Problematizing College Internships:

Exploring Issues with Access, Program Design,

and Developmental Outcomes
in three U.S. Colleges
WCER Working Paper No. 2019-1
March 2019

Matthew T. Hora, Zi Chen, Emily Parrott, and Pa Her

Wisconsin Center for Education Research
University of Wisconsin–Madison
[email protected]

Keywords: internships, access, equity, experiential learning, student development, higher education

Suggested citation: Hora, M. T., Chen, Z., Parrott, E., & Her, P. (2019). Problematizing college internships:
Exploring issues with access, program design, and developmental outcomes in three U.S. colleges. (WCER
Working Paper No. 2019-1). Retrieved from University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wisconsin Center for
Education Research website: http://www.wcer.wisc.edu/publications/working-papers

© 2019 by Matthew T. Hora, Zi Chen, Emily Parrott, and Pa Her. All rights reserved. Any opinions, findings, or
conclusions expressed in this paper are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the
funding agencies, WCER, or cooperating institutions. Readers may make verbatim copies of this document for
noncommercial purposes by any means, provided that the above copyright notice appears on all copies.
WCER working papers are available on the Internet at https://wcer.wisc.edu/publications/working-papers
 Problematizing College Internships: Exploring Issues with Access,
Program Design, and Developmental Outcomes in Three U.S. Colleges

Matthew T. Hora, Zi Chen, Emily Parrott, and Pa Her

Abstract
Internships for college students are widely promoted as a “high-impact” practice, yet the
academic literature is limited by terminological imprecision, lack of data on intern
demographics, and insufficient attention to the impacts of program format on student academic
and developmental outcomes. In this mixed-methods study we analyze survey (n=1,129) and
focus group (n=57) data from students in three diverse U.S. colleges by using inductive thematic
analysis, chi-square, and hierarchical linear modeling to document intern characteristics, access-
related problems, program structure, and impacts on student outcomes. Results indicate that
internship participation varied significantly by race, institution, enrollment status, and academic
program, and that 64% of students who did not take an internship had desired to do so but could
not due to scheduling conflicts with work, insufficient pay, and lack of placements in their
disciplines. Students also reported high degrees of supervisor support, supervisor mentoring, and
relationship between internships and academic programs—all program features that were
significant predictors of students’ satisfaction with internships and perceived value for their
career development. Based on these results, we propose a processual model for studying
internships, and we discuss implications for career advisors, faculty, and postsecondary leaders.
Specifically, we urge employers, colleges and universities to ensure equitable access to
internships for all students, to screen employer hosts for mentoring quality and capacity, and to
recognize internships can be simultaneously a positive transformative experience for students
and a vehicle for reproducing inequality.
 Problematizing College Internships: Exploring Issues with Access,
Program Design, and Developmental Outcomes in Three U.S. Colleges

Matthew T. Hora, Zi Chen, Emily Parrott, and Pa Her

Internships are widely perceived as influential co-curricular experiences that benefit students,
educators, and employers alike, based on the notion that they provide students with valuable
professional experience and networks, enable educators to create venues for students to translate
academic knowledge to real-world situations, and give employers a steady stream of new talent
with fresh ideas from academia (Maertz, Stoeberl, & Marks, 2014; National Association of
Colleges and Employers, 2018a). A growing body of research supports some of these claims by
demonstrating positive impacts internships can have on students’ employment status (Knouse,
Tanner, & Harris, 1999), wages (Saniter & Siedler, 2014), and academic achievement (Binder,
Baguley, Crook, & Miller, 2015). Consequently, internships have been designated as a “high-
impact” practice that improves student outcomes (National Survey of Student Engagement,
2018; O’Neill, 2010), leading many state governments, colleges and universities, and workforce
development boards to promote internship programs as a desirable solution to regional
education-to-employment problems.

However, while the research literature on internships is promising, higher education’s

understanding of internships is limited in several ways. First, terminological inconsistencies such
as poor or nonexistent definitions and/or compound questions make problematic the reported
internship participation rates, as well as the validity and reliability of empirical studies (Silva et
al., 201; National Survey of Student Engagement, 2018). Second, little research exists on
internships outside of 4-year universities, with little known about these programs in 2-year
institutions and minority-serving institutions such as historically Black colleges and universities
(HBCUs). Third, although scholars and analysts have raised legal and ethical questions regarding
unpaid internships (Curiale, 2009; Perlin, 2012), few studies have examined the nature of
specific barriers to internship participation, particularly with respect to low-income, first-
generation, and/or minoritized college students. Fourth, internship advocates and researchers too
often pay insufficient attention to the impact of the structure and format of internships (Silva et
al., 2018). Additionally, while long-term labor market outcomes such as wages and employment
status are important outcomes to study with respect to internship participation, near-term effects
on student satisfaction and career development are equally important, yet rarely studied
(McHugh, 2017).

Without insights into these issues, postsecondary educators and administrators lack
information that could inform continuous improvement of internship programs while ensuring
that they are accessible to all students regardless of race, class, or social connection. To address
these gaps in the literature, we launched the College Internship Study, a mixed-methods
translational research project in Spring 2018 in partnership with three institutions—a
comprehensive university in Wisconsin that is a predominantly White institution (PWI), a
 Problematizing College Internships

racially mixed technical college (TC) in Wisconsin, and a HBCU in South Carolina. Data from
an online survey (n = 1,129) and focus groups (n = 57) with students nearing graduation were
analyzed to answer these research questions: (1) How many students are participating in
internship programs, and does participation vary by student demographics, academic status, or
life/employment situation? (2) What barriers exist for students to participate in internship
programs? (3) What is the structure and format of internship programs? And, (4) How, if at all, is
program structure and format associated with student satisfaction with their internships and their
estimation of the value of the internship on their career development?

Background
What do we know about college internships and their impacts on students? First, the
influential National Survey of Student Engagement (2018) indicates that 49% of college seniors
completed or are in the process of completing an internship or a field experience, while the
Student Survey Report issued by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (2018b)
reports that 38% of juniors and 55% of seniors had an internship and/or co-op experience.
However, the way internships are defined in these reports raises serious questions about their
reliability and validity. For instance, the National Survey of Student Engagement uses a
compound question to gauge participation in work-based learning experiences, asking students to
report their involvement in an “internship, co-op, field experience, student teaching, or clinical
placement”—each of which has unique formats, regulatory contexts, tasks, and educational
goals, and thus arguably should be considered distinct types of co-curricular experiences
(National Survey of Student Engagement, 2018). This conflations of job-training experiences is
problematic because the definition of an internship, with respect to its duration, coordination
with academic programs, and actual tasks, varies considerably by disciplinary, institutional, and
national context (Hora, Wolfgram, & Thompson, 2017; Silva et al., 2018).

Despite these methodological issues, researchers have long examined the question of which
students participate in internship programs. For example, Knouse et al. (1999) showed that White
students are more likely to have an internship than Black students, and that higher achieving
students are more likely to get an internship compared to students who are lower achieving.
Overall, the evidence suggests that internship participation varies across career area and student
characteristics including gender, race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and achievement levels
(Binder et al., 2015). An issue related to the characteristics of internship participants is whether
barriers exist for some students to access these opportunities in the first place. This question is
most often raised with respect to low-income students and how unpaid internships are untenable
for students struggling to pay for tuition, housing, and food. Curiale (2009) analyzed the legal
issues associated with unpaid internships and argued the growing role of internships in making
an individual competitive in the labor market and the rising number of unpaid opportunities was
contributing to a “class divide” in the U.S. However, little empirical research exists on the
specific barriers that inhibit students’ abilities to secure and persist in internships. Given growing
concerns about the inability of some college students to meet basic housing and food needs due
to low incomes and/or the rising cost of college (Broton & Goldrick-Rab, 2018), this line of

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 Problematizing College Internships

inquiry is important, especially given prospects that some institutions do (or are considering)
require internships in order to graduate.

