Internship Struggles
As society inches toward a more digital-friendly world, information has never been so easy to obtain and so fast to disseminate. With that being said, a person theoretically can gain information and an understanding of multiple subjects at the same time. Education has been transferred through wireless connectivity, and there is no excuse to not take advantage of it, right? With more power comes more responsibility. In today’s internship culture, expectations are formed, and college students struggle to meet them because of the high demand of work they are given. Either people are too entrenched in their work that they fail to recognize those around them and what others do for them, and end up losing people who have been around them, or they fail to meet expectations of the workload and end up playing catch-up in building their career.
In my honest opinion, it isn’t fair to overwhelm students at a pivotal point in their lives that can either make them or break them. Students, especially college students, seem to have too much on their plate nowadays trying to keep up with the fast-paced world we now live in. They have to study for classes and do well in them. They have to have part-time jobs to have some kind of money to pay for things they need/bills. They need internships to get the “experience” necessary to start their career. Certainly, time management is a skill that many college students should learn, but is never really formally taught. Instead, they are made to juggle all these responsibilities while also trying to maintain their mental, emotional, and physical health.
Internships are a great way for students to work, gain experience, and make some money all at the same time. That is, however, if the internship is paid. That isn’t the case sometimes. There are unpaid internships out there that are borderline unethical and violate labor laws. Every and anything done at an internship that isn’t paid, is theft. Some of these internships aren’t even worth the “experience” because there isn’t anything hands-on that is being done. Most interns are just glorified assistants that do and cater to whatever the boss wants. Interns grabbing coffees and donuts is a stereotype because that’s what happens most of the time. Time is money, and they are wasting both when they aren’t teaching you anything in their profession. I know this first hand because I participated in an unpaid internship. Giving up time in your day to not receive any kind of compensation is not ideal at all. It wasn’t an extremely strenuous internship that required long hours, but they took time from my day when I could have been making money. Making money is essential in a college student’s life and losing out on that hurt me financially.
The rise of the gig economy has helped pave a way for students or anyone really to create a way to work with flexibility to their schedule. Uber, Doordash, Lyft, Amazon Flex, and many more are ways to work but at one’s convenience. These options help ease students’ overwhelming workload because they can still make some money when they feel they have time. It should be noted, however, that this isn’t the solution to an overwhelming workload in student’s life. These are short-term, temporary gigs that created an innovative way of hiring anyone with a car to work for them, but it’s not 100% secure income.
In conclusion, the current student climate is cluttered with work and left with minimal time to destress, work on themselves, or even work to make money. It’s important to create more discussions about this issue in order to create change. For others to be mindful of what college students go through, there has to be dialogue.
