Finding internships in engineering

I am an IIT professor. Every year, my colleagues and I receive a large number of emails from various engineering students who seek internships. It is a huge waste of time for the total set of students (thousands of students sending tens of thousands of emails), and a reasonably large waste of time for many professors.

So I thought I would write this article. If you find it useful, please forward it to somebody who can use it.

Let us get down to basics. Why do you need internships?

Because there are too few jobs and too many applicants. If there were too many jobs and too few applicants, you could sit in your college canteen wearing bad clothes and employers would come and try to entice you away. You would not need internships.

The surplus of applicants over jobs is good for employers. You, the applicant, cannot complain: that is how the world is. Engineers do not complain about how the world is, they use the properties of the world to achieve their goals. If they can.

This surplus of applicants over jobs lets employers ask for applicants who are more "job ready". An internship on your CV is a way to indicate that you are job ready. It shows that you are proactive, that you have some possibly-relevant experience, that someone selected you and gave you an opportunity already (and so you are probably deserving of another opportunity), that you did something, that you are interested, that you did not sit passively in class and collect merely a grade card.

This is why everybody in your position wants an internship. I have heard that there are "consultants" who promise to secure internships in return for fairly hefty fees. I cannot understand how such a system can exist without a part of those fees flowing unofficially to some people who have the power to bestow internships ... but that is outside our control.

It seems grim. But perhaps something can be done. The bright spot is that an internship is not a job. In principle the number of internships can be larger than you think it is.

So, what is an internship? You will find many definitions on the web. They don't matter. What matters is that if you write

"Internship: blah blah"

on your CV, then most potential employers should accept it as an internship and not complain. And in your statement of the internship there should be a verifiable aspect of work done for an external agency, and the contact information of a person who will verify what you did. Other details of the internship are less important than you think.

Why such a low standard? Because there are too many applicants, and each applicant has several components (grades, internships, interview skills, presentability, co-curricular activities), and there are several employers, and YOU need ONE job. The imperfect internship which you CAN get is much more useful than the perfect internship which you CANNOT get.

Once you agree that the minimal standard of an internship is roughly what I have outlined above, you will see that possibilities open up.

You have probably been told that you should study the research of the professor you are writing to, understand their work, do some of your own work in that direction, express a genuine interest in that work, point out how your passion aligns with that work (gosh ... the word passion in the context of career planning has been overused into meaninglessness), point out what a wonderful contributor you are likely to be (promises, promises), use some flattering words (like what a life-changing opportunity it will be for you to receive this wonderful professor's tutelage), and such things. This is clearly impossible on your part. You could not possibly do such things for more than a few professors, and they might not hire you. (Personally, I think an undergraduate who can do those things deserves a better mentor than I am.) Net result? You do this in a mass-produced way and your letter sounds fake. Success rates are very low for the set of students (the collective), although some individual success stories may exist.

I think there are better ways.

Here's one, an example from mechanical engineering (or related fields like aerospace engineering, applied mechanics, maybe civil engineering). These days MEMS accelerometers are cheap, and if you have a laptop then an additional investment of just a few thousand rupees (under 3000 rupees for sure) will let you buy these things online, learn how to use them, and develop an experimental setup where you measure vibrations of a beam. Then you find professors who work on vibrations or dynamics. You write them a letter that goes like this:

............

Dear Professor XYZ,

I am a student of Institute ABC and am interested in vibration measurement. I have taught myself how to measure vibrations using a laptop and cheap MEMS accelerometers. A youtube video showing my setup is here [link]. The setup, not including the laptop, costs Rs 2575.

Now I need an internship. Is there any use for my skillset in your lab? I could come in the summer and set up a vibration measurement system in your lab for the price of components as indicated, and would request a letter (saying I was an intern with you) from you on your letterhead. Given that your institute is in [city], I will [or will not ...] request campus residential facilities.

My CV is attached in case you wish to look at it.

Thank you. Etc.

.............

I think if you do this with 20 professors who work on vibrations in some way, you will find an internship. Maybe just 10 professors.

Here's another:

..............

Dear Professor XYZ,

I am a student of Institute ABC and am interested in preparing and editing videos on technical topics. I have taught myself relevant video making skills. A 15 minute youtube video showing my skills is here [link]. Material costs are zero, because I have my own camera.

Now I need an internship. Is there any use for my skillset in your lab? I could come in the summer and prepare videos that showcase the work in your lab, with your students in the video, for you to possibly put up on your web page. At the end of the summer I would request a letter (saying I was an intern with you) from you on your letterhead.

My CV is attached in case you wish to look at it.

Thank you. Etc.

.............

Find 20 professors online who seem to have active labs but not nice videos, and write to them. I think you will get something.

Here's another:

..............

Dear Professor XYZ,

I am a student of Institute ABC and am interested in hands-on mechanical fabrication work. To this end, I have used our institute's lab facilities to teach myself good machining and welding. I have also fabricated two setups that showcase the quality of finish I can achieve. I am also proficient in using CAD packages for drawing, and am enthusiastic about working with workshop staff for fabricating various setups for research or technology demonstration.

A 15 minute youtube video showing my skills is here [link].

Now I need an internship. Is there any use for my skillset in your lab? I could come in the summer and work with your students (or even independently) on fabrication of setups that you require. At the end of the summer I would request a letter (saying I was an intern with you) from you on your letterhead.

My CV is attached in case you wish to look at it.

Thank you. Etc.

.............

Now search online for 20 professors who have large labs, many students who do various experimental things and build prototypes, and write to them. You will get something.

Here's another.

..............

Dear Professor XYZ,

I am a student of Institute ABC and am interested in learning how to do detailed background research on technological topics. To this end, I have read online resources and worked with some of my own teachers in my college, and prepared two detailed technical reports. One is on the fire safety aspects of EV batteries, and one is on the application of AI tools to troubleshoot heat treatment problems in engineering components.

These reports are available [here] and [here]. I hope you will find a minute to glance at them.

Now I need an internship. Is there any use for my skillset in your lab? Maybe there is a broad technological area in which such a review may help you prepare a future research proposal, or where such a review may be useful to one of your PhD students. At the end of the summer I would request a letter (saying I was an intern with you) from you on your letterhead.

My CV is attached in case you wish to look at it.

Thank you. Etc.

.............

For this, look online for professors who seem to work on a variety of different technological areas over several years, write to 20 of them, and hope to find something.

I hope the principle is clear by now.

Don't select random professors, spend 10 minutes on them, and write a fake email claiming to have acquired any level of meaningful expertise in their area of research. In any case if you were an expert on their area of research you would not be an intern, you would be a colleague.

Rather, select something technical or semi-technical that you feel able to do and don't mind doing. Don't do it yet. Now think of a set of people describable in a single line (like I did above) who may be interested in what you are offering. This is a design problem. You offer skillset A to group B. You need double optimality (ideally). B is the best choice for A, and A is the best choice (within your abilities) for B. Iterate on both A and B until your strategy is clear to you and also appeals to you.

Then get to work. Do the things that you will claim that you have done. Document them, make videos, put things online. Then write to people.

There are many possible internships. The professor loses nothing, sees a direct benefit, and merely has to give you a letter. What a deal. How can they not accept?

Good luck to you.