What is Internship?
Internship is a system of on-the-job training, similar to an apprenticeship. Interns are usually college or university students, but they can also be high school students or post graduate adults seeking skills for a new career; they may also be as young as middle school students in some areas. Student internships provide opportunities for students to gain experience in their field, determine if they have an interest in a particular career, create a network of contacts, or gain school credit. Internships provide employers with cheap or free labor for (typically) low-level tasks. Some interns find permanent, paid employment with the companies in which they interned. Their value to the company may be increased by the fact that they need little to no training.
An internship may be paid, unpaid or partially paid (in the form of a stipend). Paid internships are most common in the medical, architecture, science, engineering, law, business (especially accounting and finance), technology and advertising fields. Internships in non-profit organizations such as charities and think tanks are often unpaid, volunteer positions. Internships may be part-time or full-time; typically, they are part-time during the university year and full-time in the summer. They usually last 6–12 weeks, but can be shorter or longer based on the company for which they intern.
The act of job shadowing may also constitute interning.
An internship is an excellent way to determine if the industry and the profession is the best career option to pursue. Interns not only gain practical work experience in a field that they intend to pursue but also build experience in international. Internships helps develop professional work habits; provides an understanding of corporate cultures, gives an opportunity to analyze international business settings, offers platforms to compare differences in work styles. Completing an internship is often an excellent way of gaining actual employment in the same occupational field, as many companies hire their interns as full time employees after the internship has been completed successfully. For interns, it becomes easier for internationals to secure a job in their home country upon their return.
