DPMI+ with Mercy Corps Nepal

Summer 2017

This summer I had the opportunity to work in Nepal as a Program Quality & Facilitation Intern for Mercy Corps, an organization I have been interested in working with long before coming to study at MIIS. I was able to turn this experience into my Practicum for DPMI+ an my scope of work with Mercy Corps and the required deliverables for DPMI+ had a lot of overlap, giving me the advantage of putting the knowledge and skills gained out of my DPMI courses into a real-world context and allowing me to contribute to the work of Mercy Corps Nepal while earning credit.

My scope of work with Mercy Corps was divided between program design for a proposal, work on an education program’s M&E framework, and delivering 8 weeks of data visualization training for program staff while working on a dashboard for their respective programs and the country. While I was able to participate in both a proposal and a currently funded program, I also got a bird’s eye view of programming and their M&E strengths and challenges through helping to create their program dashboards. My work included the opportunity to create and deliver presentations for the program managers, M&E country lead, country director and Southeast Asia regional director. 

As I wrap up my internship and begin thinking about my final semester, I know this internship has taught me a lot about analytical and real-world lessons within M&E work as well given me an idea about what it’s like to work with an international NGO abroad.  I am thankful to have found an opportunity that aligned so well with my own personal interest of working with Mercy Corps, furthering my M&E learning and credentials, and to have had the prior learning through DPMI and my MIIS courses that helped me not only land this experience, but also prepare me for it.

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