Where are all the interns at?

May 25, 2009 3:39 PM

My company needs a Fall intern in DC. The program we've become reliant upon has let us down. Where do we start looking?

We have only had three interns prior to this and were all sourced through a relationship with a university. They didn't come through for us this year - not enough applicants to fill all the positions and we drew the short straw. Fall is our busiest/coolest time and really need an intern. Where should we look?

Other pertinent details:
We'd like someone who would be somewhat interested in agricultural policy/regulatory work, but are realistic that this may be a small pool.
We pay $500 a month if they are full time, probably none if they were working part time and attending college. (I would fight this though - we all have been interns once.)
It is a great opportunity and our intern will get to do a lot more than stuff envelopes, answer phones, or make coffee.
We are committed to helping them find jobs in DC if that's what they want to do.
We aren't a Hill office.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

posted by gagoumot to work & money (19 comments total)

Craigslist?
posted by emilyd22222 at 3:42 PM on May 25, 2009

Uh, this seems like a kind of bogus way to get free advertising -- and an unnecessary one to, since a simple series of phone calls to the career offices of universities in your target group would doubtless yield applicants -- internships are always in high demand.
posted by paultopia at 3:43 PM on May 25, 2009

I work for George Washington University and we have many people still looking for summer internships. Please message me through here and I will follow up tomorrow and refer you personally to our job center.
posted by parmanparman at 3:50 PM on May 25, 2009

Cornell has lots of students studying agriculture and policy and probably has people looking for a fall internship. Call the Career Services office for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
posted by zachlipton at 3:55 PM on May 25, 2009

To increase the number of good applicants, many people recommend paying for interns.
posted by Houstonian at 3:59 PM on May 25, 2009 [1 favorite]

Experience.com I believe permits employers to list internships for free at multiple universities.
posted by archofatlas at 4:30 PM on May 25, 2009

Seconding that you should pay more, perhaps 75-100% of what you would pay an entry level person per month.
posted by pravit at 4:43 PM on May 25, 2009

At first, I was baffled that you weren't getting enough applications, but if you're expecting people to work full time for $500/month and you need people with this not-super-popular specialization, it could be tough.

I would fight this though - we all have been interns once.

No, we have not all been interns who were paid $3/hour to work full-time. Probably the only people who have done this either have parents supporting them and want to go into fields where competition is extremely fierce (ie, IR policy, working in the White House, etc). People regularly take unpaid internships on the Hill because there is a lot of opportunity for advancement - unpaid interns can usually get a paid job within months, but only if they work on the Hill. Can your organization offer that kind of guarantee?

That said, there are a lot of unemployed policy geeks in DC right now. Try Manatos' list, Jobsthatareleft and Democratic GAIN if you are left-leaning.
posted by lunasol at 4:58 PM on May 25, 2009

To be clear, I'm not saying that people shouldn't have to start at the bottom, but it sounds like you might need to either pay someone at least minimum wage to work full time or be willing to have an unpaid part-timer.
posted by lunasol at 5:05 PM on May 25, 2009

I completely agree with what everyone is saying about the pay, and it is why I am going to advocate for a much larger salary. The program we worked with provided free housing to the students for the semester, so their $500 went a lot further. Unfortunately, this created the expectation to the higher-ups that they could get away with $500. (Every single one of them had an unpaid internship on the Hill.)
posted by gagoumot at 5:19 PM on May 25, 2009

Some additional thoughts from me. Take 'em or leave 'em for what it's worth.

* I would disagree regarding the need for a high salary. An internship takes a lot of bandwidth from a workplace; you're essentially bringing someone on to support some of the work you do, but it takes time to train that person, and it sounds like you make good efforts to make it a learning experience. I would think that most people understand a short-term gig like this is really a learning experience, especially when done for academic credit. I think that $500/month is absolutely reasonable; if you pay more I think what you're looking for is really an experienced temp worker. I would expect a higher quality of resume and I would advertise differently if that were the case.
* But if you are looking to strengthen the salary, look to see if schools offer fellowships, whereby they match the salaries offered by internships.
* Maybe ask your prior interns for advice, if you still maintain contact with them. They might offer a new perspective on what your bottlenecks are.
* Advertise more broadly and take a good hard look at how you're marketing the position (emphasize the opportunity to build resume, learn lots of cool things, etc) at some of the sites suggested above.
posted by archofatlas at 5:30 PM on May 25, 2009

The Washington Center might be a good resource for you.
posted by jay dee bee at 5:58 PM on May 25, 2009

An "unpaid internship on capital hill" means working for some elected representative, which has significant value if you want a career in politics. A university can award credit hours for activities that represent a learning experience, like laboratory work or TAing classes. People often work for free when they believe in some cause too.

