About a month ago, I attended the Internship Seminar held by Starr Career Development Center. At the beginning, I couldn’t find a room that matched the room number I had seen online. I later found the correct room after realizing that there were smaller rooms inside a room I had initially overlooked.
Before attending the event, I was very confident that I already knew everything I needed to know about internships. But I very was wrong. I realized that doing an internship has much more to it than what I had originally imagined. There are many limitations to what students are allowed to do and the staff was very helpful in providing detailed information about the most common mistakes students make. For example, unpaid internships. Surprisingly, it seems that companies not paying their interns is considered to be taking advantage of students and is therefore illegal. I was very shocked to know this because whenever I did research online, one of the many things people said college students should consider doing was unpaid internships.
Furthermore, the staff mentioned information that is very important for international students. I already knew that I am not allowed to work, that I can’t do any internships until I fulfill one academic year, that I have to wait until I get into a school in Baruch to able to do internships, that my internships must be related to my major because I need to apply for CPT (Curricular Practical Training), that I must wait for a new I-20 to be issued before I start working, etc. However, I would have never imagined that, despite all the limitations, there is a way for me to gain some work experience. The staff told us that we can consider working for a non-profit because it is seen as volunteering, and volunteering doesn’t break any laws.
He also talked about all the resources offered in Baruch (resume/cover letter reviews, mock interviews, and more) and additional online resources like Indeed.com for searching internships and Focus for industry information and career assessment. After the workshop ended, we all got a Job Search Techniques guide that has very helpful information in it. I found almost everything I wanted know inside that guide (cold calling and networking advice, sample letter of interest, and so on). I am very glad that I attended this workshop.