A comprehensive view of college students’ summer internship
◆ Some students’ internships are not for harvest, but the names of these big companies can be written in their resumes in the future. With feedback from classmates, everyone knows that it is "water" to "brush resumes". However, if interns with "brush resumes" have more employment advantages than students who practice in a company, they will not want to practice in depth in the future.
◆ Interns’ internship time is short, and they may leave as soon as they get started, so internship units generally don’t let interns do core work.
◆ "We especially hope that the school can filter the internship units, because in the face of mixed internship information, if it lacks discernment, it is likely to be deceived."
◆ Only when interns, internship units and universities are linked, can the internship effect be maximized.
Every winter and summer vacation, some young unfamiliar faces always appear in some government agencies, enterprises and institutions, and disappear after a period of time. They are holiday interns, especially in summer.
China Youth Daily Social Investigation Center conducted a questionnaire survey on 2004 college students in August this year. According to the data, 78.2% of the interviewed college students are doing summer internships, covering junior college students, undergraduates and graduate students, among whom junior students account for 43.6%. This phenomenon is intriguing.
Why are so many college students engaged in summer internships? How was the harvest? How to get a high-quality internship? With these questions, the reporter of Outlook News Weekly conducted an in-depth investigation.
"testing the water" before entering the society
On the eve of this summer, the School of Journalism and Communication of Xiamen University held a mobilization meeting for students’ summer internship, which called juniors to listen to the internship gains of previous students and also helped students recommend internship units.
"The teacher said that journalism is practical and requires us to turn our professional knowledge into practical ability through internship." Li Tongxue, a media intern in Beijing, told reporters that after the internship, the school requires students to write an internship report and bring the internship appraisal issued by the internship unit, which will be counted as credits.
Xiao Zhang, a graduate student of Jinan University, told Outlook Newsweek that their internships should also be counted as credits. According to the requirements of "Practice Teaching" in the Training Program for Postgraduates with Master’s Degree in Journalism and Communication of Jinan University, "fresh graduates and non-fresh graduates who have not worked in the journalism and communication industry for more than one year must ensure to participate in practice teaching for not less than six months … The basis of practice teaching assessment is the appraisal materials issued by their internship units and a personal internship report."
The reporter learned that it is common for students to put forward internship requirements in colleges and universities, and the majors with strong application, such as accounting, archaeology, geology, law, journalism, etc., generally put forward stricter requirements for students’ internships.
"There is still a long way to go from theoretical knowledge to practical application. Internship helps to cultivate students’ knowledge application ability and master relevant skills." Fu Suiyan, Minister of Academic Affairs of Peking University, said in an interview with the reporter of Outlook News Weekly.
Xiao Zhang’s first internship mentioned above began in the summer of junior year, but it was spontaneous. "At that time, many students around me went to the internship. Watching others go, I couldn’t help but have pressure and motivation." Xiao Zhang said, "I vaguely feel that the theories and cases in the textbook are somewhat out of touch with the news practice, so I want to see what the real knife and gun news is like."
There are not a few students like Xiao Zhang, and some of them went to practice as soon as they were freshmen. "The earlier the internship, the higher the fault tolerance rate." Tang, an intern in an Internet company in Beijing, told reporters, "This way, you can experience multiple jobs in multiple industries or an industry and determine your career direction in advance."
Fu Suiyan believes that different from the educational environment provided by the school, the internship unit provides a professional environment, which is conducive to the transition of students from school people to social people. It’s like "testing the water" before swimming. You don’t know how deep the water is until you try it.
For the internship unit, although it takes energy and time to coach with interns, the general unit is also willing to accept interns.
"Freshmen college students are young and energetic, curious and expressive, sensitive to new things, and good at learning new knowledge and skills. As long as they are well guided, they can not only help units or enterprises fill some job vacancies, but also be a good talent discovery mechanism and reflect corporate social responsibility." A staff member of a central enterprise who has instructed hundreds of college interns said in an interview with Outlook News Weekly.
Hu Shi, who worked as an intern in the national ministries and commissions, went to a government unit in Beijing for policy research after graduation. He took the lead in recruiting interns in this unit. At present, graduate students from two famous universities in Beijing have followed him in research work. "The unit is short of manpower and the project funds are limited, which is not enough to support the recruitment of full-time personnel for research. Short-term training and corresponding subsidies for college interns can effectively solve these problems and be a good exercise and growth for interns." Hu Shi said.
Uneven internship effect
Although colleges and students attach great importance to summer internship, the internship effect is uneven, even very different. Some students may have a rich harvest beyond expectations, some may have a little taste, and they can barely cope with the assessment of their majors, while others may have no harvest or even negative results.
Mr. Zhang, who is currently working in the National Network Information Office, graduated from China Forestry University and worked as an intern in a national ministry for three years. This is his first internship experience. Recalling this past, he was somewhat unbelievable. On second thought, the reason why an internship can keep him going for so long is because the internship has given him continuous unexpected gains.
