Many private sector employers, employment agencies, equity advocates, parents and students are pushing for more government investment into on-the-job training programs for recent high school and college graduates. As the interest in apprenticeships swells there is a waning desire to financially support a staid university system with little upside potential.

Does a college diploma offer a guaranteed job? Nope. Does it saddle a young adult with debt? Most likely, yes. Does it promise a wonderful social networking experience? For the past three years, NO.

US taxpayers fund college goers at much higher levels than job trainees

In spite of this growing dissatisfaction with the status quo, FastCompany found American taxpayers continue to fund college aspirants at a rate far exceeding student apprentices. It was found, young adult apprentices and on-the-job training participants receive a penance. “Apprentices receive on average about 2% of the support that taxpayers spend on a typical college student.”

Substantial interest in US internship programs

The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) tallied the prospects of young adults in America. Sixty-one percent (61%) of 1.9 million US high school graduates enroll in a college or university for higher learning. At the same time, more than one-quarter million (265,249) participate in an apprenticeship or internship program for on-the-job training. While college participation is seven times greater than internship participation, its rate of growth is astounding.

News Nation Now, shares that the interest in apprenticeships, internships and on-the-job training for new entrants are burgeoning at an exponentially rapid pace.

NewsNation, citing the Labor Department, the number of apprentices in active registered on-the-job training programs in the US has grown by 30% since 2019. At the same time, the prospects don’t look so great in the United Kingdom. The headwinds for career pathways may have blown in the opposite direction.

30% British Young Adults Receive no Training or Education after Graduation

In the United Kingdom, the data is more concerning. Richard Layard writing for the Financial Times stressed the essential nature of on-the-job training for youth and young adults (‘Access to apprenticeships is vital to close UK’s skills deficit,’ October 27, 2023).

In the United Kingdom, Layard estimated almost 50% of recent high school students head directly to the university to attain a liberal education. Another 30% he said, “get no education or training at all beyond the age of 17.” Why?

Layard theorizes that the repealing of the 2010 Apprenticeship Act, enacted in 2009, no longer obligated the British government to guarantee the on-the-job training placement to every qualified apprenticeship applicant. On the other hand, the German system may remain the vanguard of apprentice and trainee programs for young adults.

The Standard bearer: German Apprentice Programs

Chalkbeat reports upon the German system that offers a forked approach highly regarded by its OCED country peers. When German students enter their sophomore year, students of one prong are offered a dual-tracked option to attend a vocational training school and further their academic learning through theoretical study. For the other prong, these sophomores remain in the liberal arts formal educational environment for another three years with a capstone admissions exam to enroll in a university. The method by which the Germans utilize their apprenticeship programs to lower young adult unemployment has always garnered global acclaim.

Conclusion

Getting back to the Layard’s Financial Times article. He argued, “a guaranteed apprenticeship is the way to [break the class ceiling].” He recalled, “60 years ago, the route to social mobility was as a part-time apprentice of trainee. We have shamefully neglected it. We now have less social mobility and greater wage inequality on top of chronic low productivity.”

Government officials and private sector employers in the US are doing a turnabout also. Not to mention the high school graduates themselves and their cash strapped parents.

College graduation accompanied by a university bachelor’s degree aren’t the tickets to a middle class lifestyle as it once once. Parents are beginning to think that the cost to obtain a four-year college degree far outweigh the benefit of earning the college credential. High school students themselves are finding out that a college degree doesn’t guarantee a living wage, status, upward mobility and status stability.

Employers, if you are thinking about starting an apprenticeship program within your company, you are not alone. If you are a student and are having second thoughts about college, join the club.

Many university systems across the globe readily adapted to virtual instruction, online and virtual classes during Covid-19. Conversely, however, few were quick and as agile to readily adapt their career programming to meet the demands of the job marketplace in transformation. This may have been to the detriment to their students’ lifetime earnings potential.

Reduced hope of showing collegial camaraderie, decreased opportunities to build a long lasting social network, fewer chances to interact one-on-one with college professors, and decreased prospects for participating in college extracurricular activities represented just a few of the downsides of experiencing Covid-19 as a college student.

While these experiences lessened the overall enjoyment of college life, what was particularly detrimental to the traditional college experience was the lack of internship opportunities and subsequent job placement. Why was the negative impact so profound?

Because of the negative implications on current and future earnings possibilities.

Forbes suggested that widespread campus closures led to the dismantling of the traditional college internship during those years which we believe constitutes a basic failure to provide a rite of youth and young adult passage worthy of celebration and lifelong remembrance. 

But where to we go from here? What should colleges and institutions of higher learning do now?

