Internships

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What is an Internship?

An internship is a short-term, hands-on, supervised work experience with a professional organization. It provides the student with an invaluable opportunity to apply the skills and knowledge acquired in the classroom to real world problems and enables the student to broaden his or her understanding of the field.

An internship is more than a part-time job or volunteer experience; it includes:

  • Specific learning objectives designed to increase the student’s knowledge
  • Training to hone existing skills and develop additional ones
  • Supervision to guide and mentor the intern

Through their internship, the student is able both to expand their horizons and to engage in a meaningful collaboration with their corporate or community organization for their mutual benefit.

Please note that internship hours during the fall and winter semester is normally 150 hours, 10-15 hours per week (maximum of 20 hours). Students who choose to do an internship during fall/winter semester, are encouraged to meet with an Arts Advisor prior to start of internship, in order to help better plan academic terms and ensure the internship does not interfere with your academic study.

Approval from the Arts Internship Office is required before start of internship. No retroactive approval is accepted. To schedule an appointment with Arts Internship Office, please write to aio [at] mcgill.ca.

Voluntourism

It has been brought to our attention that for-profit “voluntourism” companies have been actively recruiting students. While students are free to take such tours at their own expense, this is not something that the Arts Internship Office can endorse by providing these firms a platform for selling their tours. Furthermore, these programs often perpetuate negative outcomes and dynamics within the communities they claim to support. For this reason, the Arts Internship Office prepares students as much as possible to go with the proper mindset and help ensure that the organizations they work with are both appropriate and willing recipients of our tremendously motivated students. Aside from the fact that such tours fall outside of our efforts to ensure a good learning experience for students, the fact that they often generate significant profits by charging our students steep charges is antithetical to the university’s teaching mission and runs the risk of generating a backlash in host countries that will only make it more difficult for us to find quality internships for our students.

Fee-based Organizations

Please note that the Arts Internship Office does not fund for-profit, third-party, student administered or fee-based organizations which find internships for you. These programs are not eligible for academic credit or recognition on the Co-Curricular Record.

 

 

Finding an Internship

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