Internships

[quasimodo]

Just had an early morning trip to drop my eldest dd off at the rail station as she went on a spring internship for four days. The cost including travel accommodation and meals covered by the company.This is the fourth she is going on, the others being one day affairs again costs being paid by the companies in respect of travel.

I didn't appreciate how much of a merry go round this process is and the effort that goes into seeking these short experiences at these large companies.Its a process which begins in your first year of a three year degree or the second year of a four year degree and involves numerous tests and interviews along the way.

How things have changed in 30 years.I am told its all part of having the right experience on your linkedin profile.Without such experiences I am led to believe your chances of getting the right employment is very much reduced.

All this in my view reduces the overall enjoyment University was meant to offer if you have to think about work from such an early stage.You grow up so much faster.

[Yamin151]

Whilst things have become very competitive (thanks Tony for the 'lets get 80% 18 year olds doing degrees, however Micky mouse' policy). Anyway, whilst this has caused a lot of competitiveness up top, I have faith that there will still be a healthy 'bell curve' of people with good degrees, but without the kind of internships that cost so much in terms of interviews and difficulty and without which your future career is in doubt. If there are not enough of these type of internships to go around, but the country still needs doctors, lawyers, barristers, architects, vets etc etc then there are going to be plenty of job opportunities around for that large cohort of students who don't get this kind of intenship or all the LinkedIn boxes ticked. I am sure it is a certain amount of urban myth, Mae much worse of course by the ability to trickle out and grow these rumours on the Internet.
I don't argue that there are terribly competitive job vacancies and internships out there, but I still believe this is a top tier minority, and if you don't have all these on your LinkedIn cv you are not doomed to a lifetime of house conveyancing in Swindon with your law degree (nothing wrong with that if its what you want, but you know what I mean).

Together with that, I'd say having fab interview skills and people skills and an enthusiastic mind and attitude will buy you just as much in the long run as a posh internship and the stress it caused to achieve it.

Don't think it helps that from what I can see, the top internships involve not a little involvement in securing them of parents, both their footwork and General work, but also if it's there, the old school tie network. It was ever thus.

I refuse to despair and fall into the doom and gloom and will continue to encourage my boys that hard work and enthusiasm will eventually win the day.

[quasimodo]

It is my understanding that this FTSE 100 company had 20,000 applicants for the spring internships for which they selected 20.They only targeted 8 Universities and the interns are divided into two thirds for engineering and one third commercial.The universities targeted were Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial College London, Warwick, LSE, Herriot Watt, Leeds and Manchester.They are all being offered paid summer internships in the summer should they want them, which unfortunately my dd is unable to do this year as she will be studying abroad for a year from July. It is my understanding this is how about a third of recruits are obtaining graduate jobs.There were no shortcuts to these applicants,no old boy network just simply the hurdles in the long recruitment process nothing as parents we could help with.I agree this is not the only way employment can be gained with such employers.

I also agree you need many qualities for employment including fab interview skills, people skills,enthusiastic mind and attitude and you don't need to go down this route.But since its something my dd wants this is the road we are down.I hope those were some of the qualities she showed in getting the internship in the first place.

[Yamin151]

And I applaud your DD, how well she has done and I take nothing away from her dedication, hard work, and deserving ness of the posts she has been offered.

Given the statistics for these inenships you have just quoted, it makes me endorse my point even more though. For your daughter she wanted to go for it and it's right for her, but there are by default thousands of career jobs out there for fabulous graduates that do not require the jumping through of so many hoops, so what I'm saying is that parents and students should not despair and think the lack of such incredible achievements on their cv will make a material difference to their career in the long run, if they don't want it to.

Congrats to your daughter!

[quasimodo]

This all has to be put in context, what you don't know about are the many other applications she has made to very different FTSE companies and the different stages she has been rejected.This all requires many many hours of submitting applications and going through different tests and interviews and picking yourself up and trying again after what is in reality wasted effort.It requires fortitude and willpower.

The successes make up for all the many many rejections.

One of her friends who doesn't have the tickboxes on her linkedin profile was recently offered graduate employment with a similar FTSE company.I agree there are very many footpaths up those different mountains.

[sbarnes]

Those list of universities appear to be in the Russell Group, an unofficial elitist group of around 25 or so universities.

[Guest55]

'Those list' ???

Depends what sort of career you want to go into ...

[quasimodo]

Those list of universities appear to be in the Russell Group, an unofficial elitist group of around 25 or so universities.

I don't believe Herriot Watt is part of the Russell Group but has a very good reputation for some of its engineering and business courses.

At the end of the day it is up to the human resources departments where they are going to target their recruitment efforts.This is why I think its a good idea to read the "High Fliers" surveys when considering which Universities you should apply to so that you are aware which Universities are being targeted by major employers, bearing in mind the high costs of University education these days.

[Catseye]

The ten universities most-often targeted by Britain’s top graduate employers in
2014-2015 are Manchester, Nottingham, Warwick, Cambridge, Oxford, Durham,
Bristol, Imperial College London, University College London and Leeds.

in that rank order

http://www.highfliers.co.uk/download/20 ... port15.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Yamin151]

Those list of universities appear to be in the Russell Group, an unofficial elitist group of around 25 or so universities.

I don't believe Herriot Watt is part of the Russell Group but has a very good reputation for some of its engineering and business courses.

At the end of the day it is up to the human resources departments where they are going to target their recruitment efforts.This is why I think its a good idea to read the "High Fliers" surveys when considering which Universities you should apply to so that you are aware which Universities are being targeted by major employers, bearing in mind the high costs of University education these days.

Anyone would think it was you applying Quasimodo!