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Internships prepare students
Richard Guerra, the Career
Center’s assistant director,
said internships can teach
lessons not found in class
By Steven Neuman
News Reporter
Summer internships are a lot like
marriages. According to Career Center
Assistant Director Richard Guerra,
they may require making commit
ments, drawing up preliminary con
tracts and realizing that the process is
a partnership.
"Students forget that it's not just,
'what are you going to give me,' or
'what can you give to me,' but 'this is
what I'd like, and this is what I'm of
fering you,'" Guerra said.
Summer internships offer students
professional experience in the job
market before graduation. Assistant
Director of Undergraduate Career Ser
vices James Chang said internships
are an asset when it comes to getting
a job after graduation.
"The emphasis for all students is ex
perience," said Chang, who runs the
Lundquist College of Business career
center. "Half the things that happen in
an office only happen in an office.
You won't get that experience in
school."
Career Center Students Informa
tion Specialist Tina Haynes said de
partments are a prime resource for
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Tim Bobosky Photographer
Career Center Assistant Director Richard Guerra discusses resume strategies with junior
biology major June Wang.
students looking for internships.
"The first place I would suggest stu
dents go is within their own profes
sional schools or departments," she
said. "Both the business and journal
ism and communication schools
have their own internship coordina
tors, but if you can't get to a internship
coordinator then I suggest you find a
academic advisor or even a peer coor
dinator."
Guerra also recommends that stu
dents talk with their professors.
"They'll have professional contacts
and networks that students can use,"
Guerra said. "The other thing is for
students to go an do informational
interviews with companies, business
es and organizations that they are in
terested in working for to find out if
there are any opportunities to help
them get in the door."
Guerra said students need to keep
in mind that internships are not only
about what companies can do for stu
dents, but about what students can
contribute to the businesses as well.
"A student needs to be clear about
what they want to do and have a good
way to articulate that to someone,"
Guerra said. "It's not enough to go in
and say 'I'm a journalism major, and I
want to be a reporter.' We always en
courage students to get more specific,
be able to talk about what kind of
learning experience that they want to
gain from it, but also talk about the
skills they posses already."
Individual department Web sites
often have excellent resources for
finding summer internships, Haynes
said.
Chang said registering on the Ca
reer Center's Web site has some of the
best opportunities, but acknowledged
that one of most important factors is a
student's initiative.
"For summer internships there are
a lot of people looking to get into a
few positions," he said. "Take the ini
tiative to see someone in the compa
ny, to stand out, and don't be too
wishy-washy about what you want."
He also recommended the Campus
Interview Program because the em
ployers who participate haven't just
expressed interest, they've committed
to hiring.
However, Chang said he draws a
line between using actual business
Web sites to find company contacts
and using online job search Web sites
like Monster.com.
"Sites like that don't really work for
internships," he said. "Especially for
summer internships they're not going
to be very good because even for real
jobs companies that post there are
looking for specific skills."
Internships are generally divided
into two categories, paid and unpaid,
each with their own benefits and
PART 2 OF 2 j££
ence, it's almost going to be like a real
job," Guerra said. "They're going to be
expecting very high quality work from
you, typically it's going to be some
sort of competitive process where they
select from a pool of talent."
He added quality work is expected
in unpaid positions as well. He said
students in unpaid internships may
be able to personalize their experience
by working with an on-site supervisor
who will help them focus on what
they want to do or leam. *
Although whether an internship is
paid tends to be the defining factor
for most students, Chang said in the
end it should be about the learning
process.
"The name internship means noth
ing," he said. "We've all heard the hor
ror stories about people who get an
internship and they spend the whole
time making copies and answering
the phone. There are also those peo
ple who do a volunteer position and
take away these amazing skills and get
the most experience. The value of ex
perience is multi-fold."
In some cases the best defense to
bad job experiences is a strong at
tempt to communicate.
"The best way to combat bad in
ternships is to make your priorities
clear," said Guerra. "The number one
thing that goes wrong is students not
doing their research on the organiza
tion and the internship itself and rely
ing on somebody's word for what
they're going to be doing."
Tuesday: How to find local
summer jobs
Today: Tips for success in
summer internships
I f
it's go
ing to
be a
paid
experi
Contact die business/science/
technology reporter
at stevenneuman@dailyemerald.com.
r
17M
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