How exactly will an agribusiness lobbying company claim any of these criteria?

Btw, a software development company would usually pay co-ops or skilled interns maybe $25 per hour.
posted by jeffburdges at 6:49 PM on May 25, 2009

"I would disagree regarding the need for a high salary."

A high salary, no, but they're suggesting less than $5/hour. I was an intern at a think tank in DC 5 years ago and got paid roughly twice what they're offering.

If you really "need" interns, you may be obligated to pay them minimum wage or face possible legal action for back wages.

That said, the Heritage Foundation and the Leadership Institute are among those organizations offering help filling such jobs. The Leadership Institute basically runs a job board. More interestingly, The Heritage Foundation Job Bank will send you preselected candidates resumes that you can then contact on your own. They even list agriculture on their candidate form under issue interest & experience.

There were some posts previously about finding a job in Washington that listed some liberal equivalents, but I can't find the posts now.
posted by Jahaza at 7:03 PM on May 25, 2009

I think he was using Washington Center. Yes, they have been hurting. Why not man up and hire a temp?
posted by parmanparman at 7:10 PM on May 25, 2009

Our non-profit was recently in a similar situation last month.
Last year, we had an intern through the Washington Center program that jay dee bee suggested. The intern was fine, but interns through that program have one class a week that they go to, so the intern will be doing 30-35 hours per week.
Our second source of interns is Idealist.org postings for internships are free, and you get a much better pool of interns than craigslist (which we've noticed generally suck, we don't bother anymore).

The third source of interns is through local schools as well, we post to GWU, GMU, AU, and Georgetown, if you can find a contact in the policy schools, even better.

Our fourth is our website, we get a decent amount of traffic from college students, and probably get one or two of our in office interns through the website every year, (we also to externships, where the number is higher, around 75%). Your milage for this last part will vary. We are in a field where the type of people we want generally stay out of public policy as well. However, a major portion of our operations are centered around outreach and educating our target demographic, so our programatic operations have a nice side effect of feeding our internship program.

There are several other places for posting internships such as Hillzoo (which you have to pay for), MonsterTRAK.

Oh, final thing-our internships are all unpaid, but we're a small non-profit. (My Hill internship was also unpaid).
posted by thebestsophist at 7:27 PM on May 25, 2009

Try the career centers at local law schools. Many of my classmates are still looking for summer internships. I'm not sure how legally-oriented your work is, but policy/regulatory work might qualify.
posted by Majorita at 7:32 PM on May 25, 2009

We have had very good success with the Institute for Experiential Learning (IEL) at the Washington Internship Institute. IEL students also have classes once a week, so it's 32 hours/week, not 40, but the quality of students is generally good. We have also had really great students through GWU, GMU, AU, Georgetown, UVA, and William & Mary, as well as through our website. You might also consider looking at schools with specialized agricultural programs, as those students might match your goals better.

I'm surprised, to be honest. With the job market the way it is, our tiny, highly specialized NGO has had to turn away at least four really excellent candidates for the summer, and we already have a few lined up for the fall. And we only pay reimbursement for metro fare and $10/day in the office lunch money, and that's it.

You might want to look at what you are offering the intern and how you are selling the internship. We have good word of mouth now, but it was a struggle at first to make sure that the interns knew that they wouldn't be doing mostly admin work, running errands, or making coffee, but that they would be doing real support work for the staff and help with research. It took a while to hone our pitch, perhaps that's what's missing here if you can't get enough people?

If you have a few past interns that would be willing to give testimony to how great the internship was, make sure that the information is included on your website and in pitches to internship programs.
posted by gemmy at 8:01 PM on May 25, 2009

Oh wow. That would be my dream internship if I were in school already or were in DC (going to law school, very interested in agriculture-related law). Have you checked with GW or Georgetown undergrad/law school career offices? I can't imagine there not being someone interested in this opportunity. I see that someone from GW posted, so I bet they will have some awesome leads.
posted by ishotjr at 8:32 PM on May 25, 2009