Bianca Florentina Niculescu, Mads Kjernsby Rismoen, Niccolò Morgante and Pietro Falco are students from the master's programs Health Economics, Policy and Management and European Master in Health Economics and Management at the University of Oslo. Fall 2022 they are interns at the Norwegian Directorate of Health.
Irene Olaussen is the programme coordinator for the Norwegian participation in EUs health programme EU4Health at the Norwegian Directorate of Health, and responsible for the interns at the directorate. Olaussen explains that the interns from UiO have been given important tasks at the Norwegian Directorate of Health, related to EUs work in health. She says that the interns from UiO have been given important tasks in the Norwegian Directorate of Health's EU work.
– Niccolo is working on the biggest public health investment of all time within the EU, a government collaboration on non-communicable diseases, working on health determinants, Olaussen says.
Pietro is analyzing EUs new legislation on health contingency, and what it could mean for Norway. His analyses were used in preparations for director Bjørn Guldvog's meetings with the European Commission in November.
– Mads is working on analyzing statistics on Norwegian health workers, an area where it is important to gain more knowledge, because we know we might have a lack of competence and capacity in the health sector the coming years, she continues.
Bianca's Romanian background has been indispensable in a collaborative project between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Health and Care Services, and the Norwegian Directorate of Health. As an EEA country, Norway is currently contributing to financing development of primary healthcare services in Romania.
– Bianca has gone through documents we have received from Romania, checking the quality of the documents. She participated in conversations with the Romanian embassy and Romanian mayors, where communication in English has been challenging, and prevented things from getting "lost in translation".
Interns from the University of Oslo are positive, bold, and hardworking
Olaussen describes the students from UiO as positive, bold, and hardworking, and believes they have been an asset at the Norwegian Directorate of Health.
– We have a working environment with high pressure, a large workload, and are working on complex matters. We don't have time to constantly follow up on the students, Olaussen says.
The students must be proactive and figure out how they can contribute themselves. According to Olaussen, an internship at the Norwegian Directorate of Health is suitable for students who work independently, take responsibility and are not afraid to take initiative.
– In that regard the students are doing really well, Olaussen says.
– The Norwegian Directorate of Health is a competence organization with many projects. We have been clear with the students that we work trust-based, we do not manage the students' time in detail, but follow up on the work the students deliver.
English-speaking interns give mutual value
Olaussen believes that hiring English-speaking students has been an asset for the Norwegian Directorate of Health.
– Diversity and inclusion are not just labels, but happen by taking people in, being generous and open to mutual knowledge exchange, she says.
She explains that the project groups have held meetings in English, both to include the students, and to have the opportunity to practice the English vocabulary in their field. This has been useful, since the working language is English when the Norwegian Directorate of Health cooperate with the EU.
Olaussen advises other organizations to not overly manage the students, and says they do not need to make sure that every day is packed with tasks.
– Get to know the students, give them challenging tasks and trust. It has been valuable to have interns from UiO, and I think many other organizations will have the same experience. There is no reason why you should not take on students as interns, Olaussen says.
The Norwegian Directorate of Health announced open internship positions
When they announced the internship positions for fall 2022, the Norwegian Directorate of Health chose to release a relatively open call. The call was related to the EU4Health programme, but the directorate did not specify the tasks the students were going to perform.
– It was important to us that the internship was mutually beneficial, for both us and the students. We had to get to know the students and learn what they could contribute with before giving them tasks, Olaussen says.
Olaussen went through the applications and CVs, and selected five students based on these.
– I was impressed by their CVs and how they presented themselves in English, Olaussen says.
The selected students were invited to a meeting at the Norwegian Directorate of Health. The meeting started with a two-hour long presentation of what the Norwegian Directorate of Health is working on in relation to the EU. The students then reflected on how this was related to their skills and interests.
– We spent time mapping the kind of tasks the students could be suited for and making them competent conversation partners before they were assigned tasks. This was a good investment, Olaussen says.
Communication with the University of Oslo throughout the process
– We have had great communication with UiO throughout the hiring process, who has a good, formalized arrangement for student internships, and we knew what the internship listing should include. In the course description, the university’s and the organization’s responsibility when hiring student interns were carefully specified. This gave us confidence going ahead with the process, Olaussen says.
Internship at the Department of Health Management and Health Economics is a course at the University of Oslo, called HMAN4230: Internship.
– Since this is a university course, the students commit to it. They do a presentation on what they have done and learned during the internship, and are evaluated. When the students know that they will be evaluated at the end of the semester, they take the course seriously, and it is safe for us to hire interns, Olaussen says.
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