There are a plethora of internship opportunities at Siena College. Regardless of your major or interests, there will be an option for you! If you don’t know where to start looking, there is an incredibly helpful and resourceful Career and Internship Center on campus. Obtaining an internship not only looks great on your resume but is also beneficial for figuring out what exactly you like before graduating and entering the workforce. Additionally, you are able to see what a typical day would be like working in that specific field while making great connections that will help you later in life. There are on-campus internships available, as well as in Albany and the Capital Region. If you are thinking about expanding outside of the general area, Siena would be able to help find an internship all the way from New York City to London.
Siena is able to help students apply and ultimately land impressive internships from a wide range of companies. A few examples of those companies include, but are not limited to UPS, Merrill Lynch, ABC, American Cancer Society, and Pfizer. These internships don’t just help you in the moment, but over time there is a significant difference between students who intern during their undergrad and students who do not. For instance, a student who had an internship makes, on average, $10,000 – $15,000 more than the students who didn’t have an internship. Not only will you make more money, but internships also help students get jobs post-grad.
When a potential employer is looking at a student’s resume who had at least one internship, they will have more confidence in that candidate. The employer can see a student’s past experience and how they successfully commanded the workload that was given to them in their specific job field. While we can see that internships are a great resource for the future, they can also help in the present. A student will most likely intern in the field that they are majoring in; the information they are learning at their internship will be able to be applied to the work they are doing in their classes.
There are a few internship options a student can pursue, non-credit or credit-bearing opportunities. A credit-bearing internship means that usually instead of getting paid, the student will receive three credits that can be used in place of one of their classes. In order to receive those credits, one is required to work forty hours of fieldwork per credit hour, have regular meetings with their supervisor, and write a final paper or reflection. The benefit of this type of internship is being able to use information from the internship in your class simultaneously. A non-credit-bearing internship is solely for the experience and not credits. These internships can either be paid or unpaid. To gain more information and guidance about internships at Siena College, explore the CareerSaint website for a wealth of knowledge about internship opportunities and connect with the Career and Internship Center to get started!