Lemonade Out of Lemons: The Success of PPPL’s SULI and CCI Internship Programs during a Pandemic

A normal summer at PPPL would entail 60+ students all converging to attend a week-long course in plasma physics and half would remain at the lab afterward to perform their research for the remaining 9-weeks of their internship. In 2020, because of the curtailment of PPPL on-site operations due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we made several changes to the program. Through mentor collaboration, we were able to convert 36 out of 42 projects to be done exclusively remotely. The success of the virtual course, which was expanded from one week to two weeks in duration, drew the path to help us make up for the missing face-face value of the internship with staff and peers. The rest of the 8-week internship program consists of virtual meetings with Science Ed. staff and mentors, virtual networking with PPPL staff, grad students, and other national labs SULI/CCI programs peers, using the virtual tools Zoom, Discord, and GroupMe. We will hold virtual technical seminars with PPPL staff, professional development opportunities using resources from Princeton University, PPPL, and ORISE Learn. The internship program will conclude with a virtual poster session.