I would consider myself to be a typical middle-class New Jersey kid. Both of my parents work. I grew up in suburbia -- in New Jersey, right between the New York and Philadelphia spheres of influence. My home school district's public education is rated one of the best in the nation. But what I think defines being middle-class the most is being stuck in that financially awkward place between being able to actually afford a college education and being able to qualify for real financial aid or federal grants. Student debt is, as I've noticed, a topic that has been widely covered in the blogosphere, newspapers, and in student protests across the country. The proverbial market for this particular issue, I would say, is saturated.
Unfortunately, this is but one issue within the larger battlefield for social mobility in the United States today. A neglected (and very much related) issue, yet one which affects nearly every college student in the United States today, is that of unpaid internships. It is odd, I think, that the issue of student debt has received so much attention while the issue of unpaid internships has received little (perhaps none). Why? Because while the issue of student loans affects, for the most part, only middle class students, the problem of unpaid internships affects all but the most wealthy.
I, and I would imagine many other college students in similar positions, have seen, time and again, these dreaded two sentences: "Interns are highly encouraged to obtain funding from outside sources as the position is unpaid. Arrangements can be made for work/study or course credit." And, I suspect, they have reacted like I have: "I don't want college credit! I want to be paid!" (In fact, my college doesn't even give credit for internships.)
The thing is, I don't want to be paid because I want a new iPod or a new computer. I need to be paid because I need a way of buying three meals a day. (Maybe I can narrow it down to two?) I need to be paid because I don't qualify for work-study. I need to be paid because course books alone cost me over $600 this semester. I need to be paid because I need a way to pay for housing and food in the city of wherever this internship might be.
But if I don't take this internship, what will I do when I graduate and go out into the real world and find that every job wants two to three years of experience and a list of professional, not academic, references a mile long?
True, many colleges do offer grants to students who take unpaid internships over the summer. But the pitfalls of these programs are many. They are, at least in my experience, underfunded and poorly advertised; they will deny you funding if you get any money at all, regardless of how underpaid you are; worst of all, they often require that you apply for the grant before you know whether you have an internship at all. As a result, these grant programs, while perhaps helpful for a few students, are on the whole insufficient.
And while college financial aid offices are increasingly willing to subsidize the education of poorer students (appearing generous while at the same time initiating huge tuition hikes), there is no such office for the world of internships. In this respect, as I noted earlier, many poor and middle-class college students are in the same boat: how can we compete in a post-baccalaureate economy when we can't afford to gain valuable experience while pursuing our degree?
Without any reasonable way of attaining "funding from outside sources," unpaid internships successfully keep out those of us who are passionate and eager to learn, but simply can't afford to move to wherever your offices happen to be for three months while draining our bank accounts to pay for our own food and lodging.
I am sure that many people will recognize this as an undeniable truth -- maybe even those for keeping unpaid internships unpaid -- but perhaps what many do not recognize is the overall injustice of keeping these programs out of reach to poor and even middle-class students. As I noted earlier, many "real" jobs expect even recent college graduates to have years of experience. Ostensibly, the choice for students is between a summer job so that they can pay their bills now or an internship so that they can pay off their student loans in the future. The reality is that there is no choice at all: the costs involved in an internship, for many of us, are simply too great.
The end result? Come graduation, we will all be at a disadvantage to those who can afford to shell out hundreds of dollars for living expenses and food each summer, or to those who don't need to make any money over the summer to pay for food or books.
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In short, it seems as though the problem is that college in general should be made more affordable for the middle class, not just internships in particular.
While I'm not saying that everybody should major in the physical sciences, I am saying that there's a reason why we're getting paid and you're not. We're in demand, engineering, physical sciences, the fields of study which are actually used to make money or actually produce marketable goods are getting paid because we add value. The arts and social sciences don't necessarily do this and there's more people in these programs so the demand is higher so the costs of an internship go up.
You may not like it but it's how the system works and the moment it changes I'm going to get mad about why people who only have to memorize the ideas of others without any actual ability to implement it are getting paid as much as the people who do stuff in society.
The social sciences are vital to the functioning of our society because they are integral in shaping public policy -- they tell us what works and what doesn't.
Historians are also important: they help us learn from the past. I have a friend with a degree in American history who is dating someone working on AIDS research. Guess who had to explain to whom the history of funding for AIDS research. History majors are the only reason that science majors might have any grasp on their own evolution.
Artists, musicians, composers, singers, actors, and dancers are what keep American culture going. As much fun as you might want to pretend a cultureless society that places a premium on science and only on science, I think that most people would be miserable living like that.
The fact of the matter is that the United States is a pluralist society, that the interaction of wide varieties of different people produce better policy outcomes (funny how social science discovered this), and that there is more to life than science. While undoubtedly science has helped propel us forward, to pretend that any field other than science is useless is as wrong as it is offensive.
