Recently, as summer vacation become longer, Postechians’ and POSTECH’s interests in summer programs have increased, especially the internship program. POSTECH’s internship program is conducted through various companies and provides opportunities to learn things that can not be fully covered and experienced in a classroom: more relationships, real work, hierarchy, etc. The Postech Times has wondered how many students would want to join the internship program and how it differs according to the department students belong to. Below is an analysis of the results of a survey on this topic conducted at a general meeting.
Overall 756 students in attendance responded to this survey. First, 78 percent of students hope to join an internship. Third-year students showed the highest level of interest (85.3%), followed by second-year (80.1%), first-year (75.4%), and fourth-year (53.8%). The reasons students want to participate in an internship program are for job experience related to their major (4.5 points), research ability related to their major (4.3 points), international work capability (4.1 points), and networking (4.0 points), scored on a scale of 0-5.
According to the major that students have, the preference also differs. Students of the Department of Mathematics prefer finance and information technology, students of Chemistry and Life Science prefer health, students of Material Science prefer material, students of Mechanical Engineering prefer industry material, students of Chemical Engineering prefer energy and health, and students of other departments (PHYS, IME, EE, CiTE, CSE) prefer information technology. More specifically, students of natural sciences want to go to government research centers that do basic research and students of engineering majors want hands-on training.
Also, students want to be provided about information of companies in Korea and education about increasing their potential to enter companies through skills like writing cover letter and preparing for an interview. Currently, POSTECH is trying to develop more internship programs in domestic and foreign countries. Postechians will soon have more choices regarding where they want to go.