Internship questions

[chriscrooz]

Hey I wanted to know if any of you have done internships for Design Firms or Ad Agencies when you were starting your career? I am in the process of being hired on with an Ad Agency as a Graphic Design intern but I am not to sure if they are going to pay me an hourly rate or if I should expect it to be a freebee job. I appreciate you comments on this one.

thanks

[TheBluePanda]

Interning is not only a great way to learn, but a good way to determine if this industry is really where you want to be. It may also lead to a paid job if you preform good enough. Hopefully you will actually be doing tasks that will further your knowledge instead of putting you to sleep.

I only have one internship experience, which was a required thing for my degree. I ended up getting the job halfway through the internship.

Edit: After viewing your website and seeing your level of skill, I think you should be paid for your work.

[FreedomDesign]

When I did my internship (20 yrs ago) there was no pay, but it was college credit, and I did learn alot.

[chriscrooz]

Thanks for the input... KEEP it COMING!!!

I agree in some ways that i should be paid for my time but then again like you I am doing this internship for college credits so I'm ok if I don't get paid, it will just be double the work to have an full time internship and a job to pay the bills. thanks again everyone.

[LeftBrain Artist]

I got paid for my internship, which was also required for graduating. But the place I work for doesn't, as far as I know. I gather a lot of places don't pay - I'd be curious to know what the ratio might be . . . I think it might be as high as 75 - 80% of internships being unpaid ones. Plus or minus 70%.

Then again, I was looking for a job that paid. We had a resource at school that listed job openings and internships in the area. I was going to night school, working a part time day shift as maintenance in a welding/fab shop. I didn't want part of any gig that didn't pay, and knew I had the skills to back it up. While I understand why many internships don't pay, I personally think that's a crock. I found and took the GD job in December - then fanagled it to make it count for my internship in February, when I needed to start banking hours for my internship. My supervisor quit on me after being there for a week, so I had to wait a couple of months before they got a new guy in there to sign the paperwork that I "helped" prepare. Heh heh.

If you wait to the last minute, yeah you'll get stuck with some of the crappier internships. My advice would be to start looking early, so you can pass up non paying positions for paying ones. Unless you don't mind not being paid, or you think the company is that awesome where it would benefit you in the long run to be associated with them.

[Drorain]

here's a curveball for ya, my college wouldnt allow you to take a paid internship...it was required to be unpaid...for three college credits.

I got some freelance work out of them afterwards, not much, but something

[colonel5]

I have an intern right now, so here are a few do's & dont's to make a good impression

1)DO always keep a mindset of a student. (i'd hold that this remains true into the later years of life)
2) if you are ever told to do something a certain way or are corrected because you weren't doing it right DO NOT say something like "well i thought..." or "that's what I was thinking..." or "I was going to try that but..." etc, just do it, ask a question if you need to, but don't pretend like you knew, it's cocky and annoying
3) DO give your best to each project you are handed so that when you show something to your superior you are proud of what you are showing. Never turn something in or show a finished concept followed by the words "it's ok but..." or "well i don't really like it but" etc, I don't want to see it if you don't believe in it
4) along those same lines DO NOT start a sentence with "well i whipped this up in 10 minutes" or "i did this in like 2 minutes" - You may think you're portraying "i'm really talented I can do something like this in 2 minutes" or "i'm not happy with it because my true talent is a lot deeper than what this piece shows" What we hear is "I didn't do my best, I didn't put much time into it, & I didn't invest myself into this project"

There's always more stuff, but those are some of the important things to me

[chriscrooz]

Great tips here.... This should be put somewhere where other interns can access it to get some useful info.

the company i'm going with looks like they don't pay in the beginning. Then at the end of the internship they eval your work and usefulness to the company. Then they pay you for your time when that time comes. It seems to be fair to me because i'm allowed to work hard and show my skills.

ALSO the Principle of the company, who I sat down with, explained that I would be put to work in projects through my internship, not running arrands around the place for them, so that's pretty cool. thanks again for the info.