Check it out
I provide my time, training, and learning opportunities to the interns. It costs me to do this and the return on my investment is negligible because the person doesn't stick around long enough to reach a level of performance where it pays off for my business.
I'd like to think that I'm a humanitarian, but I also have a bottom line to consider.
While offering an unpaid internship likely costs its providers a little time and effort, students accepting those internships should ask themselves whether the experiences they will have while at that internship are worth not only spending $3000, but also not earning any money over the summer to spend on food, books, and other school-related costs during the school-year.
The people in my program are more important than college students. I'm not taking money away from the services they need to pay an intern.
If that makes me not a humanitarian, so be it.
It called "innovation", get used to it.
The benefit of using University of Dreams’ services, explains Chief Marketing Officer Eric Normington, is getting ahead of other applicants and being certain your resume has been reviewed by numerous companies.
“We provide a network for people who would otherwise be trawling the Web, sending hundreds of applications,” said Normington from his office in California. “Since we began [working with students] ten years ago, very few people have failed to find a place they liked.”
Advisers help students find internships in Barcelona, Boston, Chicago, Costa Rica, Dublin, Hong Kong, Las Vegas, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Diego, San Francisco, Sydney, Toronto and Washington D.C.
What It’ll Cost You: The costs are adjusted according to each location and range from $5,499 for an internship in Costa Rica to $9,699 for New York. Other fees include a $35 application fee and $1,000 deposit.
The programs are all-inclusive, meaning you cannot defer the housing costs even if you have an alternative place to stay (e.g., relative or friend’s home).
Keep in mind that the majority of internships are unpaid.
In the humanities, maybe, but those in the sciences and engineering could and still do have access to plenty of paid internships. IBM pays $15-25 dollars an hour for those pursuing engineering, math, physics, and computer science degrees to work over the summer; Dow pays around $15/hr for those pursuing chemistry degrees; and Schlumberger and other petro companies pay very well for those pursuing geo-science and engineering degrees.
That isn't to say there doesn't need to be a system in place for humanities students to attain job experience while getting a stipend to support COL expenses, but it does speak for the value of pursuing a STEM field degree.
There is only one sector of the economy providing job growth: UNPAID internships. Now, how's that for having a fine future to look forward to, eh Middle Class????
As someone who was required to take two semesters of science, I know full well that it is not for me. I excel and am interested in other subjects, and those subjects are what I want to study. The fact that the humanities are increasingly being reserved for only the wealthy (as federal funding is disappearing for social science research, as are paid internships), as the rest of us are being pushed to just stick to doing something that's in demand, but we very well might despise and be terrible at, suggests a larger problem in society that needs to be addressed.
I was in the weird place of being a good student in HS but parents made too much for me to qualify for any financial aid outside of the handful of scholarships.
I honestly feel for students that are graduating these days. The entry level position is almost nonexistent for those that don't have either an internal connection or a few internships under their belt.
Hence a major mistake in my college education. I have been having a lot of trouble finding a job even having graduated with honors with two bachelors: one in math, one in physics; this is because, in order to graduate in a decent time, I spent my summers taking courses instead of working an internship.
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Interestingly enough, most unpaid internships are ILLEGAL. http://www.dol.gov/whd/opinion/FLSANA/2004/2004_05_17_05FLSA_NA_internship.htm
In order for unpaid internships to be legal, they must follow these standards:
1. The training, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to that which would be given in a vocational school;
2. The training is for the benefit of the trainee;
3. The trainees do not displace regular employees, but work under close observation;
4. The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees and on occasion the employer’s operations may actually be impeded;
5. The trainees are not necessarily entitled to a job at the completion of the training period; and
6. The employer and the trainee understand that the trainees are not entitled to wages for the time spent in training.
I really wish these standards were more enforced.
In order for unpaid internships to be legal, they must follow these standards:
1. The training, even though it includes actual operation of the facilities of the employer, is similar to urrently the best chance that I will have of getting a job after I graduate, and there is absolutely no way that I can be unemployed for any length of time post-graduation (my parents cannot afford to support me post graduation, as they will be paying for my sister's college). The time and energy sap placed on not-wealthy students just to ensure that they will have a post-graduation job in this economy is ridiculous.that which would be given in a vocational school;
2. The training is for the benefit of the trainee;
3. The trainees do not displace regular employees, but work under close observation;
4. The employer that provides the training derives no immediate advantage from the activities of the trainees and on occasion the employer’s operations may actually be impeded;
5. The trainees are not necessarily entitled to a job at the completion of the training period; and
6. The employer and the trainee understand that the trainees are not entitled to wages for the time spent in training.
I really wish these standards were more enforced.