Another important question facing the field pertains to the structure and format of internship
programs themselves. Too often, internships are conceptualized as a singular event that students
take or not, with little explication of the specific elements the experience itself comprises.
Without a detailed accounting of these features, internships risk becoming a “black box” that is
poorly understood while assumed to causally (and automatically) lead to student academic and/or
labor market outcomes (Loeb et al., 2017; Silva et al., 2018). Several aspects of internships have
been identified as being potentially influential in facilitating these outcomes: a graduation
requirement, compensation, duration, supervisor support, supervisor mentoring, task clarity,
autonomy, and link to academic program. One study of a cohort of college graduates in Germany
who completed required or mandatory internships did not find any significant effect of internship
experiences on later employment (Klein & Weiss, 2011). More scholars have addressed
compensation, finding that unpaid interns are less likely to receive higher starting salaries and
offers of full-time employment (Crain, 2016), more likely to report higher rates of feeling they
have been taken advantage of (Siebert & Wilson, 2013), and are less likely to receive benefits
(e.g., job leads) and positive developmental outcomes than paid interns (McHugh, 2017).

A related line of research examining structural features of internships focuses on the duration
and supervisor quality of programs. In a study on internships in criminal justice programs,
Murphy, Merritt, & Gibbons (2013) found that 400 hours (i.e., 10 weeks of full-time work) was
viewed as the optimal length of an internship, though students and supervisors disagreed on the
exact figure. Researchers have also demonstrated that supervisor mentoring (i.e., providing clear
directions and feedback) and supervisor support (i.e., the perception of how well the supervisor
cares about employee well-being) are positively related to students’ career development and
satisfaction with their internships (D’Abate, Youndt, & Wenzel, 2009; McHugh, 2017;
Narayanan, Olk, & Fukami, 2010). Researchers have also examined the nature and impacts of
the work that student interns perform. Beenen and Rousseau (2010) found that task clarity—or
providing interns with clear understandings of expectations for work tasks—enhances student
learning and pursuit of careers in the same field as the internship site. Additionally, the amount
of task autonomy that interns have to design and perform tasks has been strongly associated with
motivation and job satisfaction in some studies (Virtanen, Tynjälä, & Eteläpelto, 2014). Last, the
stronger a student’s academic coursework is linked to an internship, the more students will gain
from the overall experience (Katula & Threnhauser, 1999; Narayanan et al., 2010).

In studying the impact of internships, many scholars focus on employment status (National
Association of Colleges and Employers, 2014), postgraduation wages (Saniter & Siedler, 2013),
and job market for former interns (Nunley, Pugh, Romero, & Seals, 2016). However, scholars
examining non-monetary or employment-related outcomes of internships and related practices
have found they contribute to positive academic outcomes such as improved grades (Parker,
Kilgo, Sheets, & Pascarella, 2016), the quality of classroom discussions (Weible & McClure,
2011), improvements in what some call the developmental value of an internship, or students’

3
 Problematizing College Internships

vocational self-concept and their confidence in their future careers (Knouse et al.,1999; McHugh,
2017), and the self-reported satisfaction a student has with his or her experience.

In addressing these issues related to college internships, we also adopt a process-oriented

perspective of students’ experiences with co-curricular programs, instead of viewing them as a
singular event or point in time. In this paper, we build upon existing process-oriented models
(e.g., Narayanan et al., 2010) by conceptualizing the internship experience as comprising three
distinct yet related elements: (1) participation and access, (2) program design features, and (3)
student outcomes and experiences. Our goal in advancing such a framework is to problematize
the act of acquiring an internship, while opening up the black box of internship programs and
improve our understanding of the relationships among specific program features and student
outcomes.

Methods
The study reported in this paper employs a concurrent mixed-methods design, where both
qualitative and quantitative data are collected and analyzed simultaneously to address the
research questions (Creswell, 2014; Teddlie & Tashakkori, 2003). The dataset used in this
analysis includes an online survey administered to and focus groups with college students at the
three postsecondary institutions. These types of institutions were selected based on their distinct
organizational contexts and student populations to collectively and individually contrast with
those institutions most often included in research or media accounts about internships (e.g.,
PWIs, private liberal arts colleges, flagship universities). The PWI is in a suburb near two large
metropolitan areas and has an enrollment of 4,168 undergraduate. Located in a growing
metropolitan area, the TC enrolls 20,801 students. The HBCU is a rural campus with 2,038
undergraduate students.

The sampling frame for the study included students in their junior and senior years (the PWI
and the HBCU) or in the second half of their degree programs (the TC) to increase the prospects
that a student had had an internship experience. To focus on students’ experiences in internships
and not on related experiential learning programs, we excluded from the sampling frame students
from programs with a required clinical practicum (e.g., teacher education, nursing and related
allied health fields), apprenticeship programs, and students in the liberal arts transfer program at
the TC. Based on resource constraints, we capped the size of the study sample at each institution
at 1,250 students.

Data Sources
The procedure for administering the online survey began with a postal letter and cash
incentive ($5) mailed to all students in the sampling frame (1,250 at the PWI, 1,250 at the TC,
and 885 at the HBCU) that included a link to a unique password-protected URL that led to the
survey instrument itself. The letter was followed by two subsequent email reminders, all of
which included the promise of an additional $10 incentive if the survey was completed. The
inclusion of pre- and postsurvey incentives was informed by research in survey administration on

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 Problematizing College Internships

how to increase response rates for online surveys (Dykema, Stevenson, Klein, Kim, & Day,
2013). The survey was completed by a total of 1,129 students—525 students (42% response rate)
at the PWI, 395 students (31.6%) at the TC, and 207 students (23.4%) at the HBCU.

An analysis of possible non-response bias was conducted based on race and gender using chi-
square tests. Our sample is representative of the study population based on races at each of the
three institutions. The proportions of the female and male students in our survey sample are
statistically significantly different than the study population, X2 (1, N=5217) = 32.61, p < .001.
Nevertheless, the present study applied unweighted analysis because, in the situation that results
with and without weights turned out similar, using unweighted data is better due to smaller
standard errors. Additionally, the unweighted regression model was performed controlling for
gender, which provided unbiased and consistent estimates (Gelman, 2007).

After completing the survey, the students were asked if they were willing to participate in a
focus group, which is a method for eliciting respondent perspectives in an interactive forum.
Fifty-seven students participated in the focus groups across the three institutions, for which
attendees received $20. Most groups included two to four students, though in some cases no-
shows resulted in one-person interviews (N = 7). These focus groups or interviews were
separated into those who had participated in an internship and those who had not. Students who
had an internship experience during college answered questions primarily about the nature of
their experience, while non-participants were asked questions about their reasons for not
participating in an internship. Information about the composition of the survey and focus group
sample is shown in Table 1.

