Engineering Internships

J

J_Berg

Member
Currently going to CU and things are starting to formulate with my Engineering degree. Anyway, trying to not have to work minimum wage/landscaping next summer and shooting for an internship.

Anybody out there have a recommendation for best ways to go about landing an internship? Applications? Solid companies? Past experience? Any and all input is much appreciated.

Take it easy
 
You gotta build the network. I guarantee, your professors are basically in cahoots with engineering companies, they know each other.

Id talk to either professors, or engineering advisors at your school. If you get to know them, at the very least you can get a recommendation, Which is extremely powerful.

Hang loose and good luck!
 
13723572:RousedWits said:
You gotta build the network. I guarantee, your professors are basically in cahoots with engineering companies, they know each other.

Id talk to either professors, or engineering advisors at your school. If you get to know them, at the very least you can get a recommendation, Which is extremely powerful.

Hang loose and good luck!
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Recommendations go a LONG way. Like he said, ask your profs.

You can also use LinkedIn, Indeed and Monster to aid your search. It shouldn't be too hard to land a position considering how engineers are always in high demand
 
I believe that a consulting firm is the best place to start. It can be a fast paced job with many deadlines, projects and an entire career of learning ahead of you.
 
One of my homies is in the engineering department at CU he keeps talking about a big engineering career fair happening on campus on Monday so I would try to find some information on that. Other wise building a network and recommendations is your best way into a field.
 
All good advice so far. It really helps to know someone who works for a company you'd like to work for. If not then even if it's not directly related to your engineering field any experience is good experience. I'm a ChemE and started at a small engineering firm making CAD drawings for a nuclear power plant. It was the worst job in my life but it paid well and only lasted a summer. From there I was able to use that as leverage to get two different co-ops and then a job in the ChemE field in manufacturing. Get your resume out to adults you know who work for any kind of company that has engineering interns. Just work your ass off and show that you want to help. That's the biggest key to internships. Jump for opportunities even if it's bitch work.

Anyway good luck and keep in mind that personal skills and work ethic outweigh any GPA. Just don't fuck off too much in class.
 
13723677:Tater.Tots said:
One of my homies is in the engineering department at CU he keeps talking about a big engineering career fair happening on campus on Monday so I would try to find some information on that. Other wise building a network and recommendations is your best way into a field.
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The career fair is for civil, environmental, and architectural engineering majors. Most companies attending specialize in construction.

Here's a link which gives an overview of the event:
http://events.colorado.edu/EventLis...formation_id=160615&type=&syndicate=syndicate

I can't find a list of who's attending online, although I have it in an email somewhere so PM me if you're interested.
 
Go to the career fair, and get to know people. What kind of engineering are you in? My recommendation is national labs if you like doing hands on and crazy stuff. They have a lot of money to spend and are willing to roll the dice on lots of interns with little or no experience. You might not make as much as industry but the work is more exciting becuase its not just manufacturing, its more research and development. Also national labs are close to the mountains, and skiing. Check out Sandia National Lab, Los Alamos National lab, or Idaho National lab.
 
Identify as a girl....or anything besides a white male for that matter and you should be set.

Seriously tho, just be able to sell yourself. Especially at a career fair. Know alittle about the company when you talk to them and know what you want to do at their company. It makes you look 100x better than someone asking a company what they do.

Tons of career websites too. Or just search companies you're interested in and apply there.

Don't give up...that's what I've been telling myself haha.
 
Apply to all the city governments, county, state DOT, utility districts, etc that you can think of. We have 3 or 4 engineering interns the bosses love them they work for dirt cheap.
 
13730504:californiagrown said:
Why is that unfortunate? Do you believe men and women bring the same qualities to a workplace?
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Yeah, I believe that they do. Whoever can do the tasks required of the position best should get the job, regardless of gender. I was just agreeing with him that being a white male can work against you now. I wasn't really taking it that seriously lol.
 
13730551:JayRich said:
Yeah, I believe that they do. Whoever can do the tasks required of the position best should get the job, regardless of gender. I was just agreeing with him that being a white male can work against you now. I wasn't really taking it that seriously lol.
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I disagree about the workplace environment and culture being the same between a mostly men, mostly women, and evenly split office.
 
topic:J_Berg said:
Currently going to CU and things are starting to formulate with my Engineering degree. Anyway, trying to not have to work minimum wage/landscaping next summer and shooting for an internship.

Anybody out there have a recommendation for best ways to go about landing an internship? Applications? Solid companies? Past experience? Any and all input is much appreciated.

