Washington Internships by Martinez Deirdre;

Author:Martinez, Deirdre;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press

SECURITY CLEARANCE

As mentioned in the section in Chapter 2 that talks about working for a federal agency, some of the internships in federal agencies require security clearance. A typical clearance process takes six to nine months, which is why their deadlines are earlier in the year (often in November). While the level of security clearance and the intensity of the process varies by agency, if security clearance is required you'll need to provide details about every address you've ever had, every employer, every school attended, and names of neighbors and teachers. They will check your criminal record, ask for fingerprints, and will probably require a drug test. The process is also a little mysterious, perhaps appropriately. Every year students tell me about clearance processes that happened and they never even heard the results or were never contacted by anyone to be told that they were cleared. Several students interviewed for this book had that experience:

Security clearance is unnerving because they don't really tell you when you pass your clearance. You have to figure out lots of things to prepare for being in Washington and security clearance can really hold you up. (college senior)

I don't know how I got security clearance because I was never contacted by anyone, no one I put down on my list was ever contacted, I never got drug tested—I don't know what they looked at but I got an email in mid-May telling me that I had passed. (college junior)

The other possibly tricky part about clearance is that every agency has its own standard for clearance. For example, one agency might require that you haven't taken any illegal drugs in the past three years, while another agency might have a problem with your ever having taken illegal drugs at all.

While all of that does sound daunting, it's much easier for students to get clearance than permanent candidates, for several reasons. First, compared to a thirty-year-old job applicant, a college student will probably have a more straightforward profile: fewer addresses and employers, fewer things that need explaining. Second, interns often get provisional or temporary clearance, which is easier to process. Also on the positive side, if you are interested in this line of work, once you have clearance it is much easier to get clearance in the future, which makes you a more attractive job candidate.

SCARY SECURITY STORIES

“On the second day at the Pentagon I was asked to do the mail run and I went into this room and there are fancy LCD screens on the wall and guys with guns and so I go to this guy and ask for the mail. This guy's mouth drops open, then he asks what office I'm from and then calls my office and asks why I'm in a secure room which is actually where they receive top secret classified cables from submarines. So now I have a red flag on my security record.” (college junior)

“I was working in the Pentagon and I had a card to swipe in and

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