Survey Measures
The following sections describe measures that assess student and internship program
characteristics. All students answered questions about demographics, life and employment status,
and academic situations (Table 1). All respondents were asked a question regarding whether they
had participated in an internship in the last 12 months while in college. In the survey, the
following definition of internships was provided to respondents:
An internship is a position held within an established company or organization while
completing a college degree, certificate, or diploma program. It involves working at the
company or organization and performing tasks similar in nature and skill-level to tasks
done by entry-level employees in the organization.

This definition was derived from examples of existing definitions and field-tested with a group
of career advisors and experiential learning professionals.

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 Problematizing College Internships

Table 1. Study Sample Characteristics by Institution

Total Sample PWI TC HBCU Focus Group
Variable (n = 1,129) (n=525) (n=395) (n=207) (n=57)
Student Demographics
Age in years, mean (SD) 27.26 (8.85) 25.81 (7.12) 30.95 (10.64) 23.91 (6.32) 25.88 (7.73)
Gender
Male (%) 408 (36.14) 196 (37.33) 171 (43.29) 41 (19.81) 17 (29.8)
Female (%) 685 (60.67) 318 (60.57) 211 (53.42) 156 (75.36) 39 (68.4)
Race
Asian American (%) 72 (6.38) 37 (7.05) 31 (7.85) 4 (1.93) 4 (7.0)
Black or African American (%) 243 (21.52) 35 (6.67) 19 (4.81) 189 (91.30) 19 (33.3)
Hispanic or Latino (%) 85 (7.53) 66 (12.57) 18 (4.56) 1 (0.48) 1 (1.8)
White or Caucasian (%) 673 (59.61) 361 (68.76) 312 (78.99) 0 (0) 30 (52.6)
First-generation student (FGS)
FGS (%) 432 (38.26) 245 (46.67) 110 (27.85) 77 (37.20) 21 (36.8)
Not FGS (%) 670 (59.34) 273 (52.00) 276 (69.87) 121 (58.45) 36 (63.2)
Life and Employment Situation
Having paid employment
Yes (%) 871 (77.15) 425 (80.95) 323 (81.77) 123 (59.42) 38 (66.67)
No (%) 247 (21.88) 97 (18.48) 70 (17.72) 80 (38.65) 19 (33.33)
Working hours, mean (SD) 26.49 (13.44) 25.35 (12.37) 29.64 (14.40) 22.11 (12.65) 14.07 (12.14)
Annual income, mean (SD) 16603.56 16729.45 20978.14 7390.48 9933.52
(18658.36) (18733.35) (19503.73) (12418.95) (13802.98)
Receiving food assistance
Yes (%) 58 (5.14) 21 (4.00) 28 (7.09) 9 (4.35) 4 (7.14)
No (%) 1044 (92.47) 498 (94.86) 357 (90.38) 189 (91.30) 52 (92.86)
Not paying bill
Yes (%) 84 (7.44) 23 (4.43) 35 (8.86) 26 (12.56) 3 (5.36)
No (%) 1017 (90.08) 496 (95.57) 350 (88.61) 171 (82.61) 53 (94.64)
Academic Status
Enrollment status
Full time (%) 827 (73.25) 422 (80.38) 197 (49.87) 206 (99.52) 44 (77.19)
Part time (%) 302 (26.75) 103 (19.62) 198 (50.13) 1 (0.48) 13 (22.81)
Grade-point average: 1 (D+) to 8.09 (1.74) 7.82 (1.73) 8.54 (1.67) 7.86 (1.73) 8.64(1.57)
10 (A), mean (SD)
Academic program
Arts and humanities (%) 139 (12.31) 70 (13.31) 56 (14.29) 13 (6.17) 5 (8.77)
Biosciences, agriculture, natural 144 (12.76) 80 (15.21) 8 (2.04) 56 (26.54) 12 (21.05)
resources (%)
Business (%) 113 (10.01) 2 (0.38) 106 (27.04) 5 (2.37) 5 (8.77)
Communications, media, public 311 (27.55) 153 (29.09) 118 (30.10) 40 (18.96) 6 (10.53)
relations (%)
Engineering (%) 46 (4.07) 30 (5.70) 7 (1.79) 9 (4.27) 1 (1.75)
Health professions (%) 46 (4.07) 23 (4.37) 14 (3.57) 9 (4.27) 1 (1.75)
Physical sciences, math, computer 75 (6.64) 48 (9.13) 22 (5.61) 5 (2.37) 4 (7.02)
science (%)
Social sciences (%) 118 (10.45) 42 (7.98) 61 (15.56) 15 (7.11) 9 (15.79)
Social service professions (%) 137 (12.14) 78 (14.83) 0 (0) 59 (27.96) 0 (0)
Internship required
Yes (%) 135 (44.85) 24 (20.17) 69 (67.65) 42 (52.50) 17 (29.82)
No (%) 166 (55.15) 95 (79.83) 33 (32.35) 38 (47.50) 38 (66.67)
Internship Participation
Yes (%) 332 (29.41) 137 (26.10) 106 (26.84) 89 (43.00) 32 (56.14)
No (%) 795 (70.42) 388 (73.90) 289 (73.16) 118 (57.00) 25 (43.56)

Independent variables. Students who answered “no” to having participated in internships

while in college answered questions about barriers to participation, while students who answered
“yes” were presented with questions about the characteristics of their internship programs,

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 Problematizing College Internships

including whether it was required to graduate, whether it was paid or unpaid, the industry it was
located in, and so on. In addition, several questions about the structure and format of the
internship were posed. The first four scales were based on instruments used by McHugh (2017),
and Beenen and Rousseau (2010), while the question pertaining to the relationship between
academics and internships were drawn from the work of Taylor (1988).

Supervisor support was measured using four items, which assessed the extent to which
supervisors care about interns’ well-being and satisfaction at work, using a five-point scale
ranging from one (not at all) to five (a great deal). Results of internal consistency tests using
Cronbach’s alpha was 0.9.

Supervisor mentoring consisted of five items that measured the nature of a supervisor
providing specific strategies to achieve career goals, encouraging new ways to behave in the job,
and giving feedback regarding job performance. These items used a five-point scale ranging
from one (never) to five (extremely often), and the Cronbach’s alpha using the current sample
was 0.83.

Goal clarity consisted of two items that measured how respondents perceived the clarity of
the goals and expectations regarding their workplace tasks. These two questions used a five-point
scale with ratings that ranged from one (not at all clear) to five (extremely clear), and the
Cronbach’s alpha using the current sample was 0.89.

Autonomy was measured using two items that assessed how much flexibility respondents had
to complete their work and how much freedom they had to make decisions during the internship,
using on a five-point scale ranging from one (none) to five (a great deal). Results of the
Cronbach’s alpha using the current sample was 0.76.

Finally, the relationship between their academic learning and internship experiences was
measured by one item that asked how related the internship was to the respondents academic
program on a five-point scale ranging from one (not at all related) to five (extremely related).

Dependent variables. In this study we focus on two potential near-term outcomes of

internships—satisfaction and perceived developmental value. Satisfaction with the internship
was assessed by a single question asking how satisfied respondents were with their internship
experiences on a five-point Likert scale ranging from one (not at all satisfied) to five (extremely
satisfied). Perceived developmental value captures the degree to which respondents consider
their experiences to have enhanced their career development (Beenen & Rousseau, 2010;
McHugh, 2017). Three items asked about the skills or knowledge students gained during the
internship, and the degree to which the internship helped them clarify their career objectives
measured perceived developmental value. These items were measured using a scale ranging from
one (not at all) to five (extremely), and the Cronbach’s alpha using the current sample was 0.82.