"The internship I originally envisaged was to do some service and auxiliary work such as odd jobs and running errands. I didn’t expect that the internship unit often entrusted me to do some core work, from compiling books to organizing training, to writing manuscripts, making external contacts, making exchange speeches at meetings, etc. My comprehensive ability was exercised in this process, and my writing was good, my language expression ability was strong, and I was able to distinguish priorities. I thought the problem was organized and met with difficulties. Mr. Zhang told reporters.
However, such internship status is not common.
"Most people don’t value the quality of internship, but only the internship certificate." A college student who didn’t want to be named told this reporter that the internship time required by the college sometimes conflicts with the time for studying for postgraduate entrance examination, preparing for studying abroad, and doing graduation thesis. Some students choose to lose the internship as a pawn in order to "protect their cars" and simply find a relationship to open an internship appraisal. Some even buy forged internship certificates through Taobao. This kind of internship effect is no different from zero.
Some internships seem to involve students, but they are just "skimming the water". "What they are interested in is not the quality of the internship, but adding an extra sum to their resumes, commonly known as’ brushing resumes’, in order to gain an advantage when looking for a job." Chai, a graduate student of China Renmin University, told the reporter that some units do not need to take classes for internships, so some students hold internships in several large units at the same time, not to gain anything, but to include the names of these large units in their resumes in the future.
In the view of the interviewed teachers and students, this kind of quick success and instant benefit internship destroys the internship ecology and artificially creates internship anxiety. Mr. Chai has been practicing in a central enterprise for 8 months. He said that we all know that "brushing resumes" is very "water", but in the case of asymmetric information, if interns with "brushing resumes" have more employment advantages than students who practice in a company, everyone will not want to practice in depth in the future.
"This is a bad cycle." Fu Suiyan said, "If schools excessively demand internship certificates and employers pay too much attention to students’ internship experience in large units, more and more internships will be faked, and internships will become meaningless."
There is another situation worthy of vigilance. For example, in recent years, there have been media reports from time to time that female students have been sexually assaulted, sexually harassed, or interns have been defrauded, exposing the potential dangers and hidden dangers of internship.
Constructing high-growth internship mechanism
How can we get an internship with high growth value? As an intern, Mr. Zhang, a staff member of the National Network Information Office, told the reporter that a good internship is the result of mutual trust and interaction between internship units and interns. Internship units are willing to spend time training interns and provide them with high-quality exercise platforms and opportunities. Interns also have passion and time to do more things in internship units.
However, the reporter learned that because training interns often takes time and energy of internship units, and some interns only use internship experience as a springboard or to increase the weight of their resumes, internship units that do not get the corresponding "return" will also lack interest in accepting and training interns. Moreover, the internship time is usually short, and the work may leave as soon as it is started, so the internship unit generally does not let interns do the core work.
There are no fewer than five units that Xiao Zhang participated in the internship. What impressed him most was his internship in a media in Beijing: "The newspaper society included the labor results of interns in the evaluation system, provided independent travel opportunities for students with outstanding ability, and incorporated the interns’ works into the internal good draft evaluation system of the newspaper, giving interns a full amount of good draft awards. It was under such encouragement that my potential was developed to a greater extent than other units."
A person in charge of a central enterprise suggested that internship units should pay attention to the voices of interns. In the process of recruiting interns, the recruitment process is serious, such as asking the school to issue letters of introduction and related materials, ensuring that interns have high quality, allowing students to participate in written tests and interviews, gaining a sense of accomplishment from hard-won opportunities and cherishing internship opportunities. In the process of using interns, whether the interns are organized into "intern groups", trained separately with formal employees, or directly assigned to working groups, the internship results should be summarized and fed back in time after working for a period of time to enhance the interns’ sense of participation.
Fu Suiyan suggested implementing the "internship recommendation mechanism", that is, the internship unit issued the "internship recommendation letter", which the employer used as an important reference for students’ employment. "If the internship unit does not recognize the performance of the intern, it can remain silent, but if the internship unit issues a letter of recommendation, it should be valued by the employer to promote the quality of the internship to a benign development."
It is worth mentioning that schools should also play a greater role in students’ internship. The reporter learned that at present, the school’s internship management for students is still relatively loose. From finding an internship unit to specific work, many are decided by interns. "We especially hope that the school can filter the internship units, because in the face of mixed internship information, if it lacks discernment, it is likely to be deceived." Chai said.
Fu Suiyan believes that it is necessary for the school to build a student internship platform, do a good job in screening and recommending internship units, keep the good and discard the bad, and at the same time do a good job in guiding students before internship, telling them why they should practice, what to pay attention to during internship, how to identify bad internship units, and which channels to ask for help in case of danger. She also stressed that the school’s intervention should be moderate, otherwise it would violate the original intention and effect of "testing the water" and should not set mandatory internship indicators, otherwise it might encourage fraud.
"Since colleges and universities support students’ internships, they should also pay attention to the two-way incentives for students and internship units, give medals and appraisals such as’ excellent interns’ to students with excellent internships, list enterprises or units with good feedback from students, establish internship bases, and strengthen the interaction between schools and internship units, and care about students’ internship progress in a timely manner." A person in charge of a central enterprise told Outlook Newsweek that only when interns, internship units and universities are linked can the internship effect be maximized. (Reporter Liu Miaomiao Intern Liu Qian)
Published in the 36th issue of Outlook in 2018.