Are you feeling lost in the search for an internship? You’re not alone. In this blog post, Reese Munson, an Economics major at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, walks you through her step-by-step journey of finding and applying for a summer internship. Drawing from her first-hand experience, Reese offers valuable insights and practical tips to help make your internship search a little easier and a lot more successful.
Balancing interests and skills: Before starting my search, I identified my interests (math, analytics), skills (analytics, research) and wants (to be in a big city). These aspects gave me a starting point for what to look for when applying to internships.
Narrowing the options: Companies post most internship opportunities on online job boards — Handshake, Indeed.com and LinkedIn. I primarily applied to internships through Handshake. To narrow my search, I filtered the postings by city, job type and industry and began searching keywords related to my identified interests, skills and field of study.
Choosing to apply: My application strategy was applying to any moderately interesting position. In each job posting, I started by reading through the responsibilities; if I found at least half of the listed responsibilities interesting, I applied. If I was uncertain, I read the job description and qualifications (tip: don’t get caught up on whether you meet all the qualifications). If I knew I wouldn’t accept the position as a last resort, I wouldn’t have applied.
Tracking applications: I noted each application in a spreadsheet, including the position title, company, date applied, location and other relevant information (often including my login to the application website).
You can also find internship opportunities by talking with employers at career fairs, utilizing your professional network (peers, professors, mentors, family friends, etc.) or searching a company’s website directly.
Sourced from Medium, published on February 1st, 2024.
