Internships for Undergrads

beth_s_mom
Mon, 30 Jan 2017 21:59:19 +0000

My issue is only with “illegal” unpaid internships, which is what my daughter was offered. Those are internships that don’t meet the government criteria for unpaid internships - ones where there really isn’t a benefit to the student and the student is just considered free labor. There are many valuable unpaid internships out there, and if a student can afford to do them, they can be a huge benefit. Just because a company isn’t paying the student doesn’t mean it doesn’t cost the company anything, either. I worked for a financial institution that had interns (of the paid variety), and the amount of regular employee time that was spent training and mentoring those interns really added up and definitely surpassed the value they added. You need to be really careful with unpaid internships, though, and ask pointed questions to make sure that there really is a benefit to the student - like training and mentoring and the opportunity to do meaningful work in your field.