Last summer, Saige Caldwell received a flier in the mail advertising a brand-new opportunity at Boise State – the Capital Connection program, where students live, study and intern in Washington, D.C. for a semester. A rising senior in the Political Science program at Boise State, Saige is interested in criminal advocacy and public interest law, and she recognized the value that an experience in D.C. would bring for her future career plans.
In the program, students complete an internship in addition to a full semester of online classwork. When choosing her internship program, Saige was drawn to an opportunity at Georgetown Law in their Public Defense Clinics, where new lawyers work as fellows in their first and second years post-graduation. Specifically, she interned for the Juvenile Justice Clinic alongside two lawyers and another intern. Her role in this program was as a primary investigator for every case brought to the clinic. Saige described the program as an intense but extremely rewarding learning experience that helped to solidify her future academic and career goals.
“To go and work in an office where I was directly working with clients- I was visiting people while they were incarcerated, I was taking them to services afterwards to get them the resources they needed to be successful…to have an impact directly on individuals’ lives is something that really fueled me and was an experience that I had never been able to have before.”
Through the connections she made in her internship, Saige was able to receive mentorship and direction from individuals who work in the career she is hoping to pursue.
“My alumni mentor through the Capital Connection program was Monica Hopkins, the executive director of the ACLU in D.C….we grew a really strong relationship while I was there and we bonded over our passions for civil rights and advocacy.”
Saige’s time as an intern in Washington, D.C. was an experience that she feels is well worth it for learning more about a desired career field and forming invaluable connections that help students move forward in their next steps. She was the first intern from Idaho in the Georgetown Law program, and she emphasized the importance of stepping outside your comfort zone and gaining experience in a completely different place:
“I cannot recommend this program enough, specifically the internship I did, for challenging yourself and gaining a new perspective that you might never have had the opportunity to experience before, especially coming from Idaho.”
In Spring of 2025, the Capital Connection program will be sending its second cohort of students to Washington, D.C. Learn more about the program and how you can support its students by visiting the Capital Connection website.
By Lainey Rehkemper