Take it easy
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Just a friendly tid bit of advice,

you can actually just sue a company if they dont hire you after the internship. Assuming there's no legitimate reason. If you do anything that could be considered the job of a current employee there, you could also sue.

ily america
 
13731436:Dennis_ReynoIds said:
Just a friendly tid bit of advice,

you can actually just sue a company if they dont hire you after the internship. Assuming there's no legitimate reason. If you do anything that could be considered the job of a current employee there, you could also sue.

ily america
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This is completely false. You are a fucking idiot. No company has an obligation to hire you after an internship. That's the whole point of them. To assess you as an employee. If they don't like you for whatever reason, you won't get hired back.

You do whatever work they assign you, even if it overlaps with other employees duties. That's the fucking point of internships lol, you are a retard.
 
13745880:PoLaRpEaK said:
This is completely false. You are a fucking idiot. No company has an obligation to hire you after an internship. That's the whole point of them. To assess you as an employee. If they don't like you for whatever reason, you won't get hired back.

You do whatever work they assign you, even if it overlaps with other employees duties. That's the fucking point of internships lol, you are a retard.
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Well that spoke for itself
 
At my school we have a class for internships. So you sign up and have someone to help you out. (possible summer credits???) Look into that and just go talk to an adviser. They might have a list of places that are offering internships or they can provide examples of what people have already done. BTW internships are not known for their pay. So if you want the cash flow you should just get a summer job.
 
13731436:Dennis_ReynoIds said:
Just a friendly tid bit of advice,

you can actually just sue a company if they dont hire you after the internship. Assuming there's no legitimate reason. If you do anything that could be considered the job of a current employee there, you could also sue.

ily america
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Lol, what?
 
Do your research. Make a spreadsheet that outlines when each position opens/closes. Have a box that says when you've applied. Make sure your resume is up to scratch.

Address all criteria in your cover letter. Actually take the time to write a personal cover letter for each position. This will take time, but quality over quantity. HR will sniff out copy-pastas.

Don't get knocked down when you don't even hear back from anyone. Keep applying. For this summer, I applied for 12 positions and inquired about 8 (meaning they did not have internship positions advertised so I sent HR an email). I was asked to test around ~5 times (psychometric testing and the likes) and only landed one interview. But one interview was all I needed, because I got the job.

Don't try and apply for 400 companies in one day. Take it slow, but steady. Good luck.
 
13730285:Casey said:
Apply to all the city governments, county, state DOT, utility districts, etc that you can think of. We have 3 or 4 engineering interns the bosses love them they work for dirt cheap.
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This. My dad worked for NIST and they are ALWAYS looking for interns. They pay well and 70% of the time they get hired out of college after the internship is over. :)
 
13746454:DirtYStylE said:
. So if you want the cash flow you should just get a summer job.
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I'd say any company worth interning at pays at least as much as a summer job, unless you have a really good summer job.
 
13750292:TOAST. said:
I'd say any company worth interning at pays at least as much as a summer job, unless you have a really good summer job.
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Banging nails pays damn well. But a good internship pays pretty decent.
 
Look for COOP programs. They're the easiest way to get a foot in the door whiteout having to be a coffee bitch. Usually costs around 400-600$ but most companies will agree to reimburse the fees.

I'm a CompE in in the midst of my third internship. I code and design aircraft simulation software for CAE.

http://www.cae.com/
 
How are your results and/or do you get on well with any of the academics at CU who might be prepared to take you on, or who can put you in contact with a collaborator in another College/Country (who might have spare funding) for such a placement? If so, and you're genuinely interested in some of the challenging aspects of research then a UROP (Undergarudate Research Opportunity) might be worth a look.

UROPs are a broadly international program, with their own ins and outs in each country, but at top Universities in England you would get paid for one of these, albeit not especially well. On the other hand, and if you're with the right academic, you might get the chance to use equipment and methods (and just generally learn from leading experts) that will set you apart from other candidates in interviews and then jobs when you graduate.
 
13729968:Mugjumper said:
Go to the career fair, and get to know people. What kind of engineering are you in? My recommendation is national labs if you like doing hands on and crazy stuff. They have a lot of money to spend and are willing to roll the dice on lots of interns with little or no experience. You might not make as much as industry but the work is more exciting becuase its not just manufacturing, its more research and development. Also national labs are close to the mountains, and skiing. Check out Sandia National Lab, Los Alamos National lab, or Idaho National lab.
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DM me if you want advice for Los Alamos National Laboratory as I am currently working there. A big deterrent for young people at the national labs is that the majority of the funding resides in weapon systems development. If you have a moral block for working in weapons, you just have remember the research can be cross correlated to every other engineering application. My advice is go industry before national labs. Industry is brutal but the pace is on a whole different level. You can go from industry to a national lab easily but it is pretty hard to go from a national lab to pindustry.
 
its not about what you know its about who you know.

That being said I don't know anybody so I can't help you.
 
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