What are technological(or computer) industry internships like?

[Ricemarine]

Right now, I've been accepted to my college of choice (University of Washington). But from what I've heard from others, it's recommended or required to do an internship as a sophomore/junior. The problem is, I am classified as a junior in entrance (at the end of winter quarter I'll have around 89 credits). Since I'm still a senior in HS, I'm not sure how well qualified I am for pursuing these internships. Thus I'm asking about what the internships are like for those who have done one, and what's usually expected to know (besides what's stated on the company's website).

Thanks .

 

[Eli]

Boeing?

 

[George P Burdell]

What's your major?

 

[Ricemarine]

Originally posted by: George P Burdell
What's your major?

Preferably Computer engineering

 

[Ricemarine]

Originally posted by: Eli
Boeing?

Bah , knew something was wrong.

 

[WarhammerUC]

get me coffee

 

[dmw16]

Credits != ANYTHING

The number of entry credits you have don't mean anything when you apply for internships. We have an internship program at my company (aerospace engineering) and I have been part of the intern candidate selection process over the past few years. Typically, we look at the years you've been in college (or years remaining) and the relevant course work. Maybe (but I doubt) it is different in the computer field, but the "experience" you get from high school and taking AP credits don't mean anything. Your college coursework will mean a lot more.

My suggestion is finish your sophomore year and then try and find an internship. However, in the meantime, it might be worthwhile to see if professors in your program have research positions open. It can be good experience and the low to no pay makes it less competitive and more of a learning environment/experience.

 

[SpunkyJones]

Cream with two sugars please.

 

[Gibson486]

Well...at big companies, you are gonna do bitch work for the most part. If you do the software side, its lots of QA and debugging. If you do do some coding, it will be copy and paste code with changing some varables. On the hardware side, it is gonna be lots of testing or CAD work. They will give you boards and you will have to test all them to se if they pass or you will have to input schematics or designs into some cad software. Either way, your first expereince will probably be boring and will porbably not test the limits of your brain.

I was lucky enough to do my first coop at a large yet not really known digital technology company doing firmware. It was design work....but I couldn't do most of it because I spent lots of time learning how to do it. They thought I did a good job with the (non)experience I had and they wanted me to come back.....hell no. I never want to do that type of work again. That said... those were the only types of jobs that came to haunt me after school (I could not find a hardware job). Every single call I got was in reference to my first coop and it kind of wore me out. Luckily, I got a job that is not firmware related, but it is also non electronics related. I guess what I am trying to tell you is look for internships by the experience they will give you and not by the name. In engineering, no one cares if you came from Intel or Microsoft unless you were a senior person there. What they look for is experience.

 

[Aikouka]

Originally posted by: Gibson486
Well...at big companies, you are gonna do bitch work for the most part.

We give you the menial work we don't feel like doing. Heck, sometimes they even put off work saying, "we'll save it for a co-op/intern" :laugh:

Originally posted by: Gibson486
I guess what I am trying to tell you is look for internships by the experience they will give you and not by the name. In engineering, no one cares if you came from Intel or Microsoft unless you were a senior person there. What they look for is experience.

Definitely. One of the best aspects that I got on my internship was how a company really goes through a software process rather than just reading about it in some book.

 

[CptCrunch]

my car needs a wash, my dry cleaning should be finished at 7:30pm, oh, and my lawn needs to be mowed

 

[Injury]

Depends on the company and what you specifically do.

Some companies will have you doing the exact same work as everyone else, so will only delegate the tasks of the less high-priority clients, some will just give you busywork. However, most of them will also test the waters with you once they know they can trust you.

 

[tfinch2]

Originally posted by: Gibson486
Well...at big companies, you are gonna do bitch work for the most part. If you do the software side, its lots of QA and debugging.

I'm interning at a pretty big software company and I am the owner of my project.

To the OP: How do you have so many credits?

 

[wwswimming]

FUN !

i had 1 summer at SLAC (Stanford Linear Accelerator Center) and 2 at Spectra-Physics
(lasers).

built particle detectors at SLAC, saw some very cool machining & rigging.

at Spectra-Physics one of my co-workers was sub-contracting for Shiva (?), the
fusion project at Lawrence Livermore.

plenty of people to learn from, sort of like a good college.

got my first taste of corporate politics at Spectra-Physics, saw my manager
get aced out for a director's job in the Corp. Fab. department, after being
promised that same job.

 

[Aikouka]

Originally posted by: tfinch2
I'm interning at a pretty big software company and I am the owner of my project.

I was the owner of my project at the software company where I interned but it didn't mean much .

 

[Gibson486]

Originally posted by: tfinch2

Originally posted by: Gibson486
Well...at big companies, you are gonna do bitch work for the most part. If you do the software side, its lots of QA and debugging.

I'm interning at a pretty big software company and I am the owner of my project.

To the OP: How do you have so many credits?

If you read further, I pretty muh said you could do that.

