Sophomore math and information science major Isabella Macdonald, didn’t expect to have an internship this summer.
After applying for dozens of internships in the fall just to have none of them pan out, Macdonald applied for one last internship before deciding to stop applying.
“I was like … I'll do research on campus in the summer,” Macdonald said. “I’m not gonna stress about applying.”
That was when Olive AI, an automation company, reached out for an interview, leading to Macdonald’s new summer job.
“I was so surprised,” she said. “I feel extremely lucky.”
Macdonald’s summer internship is paid, and she can see herself doing extra work because of it.
“I’m a lot more happy to possibly go above and beyond,” she said. “I’m gonna be a lot more inclined to go the extra mile if I’m being paid.”
Macdonald isn’t alone in her desire for an internship. UMD students apply for internships regularly, hoping to gain experience that will set them up for success.
However, some students state that unpaid internships are unfair, and provide unequal access to opportunities.
47% of unpaid interns took on student debt in order to finish their internships, averaging at about $2500 borrowed, and 60% of unpaid interns had to work a part time job on the side in order to afford costs of life, according to a study by Student Loan Hero.
Junior journalism and government and politics major Mya Zepp had both a paid and unpaid internship during her time as an undergrad. She spoke fondly of her time at the paid internship for the company Newsbreak, but was not a fan of her second internship being unpaid.
“If you can avoid it, never work for free,” she said.
Zepp’s unpaid internship filled a journalism internship requirement, meaning she got class credit to go towards her degree.
“In my case, I was able to juggle the 17 credits, the internship, and my job, but in other people’s cases, they may not be able to juggle that and that should be no fault of their own because it was hard,” Zepp explained.
Zepp continued, expressing that unpaid internships are “inherently unethical,” citing that students have unequal access to them.
“Making internships unpaid makes lower income students not be able to access certain internships, and that's completely unfair to those students,” she states.
Macdonald agrees with that notion.
“I don’t think unpaid internships should exist,” Macdonald says. “I just think it's really unfair to ask college kids who …like a lot of people are going into debt for college, and have to pay for their whole way and they’re not even getting paid for the labor they’re doing.”
Senior kinesiology major Jason Herron has worked a plethora of paid and unpaid internships, and feels similarly.
“I think interns should be paid,” he says. “A lot of times they work hard, and you know, they’re trying, they’re mostly college kids who might not be able to work a job if they’re working at internships.”
He continues, saying internships are good for teaching skills.
“I feel like the best experiences are the internships that actually, like care about you trying to learn something,” he said. “I feel like that's the whole point of an internship, is when you, they care about wanting to teach you something, as opposed to just free labor.”
Sophomore journalism major Madi Willoughby had an unpaid internship last summer, and applied for many more.
She interned at Montgomery Community Media, where she wrote one or two stories everyday, as well as managed social media accounts.
“I’m privileged enough …be more in it for the work experience than the money,” she said. “I know that there’s a lot of people who are not able to do that.”
Willoughby further explains that while internships give opportunities to students, the accessibility to internships is not the same due to some being unpaid, and can in turn hurt students in the long run.
“If you can only apply for paid positions…it can mess with your future success just based on your financial situation,” she said. “If you have to work minimum wage at a job instead of an internship over the summer, it's like that impacts your resume, and then it can impact… everything.”
UMD offers some resources to students seeking internships, such as Careers4Terps, as well as the Career Center, where students can look online at resources and meet with advisors.