Paleontology Intern

Paleontology Internship Opportunity

The San Diego Natural History Museum (The Nat) was founded by local naturalists in 1874 and has played a major role over the years in regional conservation efforts. The Museum recently celebrated its 150th anniversary and completed a strategic plan focused on encouraging a love for nature, leveraging science and collections for conservation, and using our own voice to be here for nature.

The Nat's Jacobs Center for Science and Conservation offers several externally funded internships that provide training and mentoring in curation, imaging, databasing protocols, and collections-based research to students, to prepare them for continued advancement in the natural sciences, which can translate to career pathways in academia and research, as well as environmental consulting. Within the Center, the Paleontology Department has an opening for a part-time, temporary Paleontology Intern.

Applications are invited for several paid undergraduate student internship positions in the Department of Paleontology. This is the sixth year of this immersive internship program aimed at providing undergraduate students with Museum-based experience in fossil identification, curation, and collection management.

Examples of curation tasks to be taught as part of the internship include: microscopic "picking" of wet-screened sediment concentrate for micro-invertebrate and micro-vertebrate fossils; general sorting and taxonomic identification of invertebrate and vertebrate fossils; organizing sorted fossils into individual species lots and placing in archival specimen unit trays, plastic vials, glass vials, and/or gel capsules; entering or updating collection locality and specimen identification information into the SDNHM Paleontology Collection Database;

writing locality and specimen tracking numbers on catalogued fossils; placing organized, trayed, catalogued, and numbered fossils into steel drawers and storage cabinets; photographing specimens for curation and research purposes; and participating in a general inventory and reorganization of the SDNHM Paleontology Collection.

Examples of fossil specimen projects to be worked on as part of the internship include: late Pleistocene terrestrial and marine microvertebrate fossils from coastal southern California; early Pleistocene terrestrial macro vertebrate fossils from inland southern California; late Pliocene and late Miocene marine invertebrate and vertebrate fossils from coastal and inland southern California; middle Eocene terrestrial vertebrate fossils from coastal southern California; late Cretaceous marine invertebrate fossils from coastal and inland southern California.

Qualifications:

Interest in natural history, paleontology, and/or geology; technology skills; communication skills.

Eligibility:
Applicants must be a student in the final 2 years of an earth science and/or evolutionary biology undergraduate degree program or a very recent graduate of such a program. Live in San Diego County or be willing to commute. A special emphasis is placed on recruiting students in San Diego County who are members of groups underrepresented in STEM careers.

Time Commitment:
The internship program will involve up to 14 hours of work per week over a period of approximately 24 weeks.

Pay: $20/hour. Employees enjoy free admission into all of Balboa Park's museums as well as free admission to the San Diego Zoo and Safari Park.

Ready to apply? Applicants should submit a cover letter/email, a succinct statement (250-500 words) detailing course work completed and scientific interests, and the names and contact information for two faculty references. Final date to receive applications is September 30, 2026.