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 Problematizing College Internships

Focus Group Protocol

Focus group sessions lasted about 1 hour. One or two researchers moderated and used a
semi-structured protocol with 14 questions for students who had internships and 12 questions for
those who had not. All students were asked details about their background, including their
academic program and career goals. For students who had taken an internship, questions elicited
information about their motivations for pursuing an internship, the nature of their work in the
internship, the type of mentorship they received, the relation between their coursework and their
internship, and what they think they gained from the experience. Students without internships
were asked about their plans for participating in the future, obstacles to pursuing internship
opportunities, and concerns they had about internships. At the HBCU, additional questions were
posed to all students as part of another research project. These queries focused on their
vocational self-identity and career decision-making processes. All students have remained
unnamed to protect their identities and quotes have been edited for clarity.

Analytic Strategies
Statistical analyses of survey data. Before analyzing the survey data, we used a multiple
imputation approach to impute and replace missing values. We used this approach rather than a
listwise deletion procedure to avoid losing valuable information of key variables, thereby
reducing the power of analysis (Cheema, 2014). Three steps of quantitative analyses were then
applied using R statistical analysis software (R Core Team, 2018). First, to answer RQ1
regarding internship participation, we conducted a series of chi-square tests of independence as
well as logistic regression analyses to explore relationships between student characteristics and
internship participation. Next, to address RQ2 about barriers to internships, we report descriptive
statistics from the survey item eliciting information on that point. To answer RQ3 regarding
program structure, we report descriptive statistics of program features (e.g., supervisor
mentoring) and compare these characteristics among the three study institutions using chi-square
test of independence and one-way analyses of variance (ANOVA). Finally, to address RQ4 on
the relationship between program structure and student outcomes, a two-step hierarchical
regression analysis (Ross & Willson, 2017) examined the amount of variance explained in
students’ internship outcomes (i.e., satisfaction and perceived developmental value) by student
characteristics and program-related factors. In the first model for both satisfaction and perceived
developmental value, individual-level factors that included students’ demographics (i.e., age,
gender, race, first-generation student), life and employment status (i.e., annual income, paying
bills, food assistance), and academic situation (e.g., institution type) were first entered as control
variables in step one. Then, program-specific characteristics were added to the second model as a
second step, including requirement status, internship payment status, industry areas, internship
length, supervisor support, mentorship, goal clarity, relatedness to academic program, and
autonomy. This approach allowed us to report the level of significance for each individual
independent variable and to determine the change in 𝑅𝑅 2 and F created by the second block or
variables (Petrocelli, 2003; Ross & Willson, 2017).

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 Problematizing College Internships

Focus group analysis. Focus group transcripts were analyzed in MaxQDA software to
address RQ2 (i.e., barriers to internships), RQ3 (i.e., program features), and RQ4 (i.e., program
format and their impacts on student outcomes). The first step was to segment the transcripts into
more manageable units, where two researchers reviewed the focus group protocol and then coded
two transcripts in parallel, reconciling the few discrepancies, whereupon the rest of the
interviews were segmented by one researcher (Campbell, Quincy, Osserman, & Pedersen, 2013).
The researchers then engaged in a round of analytical coding that involved engaging in
inductive, open coding of two transcripts, noting recurrent phrases, ideas, and observations
related to features of the internship experience highlighted by students, especially obstacles
related to finding and securing an internship (Ryan & Bernard, 2003; Corbin, Strauss, & Strauss,
2014). Additionally, researchers coded deductively for constructs identified in the literature (e.g.,
barriers to internship participation such as financial concerns or a lack of time). The analysts then
coded separate interviews using the preliminary codebook, reviewed their results and reconciled
differences in code definition and application, and developed a final coding scheme, which one
analyst applied to the entire corpus (Campbell et al., 2013).

Results

RQ1: How many students are participating in internship programs, and does participation
vary by student demographics, academic status, or life/employment situation?
The first question addressed in our study pertains to internship participation, with a focus on
demographic (e.g., race, gender), academic (e.g., enrollment status), and life- and work-related
characteristics (e.g, employment status) of student participants and non-participants. We focus on
these categories given prior evidence indicating that each facet of a students’ life and identity is
implicated in internship experiences and/or the college experience writ large. Of the 1,129
students who responded to our survey, 332 students reported having an internship experience
(29.4%), with considerable differences across the three institutions: 137 at the PWI (43%), 106 at
the TC (26%), and 89 at the HBCU (27%). We then examined whether demographic, academic
status, and life/employment characteristics of students were associated with internship
participation. Table 2 presents descriptive statistics for participants and non-participants, and the
results of chi-square tests which indicates the relationship between internship participation and
categorical variables reported in Table 1. Results showed that internship participation
significantly varied by race, X2 (3, N = 1,073) = 8.88, p = .03; institution type X2 (2, N = 1,127)
= 22.42, p < .001; enrollment status, X2 (1, N = 1,129) = 15.65, p < .001; and academic program,
X2 (16, N = 1,128) = 35.19, p = .004.

Given the influence of race and institution type on participation, and our study’s inclusion of
group of institutions with distinct missions and student bodies (e.g., a HBCU), we conducted a
logistic regression analysis to examine the relationship between internship participation and the
continuous variables in Table 1 (i.e., annual income, working hours, and grade-point average
[GPA]) while holding institution type and race constant. Results indicate that students who
worked fewer hours at their main job (OR = 0.97, 95% CI = [0.96, 0.98], p < 0.001) and students
who reported a higher GPA (OR = 1.21, 95% CI = [1.08, 1.34], p < 0.001) were more likely to

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 Problematizing College Internships

participate in internships. Collectively, these analyses indicate that participation in internships is

not universal and equitable across all students within the study sample, but instead varies
according to a range of demographic, academic, and life/employment situations and
characteristics.

Table 2. Descriptive Statistics and Chi-square Tests by Internship Participation

Internship Participation (n=1,129)
No (n=797) Yes (n=332) 𝜒𝜒 2 p φ
Student Demographics
Gender
Female 475 (-1.39) 210 (1.39)
1.92 0.17 -0.04
Male 299 (1.39) 109 (-1.39)
Race
Asian American 54 (0.79) 18 (-0.79)
Black or African American 154 (-2.95) 89 (2.95)
8.88* 0.03 0.09
Hispanic or Latino 63 (0.68) 22 (-0.68)
White or Caucasian 490 (1.76) 183 (-1.76)
First-generation student (FGS)
Not FGS 473 (-0.25) 197 (0.25)
0.06 0.80 -0.01
FGS 308 (0.25) 124 (-0.25)
Life and Employment Status
Having a job
Yes 259 (1.05) 612 (-1.05)
1.09 0.30 0.03
No 65 (-1.05) 182 (1.05)
Receiving food assistance
No 742 (0.06) 302 (-0.06)
0.004 0.95 0
Yes 41(-0.06) 17 (0.06)
Not paying bill
No 718 (-1.09) 299 (1.09)
1.18 0.28 -0.03
Yes 64 (1.09) 20 (-1.09)
Academic Situation
Institution
PWI 388 (2.31) 137 (-2.31)
HBCU 118 (-4.73) 89 (4.73) 22.42*** < 0.001 0.14
Technical college 289 (1.42) 106 (-1.42)
Enrollment Status
Full-time 557 (-3.96) 270 (3.96)
15.65*** < 0.001 -0.12
Part-time 240 (3.96) 62 (-3.96)
Academic program
Arts and humanities 88 (-1.82) 50 (1.88)
Biosciences, agriculture, natural resources 83 (-3.45) 58 (3.14)
Business 239 (3.12) 68 (-3.33)
Communications, media, public relations 28 (-1.37) 18 (1.52)
35.19** 0.004 0.16
Engineering 85 (1.29) 28 (-1.08)
Health professions 28 (-1.15) 17 (1.29)
Physical sciences, math, computer science 50 (-0.64) 25 (0.82)
Social sciences 104 (1.62) 31 (-1.80)
Social service professions 84 (0.31) 34 (-0.90)
Notes: Internship Yes was coded as 2, and internship No was coded as 1. Adjusted standardized residuals appear in
parentheses on the right of group frequencies.
*p < .05, *p < .01, ***p < .001.

