The Career Services office is starting a new program that offers internship experience to sophomores at UB.
The Sophomore Internship Program (SHIP) held a meeting in the Career Services office Tuesday. The program, in its first year of existence, helps sophomores gain experience in an off campus internship setting regardless of their major. Currently, there are no sophomores registered in the program.
Bob Orrange, associate director of Career Services and head of SHIP, started the program and said it is intentionally open to all majors.
SHIP is for sophomores who want to do an internship in a not-for-profit area in Western New York, according to Orrange .
"One of the most interesting things about it [is] there's a leadership component," Orrange said. "So students who are in the program would be working with, say the director of the non-profit agency or leadership in the non-profit agency, and have an exposure to what it's like to run one of these types of organizations."
SHIP aims to give hands-on work experience and counts as a three-credit class. Students must go through an application process to be accepted into the program and also need to be approved by the agency they apply to. Currently, there are 11 companies involved in SHIP, and the number changes often based on each agency's needs.
Applicants must be full-time students, have a minimum of 30 credit hours completed, and at least a 3.0 GPA.
Orrange said the internships run over a 12-week period and for credit, students must complete 120 hours with their agencies but are graded based on a once a week journal, a mid-semester paper and a final paper.
Orrange stressed that this program is specifically for sophomores who want experience in a wide range of agencies.
"The sophomore internship program is relatively new to career services, so we're really trying to get the word out to students," Orrange said.
The program is part of the Life and Learning Workshop series run within Student Affairs. These workshops aim to help students achieve success in the classroom and beyond.
Viktor Sukhotskiy, a sophomore electrical engineeringmajor,attended the event to see if SHIP was something he could do specific to his major.
"[The meeting] was definitely helpful because I'm very new to the whole internship thing, so I needed to get information what's more general and what's more specific to my major," Sukhotskiy said. "I asked today whether this was more specific or more general, because I'm looking for something maybe not as technical or specific."
Kristi Fields, an internship and alumni relations associate in the Career Services office, works with UB alumni to help current students network with people in their majors.
"My main focus is to engage alumni out in the community to open up internship opportunities within their community," Fields said. "With having that internship tie to the SHIP program, Bob and I decided to work closely together on it, so we could encourage students to apply as well."
Fields has held networking events with UB alums to offer networking with students across different fields. She hopes to see students accepted to the new program by next semester.
"We haven't had anyone placed yet at an agency, but we had today's workshop," Fields said. "Now we're starting to market it to students, so hopefully over the next semester, we'll see those students start applying."
Email: news@ubspectrum.com
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
