Examiner column for January 27.
To that question, many college and graduate students answer
“yes.” There are some who are put off by the scandal of Monica Lewinsky, and
whose parents figure being an intern would infect their child with some D.C.
“virus” that might be habit-forming.
However internships come in all shapes and sizes, and the vast majority do not involve questionable practices by employers or hideously long hours. They exist in drug rehab clinics in Virginia, and in magazines looking to upgrade their websites. They are in every television station, and every newspaper. Rug companies and alumnae newsletters hire interns, as do museums, Wolf Trap, and all manner of charitable organizations. Wherever there are jobs, there are interns who do some of those jobs for free, with a smile.
The Washington Post “Jobs” section on January 24 had a
useful article by Vickie Elmer, listing website resources and tips for
prospective interns. Every college and university in the area has
department-sponsored internships that earn credit towards a student’s degree,
as well. I am the internship sponsor for George Mason University’s English
department and, in the two years I’ve held that position, I have never seen an
internship that hasn’t benefited both employer and intern.
Current
economic instability makes internships even more attractive. For employers,
it’s like a trial run with a new employee, with no financial sacrifice or
feeling of obligation. For students, internships supply an opportunity to prove
how ready they are for the responsibilities of the workplace. The valued
qualities of reliability, punctuality, and conscientiousness—hard to judge in
an interview--will either surface during the course of the internship, or they
won’t; that’s precisely what every employer wants to know, and what all
students want to prove they possess.
Resources
mentioned by The Post include the website DCInternNet.com, which posts a list
of available internships, an online list of 800 internships from Vault.com (for
a fee of $14.95), and the guide by Deirdre Martinez titled, “Washington
Internships: How To Get Them And Use Them To Launch Your Public Policy Career.”
George Mason University’s Career Services has an online list of available internships, as do many departments at Mason and other local college campuses. The English Department’s website is: http://pwr.gmu.edu/internships/students.html.
English writing and editing internships at GMU are not terribly popular, mostly because students hesitate to call and schedule interviews with prospective employers. That’s less surprising when you factor in that interns work for little or no pay, and many students are paying for their tuition and books out of part-time job earnings.
The investment of time, however, is well worth it for any student who can afford to devote 10-16 hours a week for a few months of on-the-job training. It’s a dry run of the “real world,” without many of the scary consequences attendant with inexperience.
The interns who’ve received credit for their work in my department have all undergone steep learning curves that will help them secure and keep jobs in the future. They’ve learned about office politics, and some of the unwritten rules of the workplace. A few have secured permanent, paying jobs. For any student who can afford the time, it’s a win-win endeavor.
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