It can be argued that they should offer more remote internship  opportunities or increase the occasions in which students can apply, demonstrate and perform work tasks related to an eventual job virtually. Why? Because remote work and working from home may be the wave of the future.

College students soon to graduate and embark on a career journey of full time work need to have exposure to remote work to demonstrate their employability. Presently there is a lack of clarity as to whether universities offer remote internships on massive scales to address real world job market conditions.

Just recently the Times Higher Education (THE) published an article begging universities and colleges  to invest in virtual office and remote internship programs. THE argued that university systems have much to gain in doing do so. When promoting the availability of remote internships on their college campuses, they can make their college more attractive to top tier high school graduate applicants.

Zippia estimates that roughly 66% of workers based in the US work remotely, at least part of the time. Globally, 44% of employers still do not offer remote work at all. Still, given this figure, recent college graduates as soon to graduate college students would be remiss if they failed to obtain work from home, virtual, hybrid and remote work job experience.

Why? Because remote job experience is particularly important now as roughly 25% to 40% of all jobs can be performed remotely.  It increases the likelihood that a job applicant will be hired by an employer when they also have experience working remotely.  When remote job internships are provided these recent college graduates and college students can have the prior experience to  demonstrate that they possess the soft skills (interpersonal communication, emotional intelligence, diplomacy) to collaborate with their work colleagues remotely.  Equipped with remote work experience, they can show that they have met performance standards when using and accessing digital technology. These skills are helpful to have and are proof that the student is employable and has added value.

What do students themselves think about remote internships?

Inside Higher Education provided the results of a  2,000 student survey showing:

• 38% of the student were at least somewhat interested in a virtual or remote internship while completing course requirements,
• 18% of the student were extremely interested,
• 34% would be somewhat interested in obtaining a fully remote job after graduation, while
• 15% would be extremely interested in securing a remote job after graduation.

Why is it important to give college students experience working remotely? They will be given the opportunity in a learning and non-financially punitive environment, the chance to develop these necessary skills:

• time management,
• self- determination and internal motivation, and
• digital literacy.

Realistically, managing up is utilizing the qualities of a competent manager to help bring out the best in you as an employee. When done successfully, managing up makes both your daily job and that of your manager easier…”

Have you ever spent a week or more without being assigned tasks to do in your new job or internship? How has it made you feel? I bet you got bored and maybe even frustrated. I believe I am not very wrong if I assume you didn’t talk to your manager to ask for things to work on. If you did, then you must be good at managing up. Managing up is a good character to have for someone who is still developing, career-wise. “Managing up” sounds new? Well, it means taking things into your hands like tasks in your job that you would normally wait for your manager to assign to you and more. Realistically, managing up is utilizing the qualities of a competent manager to help bring out the best in you as an employee. When done successfully, managing up makes both your daily job and that of your manager easier. It is not only limited to proactively getting tasks done, but it also includes other important demonstrations of leadership like proposing solutions, adjusting your style to your managers, helping your team members, and more. 

How can you Manage up? 

1. Be proactive: Have a sense of responsibility in your job and give it your best. This will help you to notice problems and think of solutions to solve them. Once you do, don’t wait for later, share it with your manager. If it’s okay to act before talking to your manager go ahead and solve the problem and share the experience with the team to allow everyone on the team to learn from the experience. An attitude like this is priceless to have on the team, it helps your manager to move things through you and helps you to grow in the process.
   
2. Think out of the box: If the project you were working on is over and you are waiting for the next thing to work on, don’t just sit down and wait. Take initiatives! You can either choose to introduce something new to your team or do more research on matters related to your job or even get side training to gain more knowledge and skills in your field, but don’t just sit there waiting for your manager to spoon-feed you. As you do all that, inform your manager so that they give you feedback and maybe point you to more.
   
3. Be a team player: There sure are more ways through which you can manage up and I don’t believe I’d be able to list them all but as I talk about the ones that resonate with me the most, I wouldn’t leave behind TEAM PLAYING. Working and respecting your colleagues is very important as you take ownership of your work grow and manage up, you should always pay genuine attention to your team members’ struggles so that you help them when you can and even ask them for help when you have blockers instead of always waiting for a check-in meeting with your manager to tell them that things are not working when someone on the team might have been able to help.
   
4. Adjusting to your manager’s style: starting we saw how managing up is about facilitating your manager’s job, so it is important that you embrace your manager’s way of doing things. You might be used to other ways of doing things compared to how your team and manager do things. If your ways are better, it is always best that you share with the team your ways and if after you do that they still want to do it their own way don’t resist! Adapt so that you can contribute more to the team. Resistance will only complicate your work and your manager’s. If they accept and embrace your way of doing things, then that’s a win and a chance to add value to your team.

