern is responsible for obtaining necessary visas and arranging travel to and from the duty station where the internship will be performed;
• The intern must provide proof of enrollment in a health insurance plan, proof of school enrollment, a scanned copy of his/her passport, two letters of recommendation, and application.

Note:

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.