Spotlight for Career Services Professionals
Spotlight for Recruiting Professionals
The likelihood of securing a paid internship increases for students who visit their campus career center—the actual bricks and mortar facility—for internship assistance, according to NACE data.
Survey data show that students venturing into the career center for internship assistance are 1.35 times more likely to get a paid internship than an unpaid internship. However, if they sought such assistance virtually, the advantage disappears, and they were no more likely to get a paid internship than an unpaid one.
Meanwhile, students who do not use the career center at all are far less likely—about three-quarters or .74 times as likely—to get a paid internship than an unpaid one.
In addition, students’ perceived helpfulness of the career center’s assistance in person is a factor in attainment of a paid internship. If a student rated the help they received as “very helpful” or “extremely helpful,” they were 1.51 times more likely to get a paid internship than an unpaid one.
However, even if a student rated their virtual internship assistance as “very helpful” or “extremely helpful,” they were no more likely to get a paid internship than an unpaid one.
It is important to note that the survey data were collected pre-pandemic and, therefore, do not reflect the changes to and current state of career services, college recruiting, and internship programs, especially virtual services. Still, they offer interesting insight about the value of in-person career services.
Data are derived from NACE’s 2019 Student Survey, which were collected from February 13, 2019, through May 1, 2019. A total of 22,371 students responded from 470 NACE-member colleges and universities. The focus of the report, however, is on the experiences of the 3,952 graduating seniors who participated. In addition, this report includes in-depth analysis of the impact of students’ internships on these aspects of their transition from college to work. The 2019 Student Survey Report is available free to members who participated in the survey through MyNACE. An executive summary of the report is available for free through the NACE Store.
