An Inside Look at the AD&A Internship Experience
In addition to being a space to showcase various creative endeavours, the AD&A Museum offers a unique opportunity for UCSB students to be intimately involved in a variety of museum processes. Every year, the AD&A Museum selects a handful of promising undergraduate students from a pool of applicants to undergo a year-long internship program. Serving as a foundational tool for understanding museum work, this internship strives to provide students with an opportunity to engage with UCSB faculty and artists in the greater Santa Barbara area through mentorship, collaboration, and hands-on engagement in their respective internship fields.
Students get the opportunity to engage in a variety of fields, including curatorial work, registration and collections management, education, communications and programming in the Architecture and Design Collection–as well as the UCSB Library’s Special Research Collection.
Hear from some of our outstanding 2025–26 interns! Their experiences only highlight a fraction of the impact this program has had on our student body.
Megan Leverett, Design Intern, mentored by Marlene Moser and James Hapke
Megan’s work as a design intern consists of patterning and constructing tote bags in a variety of sizes to be sold as museum merchandise. She is repurposing vinyl banners, once used to promote exhibitions on view, that were sitting in storage until her work began. Megan remarks:
“Getting to experience the process of the conception of an object into a final product has been very surreal for me and I have learned so much about designing for a museum audience. My internship has allowed me to be hands-on in the behind the scenes of the AD&A Museum and see how much work occurs to install, and manage exhibitions. It has broadened the way in which I think about objects and taken so much of the theory that I have learned in my classes into the real world.”
Saydee Garcia, Conservation and 3D modeling and printing, mentored by Silvia Perea
Saydee’s work for Silvia Perea consists of making 3D printed replicas of Kendrick Bangs Kellogg’s architectural models through Blender, where she repairs the scans and creates models using a 3D printer. She is also involved in the cleaning and conservation of Kellogg’s architectural papers. Interns working under the conservation branch are key players to the preservation and public accessibility of the ADC collection. Saydee remarks:
“I've had so much fun in this program, because I've learned a lot of new skills and met so many cool people. The internship has been such an important opportunity for me, because I get to interact with objects and technologies that I wouldn't have the chance to otherwise.”
Tania Mancilla, Collections Management & Registration Intern (SBMA), mentored by Olivia Anaïs Giampietro
As a collections management intern, Tania’s internship experience consists of “hands-on experience in collections management through cataloging, rehousing objects, and shadowing exhibition installations.” These skills are vital for those looking into careers in art administration, registration, collections management, or art handling, creating a strong skill set of organization and attention to detail.
“I was incredibly fortunate to learn from Olivia, my mentor, whose expertise and guidance provided me with an invaluable roadmap for navigating the complexities of the museum world. Working directly with specialized materials, such as Japanese prints, allowed me to refine my precision in object handling and archival standards. This experience has made me fall deeper in love with museums, and my path ahead has never been clearer," shared Tania Mancilla.
James Peabody, Communications intern, supervised by Gabe Ritter and Ana Briz
As a communications intern, James, alongside fellow communications intern Giazul Gonzalez, assisted in various social media ventures promoting and creating material for events, exhibitions, and programs in the AD&A and greater Santa Barbara area. Their latest content project was a short video series for the AD&A Instagram page covering the most recent exhibition, Tiffany Chung: indelible traces, consisting of short interviews with exhibition curator Orianna Cacchione.
James speaks on another aspect of the internship experience, which is the group field trips visiting other museum institutions, usually outside of the Santa Barbara area. This year, interns had the honor of visiting prestigious Los Angeles institutions The Broad and MOCA, and interact firsthand with museum professionals. This opportunity is special in helping formulate a greater understanding of museum systems and gives interns valuable insight in how different museum professionals navigate their respective fields.
“The opportunity to visit exhibitions in Los Angeles with my mentors and classmates, who are so knowledgeable and passionate about museums and their impact was truly exciting. On our field trip, we not only got to experience the collections at The Broad and the Monuments exhibit at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, but we also got to hear from museum professionals at both sites, who generously shared their expertise with us,” remarks James Peabody.
Images from the internship seminar’s tour of Tiffany Chung: Indelible Traces, led by AD&A Head Preparator, James Hapke.
What these experiences ultimately show is that a museum’s impact is not confined to the walls within the institution, rather it truly thrives amongst the connections and experiences that take place beyond the walls of our exhibition spaces. If you’re interested in becoming a part of the vast museum community on campus and gaining valuable insight into museum work, consider applying to the AD&A internship program today!
To learn more about the requirements and application process, please visit https://www.museum.ucsb.edu/opportunities/. For questions about the program and to submit your application, please contact the AD&A Internship Coordinator, Nathan Segura at nathansegura@ucsb.edu, with the subject line “AD&A Museum Internship Application.”