You are here

Summer Centered: Rachel Kline '20 Delves Deep into the Past

Rachel Kline '20 sits on a brick wall outside the University of Pennsylvania's Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Photo by Alexandra Iglesia '21.

Details

Published
File Under

As an intern at the University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, the anthropology and history of art double major is helping to run a summer camp for kids interested in archaeology.

No one can say Rachel Kline '20 isn't ambitious. In addition to a rigorous class schedule—she’s planning to double major—she was recently elected Officer of the Arts, a position on Students’ Council, and she will be serving as one of two transfer student resource persons this coming fall. With such an exhaustive array of academic and extracurricular commitments, you might think she’d take a break for the summer. Kline, however, has other plans.

"As a double major in anthropology and history of art,” she says, “I wanted to experience an internship in which the two fields of study are in conversation with one another. In searching for an internship that would challenge me as an art historian and an anthropologist, I determined that an internship at the Penn Museum would draw upon this convergence of disciplines.”

At the University of Pennsylvania’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (or Penn Museum), Kline is working at its celebrated summer camp “Anthropologists in the Making,” where she engages children, aged 7–13, in summer fun with an educational bent. A typical day involves teaching and planning activities based on weekly themes related to the current exhibits. For the week focused on the Ancient Egyptian exhibit, for example, Kline might have the campers do something involving mummies; for the Ancient Greek and Roman one, she might have them do something involving cross-cultural mythology.

“I’m excited to be able to introduce a young audience to topics that I’m passionate about,” she says.

This internship, which Kline designed herself and for which she pursued funding from the John B. Hurford ‘60 Center for the Arts and Humanities, is the first step towards her ultimate goal.

“My current plan,” she says, “is to earn a Ph.D. in history of art with a concentration in the Italian Renaissance. From there, I hope to one day work as a curator or researcher in a museum of art.”

 

"Summer Centered” is a series exploring our students’ Center-funded summer work.

Related Stories