BTW, is this your first internship?

 

[nitsuj3580]

Back when I was in college, I had a couple friends that interned at IBM. They talked about how they did cool things like Windows 2000 and Office 'roll outs'. Basically, all they did was install Windows, Office, and other programs on PCs all day.

 

[Ricemarine]

Originally posted by: tfinch2

Originally posted by: Gibson486
Well...at big companies, you are gonna do bitch work for the most part. If you do the software side, its lots of QA and debugging.

I'm interning at a pretty big software company and I am the owner of my project.

To the OP: How do you have so many credits?

I do a high school program where I get college credit and high school credit at the same time by going to community college. Thus, I'm sort of a hybrid between a transfer student and a freshman.

Maybe (but I doubt) it is different in the computer field, but the "experience" you get from high school and taking AP credits don't mean anything. Your college coursework will mean a lot more.

I do realize that, but I don't have any AP credits, all my credits came from community college + summer quarter. But I will see if any professors in the community college is doing some research project, and then I'll attempt to try the professors at the UW to see if any are open.

I just want to be sure (if most of the time) they don't throw me into the deep end of the pool and hope I stay afloat or sink (since I will be doing at least one summer class). Basically my experience is about as much as a transfer student or an undergraduate who has completed most the courses possible before transferring or going into the department and taking the specialized classes. Thus, engineering physics, calculus, differential equations, linear algebra, Java I and II, and intro to technical writing are all the credits relevant to the actual thing (but there are other credits that apply to the graduation requirements).

 

[ultimatebob]

Originally posted by: nitsuj3580
Back when I was in college, I had a couple friends that interned at IBM. They talked about how they did cool things like Windows 2000 and Office 'roll outs'. Basically, all they did was install Windows, Office, and other programs on PCs all day.

IBM interns get paid well... nice gig if you can get it!

 

[torpid]

In my experience, they are usually given whatever no one else has time to do. Usually this is documenting something or working on a little side project such as an MS Access Database to track something. I would find it unusual to actually be coding anything on the main projects, but I suppose it's possible in other companies.

 

[Gibson486]

Originally posted by: ultimatebob

Originally posted by: nitsuj3580
Back when I was in college, I had a couple friends that interned at IBM. They talked about how they did cool things like Windows 2000 and Office 'roll outs'. Basically, all they did was install Windows, Office, and other programs on PCs all day.

IBM interns get paid well... nice gig if you can get it!

they get paid as much as any other intern in engineering does.....

 

[Martin]

Although it may not be required to graduate, you need to get as many coops/internships as you can since it'll help you immensely - you'll get decent money, you'll get to find what you like/don't like and it'll help you get a job after graduation.

My school had 16 month internships between 3rd and 4th years and the quality varied greatly. Some people did nothing but sit on their ass and read blogs, others did stupid menial shit but plenty had "real" jobs with just as much responsibility as full time workers. Unfortunately, targeting specific companies won't help you, since there is a lot of variation between different position in IBM, MS, etc.

 

[Born2bwire]

It always varies on your degree and where you apply.

I worked at Argonne one summer at the Advanced Photon Source. Really interesting to work at a particle accelerator but the work was not that challenging. I finished the proposed work very early and they had to scrounge for other things for me to do. On the plus side, I got to do a bunch of different things that I normally would not have done (programmed PLCs, did some PCB layouts, assembled devices). Still, the pay was crap.

Intel had challenging work and excellent pay (salary) with benefits. With them, it was like being a regular employee.

 

[sunzt]

Originally posted by: Ricemarine

Originally posted by: Eli
Boeing?

Bah , knew something was wrong.

Aerospace companies like Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Orbital Sciences, etc. have great demand for Computer, Electrical, and CS degrees. They have some of the most advanced technology (not all baby-killing) especially in radar in the world. So I wouldn't rule those out as being great potential technology companies.

Just remember that technology isn't limited to semiconductors and consumer electronics.

 

[ultimatebob]

Originally posted by: Gibson486

Originally posted by: ultimatebob

Originally posted by: nitsuj3580
Back when I was in college, I had a couple friends that interned at IBM. They talked about how they did cool things like Windows 2000 and Office 'roll outs'. Basically, all they did was install Windows, Office, and other programs on PCs all day.

IBM interns get paid well... nice gig if you can get it!

they get paid as much as any other intern in engineering does.....

They did a lot better than I did as an intern, anyway! I only made about 16K during my seven month internship at a small software company, but the IBM interns that I worked with a few years ago made $28.50 an hour and could work up to 40 hours a week during summer and up to 20 hours a week during the school year.

Their jobs varied on skill level. Some of them got to code small Lotus Notes apps, while others got stuck reimaging laptops and doing inventory work. My interns got to build development servers, often from spare parts in the server room. I was a cool "boss", too, and let them work on their own pet projects during their downtime.

Hell... those interns probably made more cash income during summer than some of the new full time college hires did!