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 Problematizing College Internships

RQ2: What barriers exist for students to participate in internship programs?

Survey results. Next, we examine the critical issue of access, with a focus on the barriers
that students report as inhibiting participation in internships. For survey respondents who had not
taken an internship in the past 12 months (N = 794), a follow-up question asked if they had been
interested in pursuing one, and 64% (N = 502) stated that they had intended to obtain an
internship but could not for a variety of reasons. The most common reasons preventing students
from taking an internship included the need to work at their current paid job (58%), a heavy
course load (52%), and a lack of internships in their discipline or field (42%). Some variation is
evident across the study institutions, which include students at the HBCU reporting inadequate
internship opportunities more than students at Institutions A and B (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. In the past 12 months, why were you not able to pursue an internship? (N = 502)

Focus group and interview results. The 57 focus group participants provided additional
detail on the nature of these barriers. Analysis of participant utterances revealed several themes,
and here we elaborate upon the three most frequently reported issues: compensation, schedules,
internship availability.

Internship compensation. Students who reported compensation as a barrier highlighted the

need to consider their financial stability and their subsequent preference for a paid internship.
Some students had not taken an internship simply because they could not find any that paid
enough for them to consider leaving other paid employment. As one student explained:
My biggest struggle is most of them are unpaid. I am 26, getting married in a year …
trying to do adult things and not getting paid for several months is just not something I
can afford to do right now. I’m currently working a sad minimum wage job but it’s at an
animal shelter. So I’m at least getting some money. But I wouldn’t be able to do classes,
do the internship, and actually work to make money. Which is kind of important because
I’m basically just paying for school as I can, at the moment. Money is unfortunately an
important motivator in what I’m looking for in an internship, and very few are paid.

Another student found some internships with stipends, but explained that they were not large
enough to even pay for the gas it would take to get to and from the internship. Besides the issue
of compensation, the costs associated with applying for these opportunities may in themselves
represent a barrier for some students. One student at the HBCU observed that, “I looked at the
application, but you’ve got to pay $50 for the application fee—I mean, people don’t have money
like that to just be giving out!”

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 Problematizing College Internships

Conflicts with school, work, and personal schedule. Another concern voiced by students
involved balancing the scheduling demands of their paid employment, coursework, and an
internship. As one student observed, the time students spend working at an internship, studying
for their coursework, and managing “normal jobs” can be a tenuous balancing act. When
students did find internships that were promising, some found that the hours needed for an
internship conflicted with their time available for school, personal and family obligations, and
paid employment, which ultimately resulted in them not pursuing internship leads. Additionally,
students who had jobs in areas unrelated to their major but also were seeking internships, usually
did so in order to acquire more professionally relevant experience. However, given that
internship pay (if available) was often not enough money to cover tuition and other basic needs,
several students explained that they had little choice but to continue working at their “main” job.

Internship availability. Several students expressed concerns about the limited availability of
internships in general and the competitive nature of these positions, which appears to
disadvantage students lacking social connections or not attending prestigious universities.
Several students talked about being rejected for multiple internship openings, which they
described as frustrating and disheartening. One student explained that, “At (Institution Name)
they put a lot of pressure on us to get internships, but they are so hard to get so it’s very
frustrating and annoying at times.” Another student in that focus group observed that, “Yes,
you've got to deal with the Ivy League kids, everybody else comes from these big schools … and
we’re just a small institution and people don't really know who we are.” Students also
emphasized the availability of internships as a field-specific problem. One student in physics and
applied math explained that she hadn’t taken an internship simply because, “There aren’t any
here offered for me in my field.” In contrast, a business student explained, “there’s just a lot of
opportunities in the business program, (so) it’s easy for us to get multiple internships.”

Taken together, the qualitative and quantitative data indicate that the primary barriers for
students in our study included scheduling conflicts (with paid work and coursework), the fact
that an unpaid internship was simply not a realistic option for many students given other
expenses and obligations, and a lack of internships for students in particular disciplines and for
those attending less prestigious institutions.

RQ3: What is the structure and format of internship programs?

Survey results. For the 323 students in our study who reported their internship program
features, we report how they described features of the structure and format of their internship
program (Table 3).

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Table 3: Descriptive Statistics of Internship Program Features and Tests of Institutional Differences
Total Sample PWI TC (n=103) HBCU
Internship Program Characteristics (n = 323) (n=135) (n=85)
𝜒𝜒 2
Required to graduate 63.46***
Yes (%) 135 (44.85) 24 (20.17) 69 (67.65) 42 (52.50)
No (%) 166 (55.15) 95 (79.83) 33 (32.35) 38 (47.50)
Compensation 15.29**
Paid (%) 216 (66.87) 74 (54.81) 77 (74.76) 65 (76.47)
Unpaid (%) 107 (33.13) 61 (45.19) 26 (25.24) 20 (23.53)
Industry 60.32***
Agriculture (%) 10 (3.11) 3 (2.22) 4 (3.92) 3 (3.35)
Construction (%) 8 (2.48) 2 (1.49) 6 (5.88) 0 (0)
Education and health services (%) 92 (28.57) 44 (32.39) 19 (18.63) 29 (34.12)
Financial activities (%) 19 (5.90) 11 (8.15) 5 (4.90) 3 (3.53)
Information (%) 30 (9.32) 5 (3.70) 19 (18.63) 6 (7.06)
Leisure and hospitality (%) 29 (9.01) 19 (14.07) 6 (5.88) 4 (4.71)
Manufacturing (%) 12 (3.73) 6 (4.44) 6 (5.88) 0 (0)
Other services (%) 53 (16.64) 24 (17.78) 16 (15.69) 13 (15.29)
Professional and business services (%) 46 (14.29) 16 (11.85) 10 (9.80) 20 (23.53)
Public administration (%) 11 (3.42) 2 (1.48) 3 (2.94) 6 (7.06)
Retail trade (%) 12 (3.73) 3 (2.22) 8 (7.84) 1 (1.18)
F
Weeks of internship (SD) 13.89 (7.18) 15.21 (6.91) 14.80 (7.72) 10.68 (5.90) 12.42***
Supervisor support (SD) 4.21 (0.86) 4.22 (0.84) 4.02 (0.98) 4.41 (0.70) 4.91**
Mentoring (SD) 3.38 (0.86) 3.43 (0.83) 3.00 (0.89) 3.78 (0.73) 22.05***
Goal/task clarity (SD) 3.96 (0.90) 3.99 (0.97) 3.72 (0.93) 4.19 (0.84) 6.80**
Autonomy (SD) 3.88 (0.95) 3.93 (0.95) 3.75 (0.99) 3.96 (0.87) 1.49
Relatedness (SD) 4.03 (0.99) 4.12 (0.92) 4.23 (0.93) 3.66 (1.09) 9.02***
*p < .05, *p < .01, ***p < .001.