Why is managing up important?

All the ways to manage up…But why should you care? It is all for your own good. Whatever goal you have as you start your new job, managing up will help you to reach there. Your goal can be professional growth, where you see yourself becoming a manager too or having an impact wherever you are, managing up is the sure deal. Two undeniable outcomes that you’ll gain from managing up are professional growth and leadership.

1. Profession growth: If you noticed all the ways of managing up shared, lead you to become good at what you do. If you follow the “think out of the box” tip and choose to learn and do things that are beyond your work assignment you’ll end up knowing more, contributing more, and producing more in your career and job.
2. Building your leadership: another important thing is that as build that powerful attitude in your job, you’ll grow into a great leader and your superiors will notice how valuable you are to the team and then raise you. Even if they don’t, leadership is a lifestyle, you’re surely going to get more opportunities to improve things wherever else you’re going to be.

MANAGE UP! 

High paying positions are very competitive. To win one of them, it requires work experience. Thus, it is vital to look for an internship placement that will help you to grow professionally. The right internship located at a supportive, nurturing employer will help you to develop the skills you need to prosper in a highly competitve marketplace.

Internships offer an official work, learning and on the job training for people with different backgrounds seek to gain work expertise for the advancement of their careers. It is mostly offered to students and recent graduates to help them gain real world knowledge within their particular area of study. An apprenticeship, on the other hand, also offers on-the-job training,  but typically this arrangement is reserved for people who lack a formalized four-year college degree and wish to learn to apply a skill, art or trade under the tutelage of an expert. Examples could be carpentry, plumbing, electrician or fine artist.

But back to internships. Internships are temporary and are usually scheduled during school breaks (summer and winter). Many internships for recent graduates are full-time and unpaid. The most coveted internships, however, offer competitive wages. There are a few that are part time with lenient reporting structures, job duties and assignments.

Internships are very essential on both parties. Internships offer many advantages to employers. They employ interns to exchange information about the latest trends, techniques and theories that students are eager to apply. Employers anticipate the development of new initiatives and innovation  the internship brings to workplace. Companies recruit top talent, eager and energized and ready to contribute new ideas for the company’s growth and enhanced profitability.

Internships provide advantages to the college student, and recent college graduate also. Many believe their is no better way to gain valuable work experience than through an internship. Internship placements offer interns the chance to learn and grow in a non-threatening environment.

Please see below some of the many reasons why internships are important.

Discover new capabilities and reach to the fullest potential

Since self- improvement is vital part of professionalism. Internships is a safe environment to discover your core values, strengths and weaknesses.  Apart from developing character with such realistic morals including integrity, commitment, and self-motivation. It offers you the space to discover what in career you might be able to do, as various organizations  provide interns with the opportunity to explore working in different departments and find the best one they like working in, it leads them to achieving their long term goals. 

Connect and network with professionals

Internships allow you to grow your professional network. To Build  professional relationships, provide you with first step into the world of work.

Working within your chosen field is essential to your future career. The connections you create can lead to future job opportunities and may increase your marketability. Because you have already proven yourself to those within your network, you may have an advantage over competitors when trying to secure a job or end up offering you a full-time job after graduation.

Chance comes once, You should grab advantage of these networking opportunities. Even if you think it is not necessary, it’s always crucial to have a backup plan. Life changes and a time may arise when a network may come in handy.

Acquire long lasting guidance through mentorship  

Finding the best mentors in your field can prove extremely helpful as they can help you steer through your career journey! Finding a mentor who can assist you in your professional development is crucial, and an internship may help you develop such a relationship naturally. You will also have the chance to interact with company executives, who can serve as mentors when you are looking for information or advice on how to advance in your career

Build an outstanding status and lead to full time employment

Internships teach you how to operate in the workplace. You learn the appropriate way to interact with, and address, your coworkers, your superiors and your boss, now you already have work experience, to the market labor you are competitive. The more experience you acquire, the better you position yourself for success in landing a job.

you will understand the importance of an internship when you can easily list down your accomplishments on a piece of paper. Thus, after completing an internship, you must sit down to contemplate over all the things you got to learn and how they can help you professionally as well as  personally.

Whether the skillset you are looking for is rare or you simply aren’t getting the volume of applicants you would like, finding the right talent for the job can be challenging for HR professionals. Internship programmes can potentially give businesses access to a future pool of talent.

But how best can HR professionals transition skilled, young graduates from interns to permanent members of the team?

Cultivate relationships

Treating interns as valuable team members is a sure-fire way of embedding them quickly into the company.

