It’s not a secret that being a recent graduate, from college or high school, and an entry-level job seeker is a complicated challenge. When searching for your first job, you’ll probably face employment-related difficulties because you have no experience or professional background. 

You have no opportunity to land a good position without working experience, yet you can’t develop your hard skills without a stable job. This situation looks like a vicious cycle, but fortunately, there is a way out! 

An internship is a great invention that allows you to make the first few steps up the career ladder and to start your professional growth through practice. In a few words, an internship is work experience for students, recently graduated specialists, and entry-level job candidates offered by companies and organizations for a limited period of time. It can exist in the format of an intensive practical educational course provided directly at the workplace.

As a rule, an internship program checklist includes theoretical industry-related pieces of training, practical work with the coach, and intern’s self-development with their improving knowledge base. Besides other variations of internship, it can be provided in the form of so-called “job shadowing”, when an intern performs regular working operations under the supervision of one of the more advanced employees and follows real-time instructions. 

We have gathered some information that can be useful for those candidates who are hunting for good internship opportunities in this article. Feel free to read and know where to find the best program, what rules to follow when applying for the intern position, and how to write a cover letter for an internship, which will make your candidacy stand out of the crowd!

Incredible myths about the internship programs

Some dismissively call internships “not the real job, indeed,” and tell you that interns are “just slaves with no rights” for the large corporations. Though, there are not enough reasons to take such statements seriously. You can easily find more pros of an internship than cons, and it is only your choice what to start your professional career building with - a part-time job during your summer vacations or a probation term traineeship in a respectful organization.

Of course, you shouldn’t be so naive as to expect to get a great salary from the very first day. Nevertheless, don’t forget that top companies never undervalue their interns and, most likely, are highly interested in your motivation. Successful internship programs are the markers for the organization’s status and positive image. In general terms, the internship can exist in several types in regards to the pay for work:

• Paid internships. This type is commonly used in professional areas, such as engineering, healthcare, law, business, science, and IT. It is expected that interns are fully involved in the process and perform regular duties.
• Unpaid internships. This type is commonly used by various non-profit charities and different kinds of social work. Interns deliver their volunteering activities and get working experience in return.
• Partially paid internships. This format implies that students are paid with some fixed stipend for their work. Interns can be involved in research or assisting in some parts of scientific work, for example.
  
  

Moreover, internship programs have even more advantageous features, as for example, having more free time due to a flexible working schedule that is often customized according to the students’ education process.

How and where to look for the best internship program

As it was mentioned earlier, human resources departments of large corporations pay great attention to their internship programs as they are expected to form the future core of the company staff. Top employers are interested in attracting young specialists with awesome ideas and a fresh workforce with high motivation. Every year traineeship opportunities for a great number of interns are provided. You can search for related information in the sections dedicated to internships on job boards or study special yearly charts created by authoritative websites and mass media.

For example, Internship.com provided their own top chart based on Chedd data models, representing the statistics, which schools do companies hire interns from. This list consists of the top US companies, including Google, Facebook, IBM, General Electric, Morgan Stanley and more, and their requests for students, recent graduates, and entry-level job seekers. 

The WayUp made a comprehensive top 100 internship programs rating of the companies selected by a panel of industry expert judges and thousands of public votes. Researching it, you can find general information about internships according to your interest, educational background, and existing professional level or qualification. 

You will probably be surprised to know that 90% of the total amount of PwC interns traditionally receive full-time job offers. At the same time, General Electric invites more than 5000 postgraduate students every year to join their internship program and about 60% of the current employees were former GE interns. And there are a lot of other examples…

As you could see via the mentioned links, the internship is not a nightmare and it is an awesome idea to catch the opportunity of organizing your self-development and getting your first serious professional experience. 

Effective tips for writing a cover letter for an internship

After you made the choice of your prospective company and internship program you should send an application document. In many cases, you’ll be offered to pass a special survey and to point out some general information for your future intern job profile. 

Do you need a cover letter for an internship? Sometimes it is obligatory. At that rate, you can turn to an acceptable intern cover letter template and use it as a reference. Get familiar with this sample cover letter for an internship and compose your own. 

Your cover letter for an internship position already suggests that you have a lack of professional background. That’s why you should point out examples from your academic experience and additional self-education. So let’s figure out what are the basic simple rules of successfully writing a cover letter for an internship!

• In order to make your intern self-presentation stand out from the crowd, follow a certain document structure. Point out your contact info in the header and don’t forget about the official salutation.
  
• The opening part of your intern cover letter should be confident and has to intrigue the reader. Use power verbs and try to describe yourself without hyper self-praise.
  
• Your intern application should always be tailored to the specific case. Customize your cover letter according to the program and make sure that it is unique.
  
• Search for the internship program description and compare the list of candidate requirements with your skillset. Prove your particular abilities with certain real examples.
  
• Feel free to use keywords from the internship program description. Highlight your main personal and professional strong features in accordance with the listing.
  
• Proofread your cover letter before sending and check the text for the smallest mistakes, typos, and even minimal grammatical errors attentively. Keep it clear, short and readable!
  
• Win several additional points by adding some bright details about your relevant volunteer experience, from extracurricular activities to social work that you had performed as a student.
  
• Your cover letter for an internship position should contain a powerful closing sentence. Formulate the conclusion of the document as a confident call to action for the hiring manager.
  
  

One of your essential missions in the role of the intern will be not just to fulfil the assigned tasks but to learn something new and gain experience. Implementing tips and recommendations from this article will make you “faster, better, stronger” than other candidates and will open the way to your great internship.