For internship participants, more students were in academic programs that required an
internship to graduate than those with no such requirements (45% vs. 55%), more were
compensated for their work than those taking unpaid internships (67% vs. 33%), and the average
internship was approximately 14 weeks long. Additionally, almost one-third of the internships
were in education and health services sector (29%), followed by professional and business
services (14%), information (9%), and leisure and hospitality (9%).

With respect to the nature of supervision during their internships, students assigned relatively
high ratings to the quality of supervisors’ provision of support (M = 4.21, SD = 0.86), especially
in comparison to the quality of mentoring during the internship (M = 3.38, SD = 0.86).
Regarding the nature of the work conducted during the internship, students reported that the
relationship between their internship and their academic program was relatively strong (M =
4.03, SD = 0.99), and that the clarity of task-related goals (M = 3.96, SD = 0.90) and the degree
of autonomy for how to perform their work (M = 3.88, SD = 0.95) were also relatively high.

Given the observed variation in mean values across institutions on these measures, we then
used chi-square and one-way ANOVA tests and found that all program features except task
autonomy significantly varied across the three study institutions. For instance, whether
internships being paid or not paid varied significantly across the three institution types,
𝜒𝜒 2 (4,323) = 15.29, p = .004 with students in the TC and HBCU reporting higher percentages of

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paid internships (75% and 76%), while only 55% PWI participants reported their internships as
being compensated. In addition, students from the HBCU reported receiving greater supervisor
support, mentoring, goal clarity than the other two institutions, while the technical students
reported greatest degree of relatedness to academic program.

Focus group and interview results. For the 34 students in focus groups who had taken an
internship, they described several prominent features of their internship programs, which are
summarized by theme:

Several students described different kinds of supervision during their internships that varied in
their amount of training and autonomy. Some students described their work as highly autonomous
—meaning that they had little training, guidance, and feedback as they completed their tasks.
Others felt less autonomous, meaning that they were trained and supervised when necessary. For
example, one student said that his supervisor was, “not there watching,” but that “he's there to
answer questions and to fix issues that came up.” Students also discussed varying levels of
mentoring, with some supervisors actively coaching and mentoring interns’ performance, whereas
others had limited opportunities for mentoring. One student who received little feedback stated,
“that's the part that's concerning—it’s just that I want to know how I’m doing in my job.”

Putting their internship experience in the context of their career development, some students
felt that their work was directly related to their future careers. This often referred to honing their
technical skills, but some students also described acquiring socio-emotional or “non-cognitive”
skills that they felt would benefit them in their future employment (e.g., communication,
teamwork, self-confidence). Finally, most students talked about their internship as
complementary to their school work, explaining that some of what they learned in class was
related to their internship, but that their internship gave them a better grasp on how these
concepts worked in the real world: “I had the basic knowledge, but being able to sit there first
hand and say, ‘Okay, this is how a retirement account really works’ has definitely taught me
even more than what you can learn in a classroom.”

RQ4: How, if at all, is program structure and format associated with student satisfaction
with their internships and their estimation of the value of the internship on their career
development??
Survey results. Finally, we report results from the analysis of the relationships among
structural features of internship programs and their effects on the two main outcome variables of
interest—student satisfaction and perceived developmental value. Table 4 presents the
correlation matrix for all independent and dependent variables in the analysis. Supervisor
support, mentoring, goal clarity, autonomy, and relatedness to academic program were
significantly correlated with each other as well as with satisfaction and students’ perceived
development value, with correlation coefficients ranging from 0.11 to 0.69.

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Table 4. Correlations of Independent and Dependent Variables (n=323)

Industry Areas
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19
1 Age 1
2 Gender
(1, female; 2, male) -0.03 1
3 Race a -0.23*** 0.14* 1
4 First-gen
(1, No; 2, Yes) 0.07 0.13* -0.06 1
5 Annual income -0.2*** 0.1 0.29*** 0.03 1
6 Paying bills 0.06
(1, No; 2, Yes) -0.08 -0.01 0 0.05 1
7 Food assistance -0.06
(1, No; 2, Yes) -0.04 -0.05 0.01 0.06 0.24*** 1
8 Institution -0.08 0.16** 0.6*** 0.08 0.28*** -0.08 -0.08
9 Required 0.13*
(1, No; 2, Yes) -0.08 0.02 -0.12* -0.05 0.12* 0.13* -0.28*** 1
10 Paid (1, No; 2, Yes) -0.03 -0.08 0.08 0.03 -0.05 0.11 0.04 0.2*** 0.08 1
11 Industry b 0.02 0.06 0.01 0 -0.05 -0.06 -0.07 -0.07 -0.01 -0.1 1
12 Weeks -0.15** 0.12* 0.24*** 0.01 0.19** 0.05 0.02 0.24*** -0.1 -0.06 0.08 1
13 Supervisor support - 0.03 -0.09 -0.16** -0.01 0 -0.1 -0.08 -0.07 0.06 0.04 -0.06 -0.01 1
14 Mentoring 0.03 -0.08 -0.26*** -0.02 -0.07 -0.05 -0.05 -0.12* -0.01 0.06 -0.1 0 0.69*** 1
15 Goal clarity -0.05 -0.09 -0.15** 0.08 -0.01 -0.05 -0.01 -0.07 0.05 0.1 -0.03 0.08 0.65*** 0.56*** 1
16 Autonomy -0.01 -0.06 -0.13* 0.04 0.09 0.05 -0.06 0 0 0 0.03 0.1 0.40*** 0.42*** 0.33*** 1
17 Relatedness -0.13* 0.01 0.17** 0.01 0.09 -0.05 -0.14* 0.17** -0.06 0.04 0.09 0.19** 0.23*** 0.11* 0.19** 0.15** 1
18 Satisfaction -0.07 -0.09 0.01 0.02 0.11 -0.07 -0.09 0.06 -0.01 0.02 -0.05 0.05 0.68*** 0.57*** 0.57*** 0.32*** 0.38*** 1
19 Developmental value 0.01 -0.09 -0.08 -0.02 0.04 -0.04 -0.02 0.01 -0.03 -0.02 -0.04 0.1 0.56*** 0.58*** 0.47*** 0.31*** 0.49*** 0.66*** 1
*p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
a Race levels: 1, race; 2, Black; 3, Hispanic/Latino; 4; White
b Industry areas: 1, agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting; 2, construction; 3, education and health services; 4, financial activities; 5, information; 6, leisure and hospitality; 7, manufacturing; 8,

other services (except pubic administration); 9, professional and business services; 10, public administration; 11, retail trade.

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Table 5 includes the results of the hierarchical regression analysis, which indicates the
contributions of student characteristics (Step 1) as well as the contributions of program features
(Step 2) to internship satisfaction and development value.

