Are Graduates Finding Jobs?

Marian
Thu, 18 Jun 2009 06:59:31 +0000

This was a terrible year for internships. My daughter (rising junior with 4.0+ GPA and a previous internship on her resume) applied to about 25 of them – half paid, half unpaid. A few of the paid ones responded by saying that their internships had been cancelled for this year; she never heard from the others. She was invited to interview for four unpaid internships, and she ended up with two good offers. But if an unpaid internship had not been an option for her, she would have had nothing.

At least she has the good fortune to be in a field that has unpaid internships. Organizations that offer unpaid internships have no particular reason to cut back on them this year; I think the main reason why the competition for them is so intense is simply because the kids who would have gone for paid internships were joining in the competition for the unpaid ones.

Things have been even worse, as far as I can see, for kids in fields where all the internships are paid. When companies cut back on those internships, there’s nowhere else for the students to try. Before this year, I’ve never heard of computer or engineering students going without internships, but it’s certainly happening now.