Internships

[Edoc'sil]

Interning at Lake Region Medical, converting 2D models to 3D.

[theprgramerdude]

Through robotics I met an electrical engineer at a local company who offered me a summer internship-like job starting next week, where pretty much another buddy and I test some experimental electrical equipment and electronics for them, go through some code looking for bugs, etc. This is only one of many great things that has happened because of FIRST.

[davidthefat]

One question, would the internships be everyday type of thing or weekend or once a week type?
My summer schedules are PACKED since I have Football practice 4 hours a day with summer school

[Chris is me]

Depends on the kind of summer school.

I found it a lot more beneficial to do summer camps, academic programs, and maybe part time jobs than high school internships. You have all of college for that. You need to get pretty lucky to get them in high school.

[MGoelz]

Originally Posted by Chris is me

You need to get pretty lucky to get them in high school.

It's not about luck. It's about who you know and how determined you are to get a position with a particular company.

During first semester of my senior year of high school, I was an intern at Rolls-Royce. Their system is really competitive. There's an application process and they only pick 6 students per semester. The experiences you gain there are invaluable, though. They rotate you through three different departments so you get a variety of experience and small projects. All but one of the students during my time there was on a FIRST team.

During second semester, I got into Allison Transmission via a mentor from my team. I've done a lot of organization and simple data analysis since I've been here. I got in the middle of a rather large project near the end of the school year, and my supervisor asked me to stay over the summer, so that's how I'm here. It wasn't hard to get the internship here at all.

Just a few pointers:
On your resume include a section about all that you've done with robotics and how that can translate into a particular company's needs.

Remember, it's a job. And you are the primary benefactor because in an internship, you are surrounded by highly knowledgable people. Always be respectful, and always be observant.

An internship is also very time consuming. During my last year of high school, I couldn't participate in very many after school activities because of it, but it was well worth it, in my opinion.

[rcmolloy]

Thanks to my mother and father, I will be interning at Concord Engineering Group in Voorhees, NJ. I don't know my hours and pay yet but it should be pretty solid. One of the co-workers I will be interning with and learning from is a BIG fan of FIRST and has been with it since it's EPCOT's days. I'm not sure if he has been to the recent competitions but I have heard he is a huge fan.

[Lisa Perez]

Originally Posted by MGoelz

Just a few pointers:
On your resume include a section about all that you've done with robotics and how that can translate into a particular company's needs.

I've found that a lot of people think that a resume needs to have job experiences on it, and that they can't start one until they've actually had a job. Not true. Even if you've never had a job before, you can use a resume to capitalize on any and all leadership, teamwork, design, and problem solving experiences that you had during high school.

Also note that you may need to have multiple resumes with different foci depending on what you're applying for.

If any of you are looking for resume feedback/editing or tips on getting one started, I'm willing to lend a hand. Just PM me

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by davidthefat

One question, would the internships be everyday type of thing or weekend or once a week type?
My summer schedules are PACKED since I have Football practice 4 hours a day with summer school

Most of my highschool/college intern experience was a 40+ hour a week full time job. For a short time during highschool, I had a 10 hour a week afterschool internship.

Every engineering company has some sort of intern program. However, they likely are all full time things; you'll have to decide what is more important to you.

Also, pet peeve of mine, do not say you are working as an engineer, or are an engineer, until you own a degree that tells you so.

[BX HANNAH]

Both last summer (between Junior/Senior Year) and this summer (after Senior Year) I have had/will have an 8-week summer internship at NASA Glenn Research Center. I'm working in the Electric Propulsion Lab with my mentor who is an electrical engineer in the testing division there. It's pretty awesome. I still can't believe it. I work 40 hours a week, I actually work more hours than some of the civil servants there haha. It's really amazing though, I gained so much knowledge last summer it was incredible! I found out about it through FIRST and the heads of the program said they really look for FIRST students!

[Pat Fairbank]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Also, pet peeve of mine, do not say you are working as an engineer, or are an engineer, until you own a degree that tells you so.

Not to mention it's illegal to do so in many jurisdictions, until you not only have a degree, but a licence also.

[RyanCahoon]

If you're looking for internships, make sure to check out small local engineering firms. A lot of times interning at a smaller business means you can work on some of the more interesting work.

I got an internship developing an embedded vision system summer after senior year because the owner of a small electronics fab house was impressed by some of the work I'd done at a demonstration my team did.

--Ryan

[Zach O]

Well, I'm a sophomore this year, going to be a junior, and I was originally looking for an internship. I got picked up at a robotics company as an employee for the summer (which includes pay) doing all the "intern jobs" and some iPad development.

My job should run 5 days a week, 8 hours a day, although many people may be flexible with their schedules (as long as your work ins't crucial in their company). I'm also taking online courses for summer school (since I took too many math and engineering classes to get this years required courses in :\), and that's going well so far.

I also got my summer job though FIRST.

[sgreco]

If you're looking for an internship ask one of of your team's sponsors. My team has had a lot of success with this in the past. 5 of our current sponsors have employed team members and we have never had any of our team members looking for a job with one of our sponsors get denied. I am currently employed close to full time over the summer making SolidWorks models for a industrial vacuum pump company, and basically designing custom applications for their pumps. All I did was ask a sponsor if for a job, and they gave it to me.

[Joe Ross]

You are probably too late for an internship at a large company for this summer. Typically they will have structured programs that you should be applying for months in advance. Large companies will also screen based on GPA. In college a lot of them look for a 3.0 (and many a lot higher then that), I would expect it to be even higher for high school.

As others said, your best bet will be with smaller companies that you have personal contacts with, for example your team's sponsors, your mentor's companies, and family friends. At this level one of the main criteria will be how hard you work, so hopefully you've impressed your references. At a company without a structured program you could probably negotiate your hours. However if you want to do anything "real" you're probably looking at a 40 hour week.

Also realize that a lot of employers will google you now also. Thus it's important to make sure your online personality reflects your offline personality.

[Garret]

In the past members from my team have gotten internships at JPL. Our mentor from JPL would help them get the internships I think. from what I have heard from them the internships are really good.

I really do not know much else other than this because most of this happened before I was on the team. All I know is that they still offer them but nothing other that.