Table 5. Results of Hierarchical Regression Analysis for Internship Satisfaction and Developmental Value
Model 1 Model 2
Satisfaction Developmental Satisfaction Developmental
Value Value
Step 1: Students characteristics
Age -0.05 0.00 0.03 0.10*
Gender_Male -0.11* -0.08 -0.07 -0.06
Race (reference group: Asian American)
Race_Black 0.48 0.59 0.21 0.44
Race_Latino 0.20 0.18 0.18 0.16
Race_White 0.28 -0.14 0.63* 0.25
First-gen_Yes 0.01 -0.03 0.01 -0.03
Annual income 0.02* 0.01 0.01 0.01
Paying bills_Yes -0.29 -0.19 -0.12 -0.08
Food assistance_Yes -0.49 -0.06 0.01 0.37*
Institution (reference group: HBCU)
Institution_Technical college -0.02 0.10 -0.04 0.04
Institution_PWI 0.26 0.49 0.13 0.62
𝑅𝑅2 0.07 0.06
F 2.06 1.72

Step 2: Internship program features

Required_Yes 0.05 0.02
Internship being unpaid -0.08 -0.16*
Industry (reference group: agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting)
Industry_Construction 0.88** 0.01
Industry_Finance and Insurance 0.59* -0.14
Weeks -0.01 0.00
Supervisor support 0.41*** 0.15*
Mentoring 0.11*** 0.20***
Goal clarity 0.53*** 0.23
Autonomy -0.03 0.18
Relatedness to academic program 0.21*** 0.37***
𝑅𝑅2 0.61 0.57
𝛥𝛥𝑅𝑅2 0.54 0.51
F 14.92 13.05
𝛥𝛥𝛥𝛥 12.86 11.33
*p < .05, *p < .01, ***p < .001.

With respect to satisfaction with the internships, gender and annual income were two
significant control variables, with males reporting lower satisfaction score (β = -.11, p = .048)
and students with higher annual income (β = .02, p = .019) reporting greater satisfaction with
their internships. However, student characteristics only explained seven percentage points of the
variation in satisfaction, 𝑅𝑅 2 = .07, F(11, 311) = 2.06, p = 0.023. After adding program
characteristics to the model, construction industry (β = .88, p = .003), finance and insurance
industry (β = .59, p = .029) were significant predictors of students’ satisfaction with their
internships. Additional variables that were significant (and positive) predictors of satisfaction
included supervisor support (β = .41, p < .001), mentoring (β = .11, p < .001), goal clarity
(β = .53, p < .001), and relatedness to academic program (β = .21, p < .001) significantly and
positively predicted students’ internship satisfaction. Model 2 explains 61% of the variation in

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satisfaction, 𝑅𝑅 2 = .61, F(30, 292) = 14.92, p < .001. These results suggest that internship
industry, supervisor behavior, nature of work in terms of clarity and link to coursework are
important factors shaping how satisfied students are with their internships.

The second columns in both models include results from analyses of these predictors on the
developmental value of students’ internships. The results indicate that no Step 1 variables were
significantly associated with developmental value, 𝑅𝑅 2 = .06, F (11, 311) = 1.72, p = .07; but that
age (β = .10, p =.026) and receiving food assistance (β = .37, p = .041) became significant
control variables when program features were added to the model. In addition, internships being
compensated (β = - .16, p = .044), supervisor support (β = .15, p = .034), mentoring (β = .20, p
< .001), and relatedness to academic program (β = .37, p < .001) significantly predicted students’
perceived value, 𝑅𝑅 2 = .57, F(30, 292) = 13.05, p < .001. Interns without compensation rated the
developmental value of their internships lower than paid interns. Conversely, supervisor support,
mentoring, and an internship closely linked to coursework positively influence students’ view of
the developmental value of their internship.

The change in the R-squared value was computed using ANOVA, indicating that adding
Step 2 variables (internship program features) significantly improved both the satisfaction model
(F = 20.91, p < .001) and the developmental value model (F = 18.54, p < .001), with the second
model explaining an additional 54% of the variance in satisfaction and 51% in developmental
value.

Focus group and interview results. While we did not explicitly ask students in the focus
groups about the relationship between the structure of their programs and their subsequent
satisfaction and/or developmental outcomes, we include here themes about how students viewed
the ultimate outcomes and benefits of their internship experiences. These results highlight that
while satisfaction and developmental value are important outcome measures, additional effects
of internship experiences should be considered.

For the 34 students who had participated in internships the most cited outcome of an
internship was “real-world” or “hands-on” experience. Students discussed their internships’
experiential value in terms of gaining experience in an authentic workplace setting with people
engaged in the daily work of a profession, which was seen as distinct from yet complementary to
their classroom experiences. Another outcome was the opportunity to explore the field, where
students felt that they could use internships to “test out different avenues of what you might want
to go into.” For example, one student found that “I think the experience … at my internship
confirmed that this is kind of what I want to do in the future,” whereas another student found that
their internship experience helped them see what they did not want to do in the future. Besides
exploring different occupations, students spoke of internships as providing the opportunity to
experience different workplace cultures, which could also inform decisions about their future.

Students also discussed how they grew personally during their internships. Examples
included students’ gaining a better understanding of themselves, personal interests, attitudes and

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behaviors, perspectives on life and work, and sense of self as a professional. One student said, “It
made me see what I was going to put up with and what I was not [going to put up with].” Finally,
many students felt that their internship was key for their future job prospects, and that having
internship experience would get their “foot in the door” for future jobs, either from the company
where they interned or at other companies. Students whose goals were to go into academia or
research also explained that this was essentially required for graduate school applications, so
their internship served as an important stepping stone to access postgraduate education.

Discussion
There is a widespread and growing conviction that internships are a valuable or even
essential co-curricular experience that have positive benefits for college students, educators, and
employers alike. The global advocacy for internships, however, overlooks the fact that the
research literature, while impressively diverse with respect to discipline and geographic
locations, is hindered by methodological limitations and findings that are inconsistent and/or
incomparable across research contexts. Further, long-standing concerns regarding the potential
for internships—especially those that are unpaid—to exploit students, reproduce social
inequalities, and even endanger students’ well-being (Curiale, 2009; Perlin, 2012) makes it a
moral imperative that postsecondary leaders and educators pause before uncritically embracing
internships as an unqualified good.

In this paper, we aim to open up the “black box” of internships by viewing them not as a
singular event that is simply experienced (or not), but as a process and problem of access, design,
and subsequent impacts on students’ development and career trajectories. Ultimately, we find
that internship participation varies substantially across different student groups, that barriers to
participation are real and formidable, and that the design of internship programs—especially the
role of mentors and supervisors—needs careful attention for educators and employers to increase
the prospects of college students having a satisfying and productive experience.

Participation Rates are Low and vary across Institutions and Student Characteristics
With respect to our first research question about internship participation, our study contributes
to the field in three distinct ways. First, our survey instrument used in the College Internship Study
addresses key technical limitations observed with other commonly used surveys (e.g., those
conducted by Higher Education Research Institute, National Survey of Student Engagement,
National Association of Colleges and Employers). Specifically, our instrument provides a clear
definition of internships for respondents, does not include other forms of work-based learning in
the definition or survey items (e.g., co-ops, apprenticeships, clinical placements), and elicits
detailed information on the structure and format of internship programs. Future research should
build upon this more fine-grained approach and national-level instruments should be updated and
revised with respect to how internships are defined and measured.

Second, the results indicate lower participation rates (29.4%) than other national surveys,
such as the National Survey of Student Engagement (49%) and Higher Education Research

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Institute survey (61%). Different sampling strategies and corresponding limitations, such as our
focus on students nearing graduation or other researchers focus on private and/or 4-year
institutions only, as well as terminological issues outlined above may explain these differences.
These discrepancies, however, indicate that a valid and reliable measure of internship
participation on a national level does not yet exist.

