Happy Tuesday! Hope everyone enjoyed your weekend! Mine was a little rocky, but I did because I finally finished my DICAS application!!! I’ll share more in a blog post sometime soon. What I can say right now is that I’m so happy to be done with it for now. Today, however, I wanted to share what I’ve found on a dietetic internship at the very popular Texas A&M University in College Station. Although the school is well-known for its insane school spirit and its traditions, it also has a well-rounded dietetics program. If you want to become a Texas Aggie as a dietetic intern, here’s some info to know before you apply!
Internship Basics
The Texas A&M internship offers a nine month internship (August to May) that can be connected to an optional Masters of Science degree. The program accepts 12 students each match period and only participates in the spring match. Six of those spots are reserved for A&M students that apply by the pre-select date on January 15. Overall about 43 people apply per year, which means on pure numbers alone you have a 28% chance of acceptance. Don’t forget that percentage doesn’t reflect the number of pre-select applicants versus normal applicants. If you’re a current A&M student, you’ll have odds greater than 28%. If you’re a normal student, you’ll have lower odds.
The internship doesn’t have any graduate classes connected to it as far I’m aware. Because of that and the fact that the graduate program is completely separate from the internship, I’ll on focus on the internship. If you’re interested in earning a graduate degree in nutrition, kinesiology, public health, or food science while you’re there for your internship, I’ll link to their resources on that here.
Texas A&M Rotations
Every internship offers rotations in clinical, foodservice, and community settings, and of course, Texas A&M’s program is no exception. The school also has a clinical concentration, which means that interns will spend more time in places like clinics, hospitals, and dialysis centers.
Based on the example DI rotation sites page, many of the rotation sites are in the Temple and Bryan/College Station areas. Some are also in Waco, Belton, Brenham, and even Austin, Houston, and Dallas! For those of you not familiar with the area, Austin and Houston are about a two hour drive from Bryan/Collage Station and Dallas is three. Not to worry, though. Most of the sites seemed closer to an hour-and-a-half commute time, or right in the local area.
Based on the different example sites, interns work with populations including veterans, kids in hospitals and school districts, patients on dialysis, WIC clients, and A&M students. Past rotations have also been at a preventative wellness center, TAMU AgriLife Extension, and the Cardiac Rehab Center at Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston.
Why Choose the Texas A&M University Dietetic Internship?
The Texas A&M University Dietetic Internship’s mission is “to provide a high quality education and a variety of supervised practice experiences to prepare interns to be effective entry-level registered dietitian nutritionists.” Therefore, based on that statement and what I’ve read, consider if A&M is right for you if…
- Want a well-rounded internship experience that reflects all parts of being a dietitian
- Would like to focus on clinical settings
- Want a shorter internship
- Would like to live in Texas and learn more about working with smaller populations and rural areas
Resources
Interested in learning more about Texas A&M and their dietetic internship? Here’s some websites that I sourced for information or found useful!
- Texas A&M Dietetic Internship main page
- Application specifics
- Even if you aren’t considering A&M, you might want to check out this page for dietetic interns. Each of the rotation descriptions show either what you need to know going into the rotation (specific MNT, for example) or what you’ll be doing during that rotation. It’s a great way to get a feel for what will be expected of you in an internship.
- Finally, a FAQ page for questions I might not have answered here
Interested in the Texas A&M University Dietetic Internship? Share your thoughts in the comments section!
