Dave earned six academic credits this summer reorganizing nuts and bolts for his quantum physics internship.
by Irma Pelt
Senior Staff Writer
As the summer draws to a close, many college students are faced with the arduous task of defending their internship experiences against the predefined learning outcomes provided by their academic departments.
“This was a highly competitive internship,” said Brandi Estrada, a senior at Bomgren State University. “My advisor was convinced this would be the stepping stone to a career in public relations.”
Estrada completed her internship at Sander & Boren, a public relations boutique in Chicago.
“It was just bitch work,” said Estrada. “The only PR I actually did was sucking up to the baristas at Starbucks who hated the company owners.”
Estrada has spent the last three weeks of her summer vacation writing essays to create the appearance that the work she did fits the internship criteria for her degree program.
“Like, I was supposed to gain experience writing press releases. I wrote some fake ones to my friends on Facebook with updates about the shit going on in the office. That totally counts in my book,” said Estrada.
Estrada’s academic advisor, Jackie Shippee, is responsible for reviewing Estrada’s internship portfolio.
“Honestly, I’m not even going to read it,” said Shippee. “Internships are a test of resilience more than a test of academic fortitude. If I read it at all, it will be to see how well she’s able to exaggerate her experiences.”
Terry Erb, a history major at Sinclair Compton College, completed his internship at the National Museum of Television History.
“I was supposed to learn about archiving and restoration,” said Erb. “I know a whole lot about how the museum’s lead curator was banging his secretary in the restoration lab.”
In light of his situation, Erb focused his final summer research paper on restoration of digital surveillance footage thought to be deleted.
“I got a pretty sweet bonus at the end of the summer,” said Erb, who noted that the National Museum of Television History would be paying his tuition for the upcoming academic year.
“Yes,” said Erb, “from what I’ve learned about the real world, I’d say this internship taught me a lot that applies to my future.”
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Obviously, the thing these students didn’t learn on their summer internship was to keep their ears open, their noses to the grindstone and their mouths shut! Good luck in the real world!
Satire. We write satire. Those students are fake. Brandi Estrada never had an internship and she will never get a job in the real world because she is not real herself.
Quite often there are elements of truth in satire. Interns talk…people talk. The names/places may be fictional but the issues remain the same. Thanks, for bringing them out in the open.
Amen to that. I bet you have a million stories to tell from your job in career services. I’m amused at the tweets and blog posts I see active job searchers writing for the whole world to see. I *think* they want jobs, anyway.
Thank you to whoever wrote this article. I live in Western East Carolina, and since this article aired, I haven’t received any calls back from potential employers.
I will soon be undergoing the legal name-change process.