Third, our study provides new evidence that substantial variation in internship participation
exists across diverse institution types, and for students with particular demographic, academic,
and employment characteristics. For instance, internship participation was higher at the HBCU
(43%) in our study, in contrast to the TC (26%) and the PWI (27%). Additionally, students with
longer working hours at their main jobs, those with part-time enrollment status, and who have
lower GPA were all less likely to have an internship. Given increasing numbers of college
students who work, and the necessity to do so with the rising costs of tuition and basic needs,
these data should raise concerns about the potential barriers for working and/or low-income
students to participate in an internship (Perna, 2010). Ultimately, more research on the
institutional and personal factors related to internship participation is needed, and we argue that
the unqualified goal of increasing participation in this “high-impact” practice must be tempered
with the recognition that access to internships does not appear to be equally distributed across
institutions and student demographics and/or life situations.

Barriers to Internship Participation may Exacerbate Inequality

Analyses of our survey and focus group data regarding barriers to internship participation
provide additional insights into this problem of equity and access while raising several questions
that researchers should examine. First, the fact that 64% of the students who did not take an
internship (N = 795) had, in fact, wanted to pursue one but could or did not, indicates that
additional research about barriers to participation should be a high priority. The qualitative and
quantitative data collectively indicate that these barriers fall into three primary categories:
scheduling conflicts (with paid work and coursework), a lack of internships in their discipline or
region, and the fact that unpaid internships were simply not a realistic option for students to
pursue given other expenses and obligations.

Of course, these barriers are unfortunate for all students seeking an internship opportunity,
but are especially problematic for low-income, first-generation, and/or minoritized students for
whom an internship may be an especially valuable professional experience. Students in these
groups are at a higher risk for dropping out of college (Museus & Quaye, 2009), often have less
robust social and professional networks with which to draw upon when making academic and
career decisions (Rios-Aguilar & Deil-Amen, 2012), and are at a disadvantage with respect to the
elite and White-dominated cultural capital implicated in employers’ hiring decisions (Rivera,
2012). College and college-related career socialization provides students with a valuable
opportunity to develop the attitudes, behaviors, connections, and résumé-building credentials that
enhance one’s prospects for getting a job. Disparities in access to internships for these students
may have long-lasting effects, moderating the effects of education on upward mobility.

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 Problematizing College Internships

Finally, the issue of internship compensation cannot be ignored. It is promising that 67% of
our study sample were paid for their internships, but the fact that 33% were not remains a
concern. Despite the fact that some research has found that unpaid internships are correlated with
confirming or rejecting career decisions, and thus may play an important role in helping students
explore their professional interests (Crain, 2016), our results indicate a significant and negative
effect on the developmental value of an internship. Furthermore, we argue that debates about
intern compensation should not solely be limited to their effects on developmental or career-
related outcomes, but should be steadfastly focused on concerns about equity, fairness, and
student well-being. Prior research found that students from disadvantaged backgrounds are more
likely to struggle to secure paid internships (Hun & Scott, 2017), and to ask students who are
already struggling with tuition, housing, and basic needs-related bills is in our view simply
unethical. Furthermore, with evidence that internships (and students) are being exploited to fill
short-term labor short-falls and even to replace full-time workers (Chan, Pun, & Selden, 2015),
educators, advisors, and employers must have student safety and well-being foremost in mind
when thinking about internship requirements and opportunities on their campuses.

Structure of Programs and Their Impacts

Next, we consider one of the central issues addressed in this paper—the question of how
internship program structure is associated, if at all, with student outcomes. Our findings suggest
that internship programs with specific characteristics—especially supervisor support, supervisor
mentoring, and relation to academic program—can lead to greater internship satisfaction and
perceived value of the internship to students’ career development. These results confirm prior
research that highlights the importance of good job-site supervision, leading McHugh (2017) to
state that, “for institutions that encourage and/or require internships, screening internship
providers in terms of their supervisory commitment is warranted” (p. 377). We go further and
argue that colleges and universities should vet potential internship hosts to ensure that they have
adequate, trained supervisors on site to supervise student interns and provide regular mentoring
and critical feedback (O’Neill, 2010). The presence of high-quality supervision, along with the
need for meaningful work and not menial tasks such as making photocopies or serving coffee, is
a long-standing critique of college internships that remains a pressing issue to this day (Frenette,
2013; Perlin, 2012). While not a completely failsafe mechanism for ensuring effective
supervision of interns, agencies such as the North Carolina Community and Technical College
Jobs Consortium provide an example of ways to increase the prospects of effective (and non-
exploitative) internships by requiring employers to demonstrate the adequacy of their mentoring
capacity while refusing to post unpaid internships. These basic safeguards should be standard
practice for colleges and universities throughout the U.S.

Another programmatic design feature that the survey and focus group data indicate are
important for student satisfaction and developmental outcomes is the relationship between the
internship tasks and students’ own academic and career trajectories. That is, a biology major
aiming to work in the biotechnology sector is unlikely to find an internship in a bank very
fulfilling or useful. That said, the fact that some students reported using internships as a venue

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 Problematizing College Internships

for exploring career opportunities, in the spirit of keeping an open mind about their ultimate
career pathways, suggests that the importance of a close link between internship and major may
vary from student to student.

Future research in this area should examine this issue, along with the prospect that different
internship formats may impact different kinds of students (e.g., discipline, region, first-gen, low-
income, racial/ethnic minorities, gender) in different ways. In addition, we encourage researchers
to examine the influence of internship duration on student outcomes in light of growing interest
in “micro-internships” that are much shorter than traditional programs and to expand the
conception of internship outcomes to include more psychosocial factors such as vocational self-
concept, career exploration and adaptability (Savickas, 1997).

Conclusions and Next Steps

Several limitations to the study should be noted, particularly the prospects of selection and
response bias in the survey component of the study, and self-selection bias for the student focus
groups. While the results illuminate features of students’ internship experiences at each
participating campus, they should not be used to make general claims about college internships
in general, or the experiences of students at the PWI, TC and HBCU in particular.

One of the primary conclusions that we can draw from this first dataset from the College
Internship Study is that the field needs to adopt a process-oriented and developmental account of
student experiences with internship programs. That is, instead of viewing internships as singular
experiences that can be measured with a “yes/no” question about participation and that
unquestionably cause positive labor market outcomes, we argue for a new perspective. Building
upon existing processual models of internships (Diambra, Cole-Zakrzewski, & Booher, 2004;
Sweitzer & King, 2013), we propose a framework for studying internships that takes account of
the following stages: (1) the demographic, academic, and life/employment situations of college
students, who then aim to (2) gain access to internship opportunities, which are influenced by
geography, discipline, and local labor markets. If successful, students then (3) participate in an
experiential learning space characterized by important structural features, which ultimately may
lead to (4) outcomes such as students’ employment status, future earnings, and changes in
vocational self-concept and sense of self (see Figure 2).

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 Problematizing College Internships

Figure 2

Besides guiding research on college internships, we suggest that this framework be used by
postsecondary leaders, career services and student affairs professionals, employers, and
policymakers to better understand the specific forces at work that shape access to and
experiences with one of the most promising yet vexing co-curricular experiences available to
students—the college internship. Ultimately, the field should recognize that while internships
may be a vehicle for the potential transformation of a person from a student to a budding
professional, they may also reproduce inequality by making these experiences inaccessible to
students who lack sufficient financial or social capital.

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 Problematizing College Internships

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