The importance of this is not lost on Hooi Kok Mun, Senior Partner, National Audit Practice Leader, Grant Thornton: “We always provide a supportive environment to our interns and their senior will evaluate their work performance so that they can suggest their area for improvement. They also will experience the real case study within a team so that they can learn and grow together.”

Cadre, a small accountancy firm in Cardiff, hired its first intern in the summer. Tax Director Jamie Williams hopes in the future the programme will help it identify and recruit talented graduates at the end of the experience.

“The internship programme will give us an opportunity to actually understand whether that person would be a good fit for the company and if they would actually enjoy working at the firm,” he explains. “If, after the summer, we like the way they work and they get on with the team, that would probably lead to an offer of employment.”

Gain access to more than 50,000 candidates from more than 80 countries, representing more than 30 different industries and career fields.

Take a strategic approach

Baker Hughes has established a three-pronged strategy to maintain positive relationships with interns. Firstly, Nelly Poh, Global Finance Organization (GFO) Learning & Development Lead, explains that a university bootcamp has been set up: “It’s a two-day ‘get to know Baker Hughes’ event. Students also get to participate in case studies and do a presentation before senior leaders of the Finance organisation”.

Secondly, the firm has created a “university ambassador programme that builds a regular engagement with universities.” Thirdly, Baker Hughes makes sure that there are champions in the global finance organisation designed to “target universities for continuous engagements.”

There are significant benefits to maintaining relationships with interns. As Hooi says, “while internships can be beneficial for both the firm and students in the short term, we also convert interns into entry-level employees”.

Encourage real-world contributions

At the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) says a graduate programme has been established to offer former interns and other qualified applicants “a unique opportunity to contribute to UNDP’s mandate”, HR specialist at the UNDP’s Global Shared Service Centre (GSSC) Kris Oestvang says. The intern/organisation relationship can undoubtedly be bolstered by the intern being made to feel they are part of a larger plan. At the UNDP, graduate trainees take part in a two-year assignment with one of the UN’s country, regional or headquarter offices.

Trainees are able to gain direct exposure to UNDP’s work with an onus placed on two streams: ‘programme and policy’ and ‘corporate operations.’ In the former, they “contribute to UNDP’s programmes and project activities.” The latter stream enables trainees to “contribute to management services that support effective implementation of UNDP programmes, or work in the area of organisational policies, processes, and oversight”.

How can you successfully recruit top intern talent?

Attend university events

Having a presence at university events is usually a great place to start. If your organisation is running a stall, start building buzz by promoting through your channels a few months in advance. Speak on a topic of interest. Be prepared with branded materials from your organisation, and be able to answer any questions they might have.

Do you have any recent university hires currently in your organisation? Bring them to the event, along with your best brand ambassadors to show students the type of people they could be working with and what they’ve managed to accomplish with your organisation. Demonstrate how a career with you will benefit them.

Connect with the right university clubs and student groups. For example, if you’re wanting to increase your technically-skilled talent pipeline, connect with a computer science group to see if you can introduce your brand and network with prospective candidates.  

Have a strong online presence

University events are great, but according to Sanjeev Agrawal reporting for Harvard Business Review, you need to go where students are: online.

“Students are online all the time. Invest in a visually appealing, content-rich site where students can go to and learn about your company. If you can, [personalise] the site to showcase the right alums, intern experiences, and the basic messages you want to deliver to potential hires. Done right, a good “brand page” can have the same effect as a great conversation at a career fair — it’s the story of your mission, your culture and why they should join you.”

Establish your brand on social media and be authentic. Keep in mind “most online communities don’t like being marketed to, so be authentic, add value to users, and be cautious of blatant self-promotion.”

Include a designated internship or graduate program segment to your careers website with an easy-to-use application portal for interested students to apply. 

Join Online communities

The Remote Internship is built on your growth and recruiting.

We can assist you in finding interns for any period of time, from a year to a few months, at no cost.

We have everything you need to be successful, whether you want to boost your employer brand or just have access to over 100,000 qualified interns.

Post an internship for free in our community

1) Create Account

Get started by creating your personal account

2) Post

Create a career page and post internships available in remotely

3) Start hiring

Begin screening and recruiting using our built-in process

Gain access to more than 50,000 candidates from more than 80 countries, representing more than 30 different industries and career fields.

Internships can be game-changing for your talent pipeline. These programs give you first access to new talent entering the workforce before your competitors, each party can determine if they will make a good cultural fit, and interns can learn new skills and bring fresh perspectives to your organisation, and become brand ambassadors and referral sources.

Does your organisation offer internships or graduate training programs? Leave us a comment.