Terre des Hommes

Third Year DPhil, DPhil Education, Remote working

Work Projects

For this internship, I was assisting with research activities for Terre des hommes Children and Youth in Migration programme. This involved a desk review exploring the concept of youth empowerment, both in the literature and internal documentation, and then developing a background paper, indicators and operational guidance for future projects with migrant youth.

I worked mostly with one supervisor, who is the Regional Manager of the programme for Europe, via Skype calls during the summer and email contact. I was also in touch with other relevant staff who were very helpful in providing documents, contacts and further information.

My supervisor and I agreed on the terms of the internship when I started, refined my research plan and then discussed my draft reports and key tasks to prioritise and maximise the usefulness of any work I produced. I did all this remotely, due to COVID restrictions on travel, and had a lot of scope to shape the nature of the internship as I worked independently.

Daily Life

I completed this internship remotely, which had its pros and cons. I was looking forward to getting involved in Terre des hommes office life in Budapest and getting to know the staff and other interns there. I feel that this is a key way to form relationships with peers and colleagues in a sector I would like to work in in the future.

However, being remote meant that I had the freedom to move around and could determine my own working hours to better fit with family life and other tasks related to COVID-related upheavals. In general, I stuck to regular working hours to keep a routine and avoid the issue of erratic schedules which can happen when working from home. In the evenings and at the weekends I tried to get outside as much as possible, seeing friends and family (albeit from a distance) and doing something active to balance out all of the screen time.

Lasting Impressions

The internship has confirmed my career ambition to work in or with this sector, either via academic relationships or a non-governmental organisation. I learnt more about the process of developing projects and translating academic research principles into practical tools, as well as how certain concepts and principles are put into practice. It has also confirmed my passion to work with youth affected by migration, which is the focus of my DPhil, and to find ways to enable them to participate more fully in the life of their new host communities.

MSc Criminology and Criminal Justicestudent, Remote Working

Work Projects

Terre des hommes is a children’s rights NGO with the European office based in Hungary. The internship was remote working and lasted three weeks in total. I conducted an open-source research project mapping technological innovations within European criminal justice systems.

More specifically, I identified applications, digital tools and chatbots which aimed to support children in gaining access to justice. I wrote up a 7,000-word research report showing my findings and providing clear conclusions about the spread of relevant technological innovations. The other document was an Excel spreadsheet containing raw information about the projects individually, essentially a database listing digital tools.

I had daily contact with my supervisor by Skype and I had weekly video chats discussing my findings and offering guidance on my work. My supervisor sent helpful information sources and examples of projects as well as strategy docs from the organisation. It was a very useful experience which produced clear results and helped add something to my CV.

Daily Life

This was eventually a remote working internship conducted from the UK while my supervisor worked from mainland Europe. I worked very flexibly, my supervisor allowed me to work irregular hours as necessary, and work slightly different days than the usual Monday to Friday. This was helpful and allowed me to complete other job interviews.

I kept busy outside of work, pretty basic things like walks during lunch or running were really helpful. The downside of working remotely is that you can easily get into a very narrow routine and getting out of the house is vital. I had fairly limited contact with my supervisor, usually I would send one message per day to my supervisor and get one reply. Throughout the project this was good, as my terms of reference were pretty clear. The only caveat is that my internship was only three weeks, if I had worked longer, then I might have found a slightly different routine was best.

Lasting Impressions

Generally, the internship was enjoyable. I had the independence to conduct my own research and the autonomy to manage the project largely by myself as it was remote. The downside to this was that you lost some of the benefits of an internship such as the networking and the time meeting colleagues. That being said, this internship gave me useful and relevant experience for my CV, a valuable addition to my work history following Oxford.

Elisa Sisto, Green Templeton College, MSc Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, Mixed In-person/Remote Working

Work Projects

I conducted research and fundraising activities pertaining to the target group children left behind, understood as children having at least one parent/caregiver who left in migration. I first led desk-based research on the legal and policy frameworks regulating labour

migration between the European Union, Moldova and Ukraine and on the challenges faced by children left behind. Building on this research and on a previously written Concept Note, I drafted a project proposal aiming to support transnational families from Moldova and Ukraine.

I wrote the narrative as well as the logical framework sections of the proposal, which were then reviewed and edited by the consortium of project partners. In addition, I conducted interviews with representatives from Terre des hommes delegations in Eastern European and South Asian countries featuring a large prevalence of transnational families in order to assess whether a mechanism for internal cooperation could be beneficial to each delegations work pertaining to children left behind.

My internship supervisor, Pierre Cazenave, offered his generous availability and support throughout the internship to ensure that I not only understood but also enjoyed the tasks at hand. It was a real pleasure and honour to be supervised by Pierre, who always greeted us in the office with kindness and made sure that we felt integrated and valued within the team.

Daily Life

Walking to the office in the morning was a highlight of daily life in Budapest. Terre des hommes offices are located at the top of a building in Buda with a breath-taking view of the Hungarian Parliament. Living in a lively district of Pest and crossing the Danube in the morning and evening to get to and from work was a pleasurable routine. Life inside and outside of work was enjoyable and enriching, and we were very much encouraged to take time to discover the city. On the weekends and in the evenings, together with a fellow classmate and intern, we discovered the different districts and atmospheres that Budapest has to offer. In addition, we were kindly invited to office social events through which we had the opportunity to meet colleagues from other Terre des hommes programmes.

Lasting Impressions

I thoroughly enjoyed my experience with Terre des hommes Children and Youth in Migration Programme in Budapest. I am extremely grateful to my supervisor Pierre Cazenave, to Terre des hommes, to the Oxford Internship Office and to Santander for making this opportunity possible. Pierre’s style of leadership offered interns independence and responsibility, and I felt that the work I was invited to produce was important for the organisation and could make a difference.

I also gained new skills pertaining to project proposal writing that will without doubt prove useful for a career in the fields of migration and child protection. Moreover, conducting the interviews regarding a mechanism for internal cooperation exposed me to the work and visions of a diversity of Terre des hommes staff operating in different countries and contexts. This internship confirmed my career ambitions and offered me invaluable insight into how an organisation of the size and international outlook of Terre des hommes functions.