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Employer Quotes
The quotes below are from employers in this industry: Engineering
They are talking about this topic: Educational Partnerships
The quotes below are about this issue:
Employers speak of the internship programs they are currently involved in and the importance of new hires having internship experience.
| "Our company definitely encourages internships. We get about eight or ten interns every summer. We also have some of the longer internships—the co-ops. We've got a wonderful young man from [MnSCU college] with us right now. He's just fun to talk to. He's got a great mind." | Central |
| "One change that we see in our engineering program—I don't know if anyone is familiar with how they approach the engineering training other than just coursework—there is some coursework, but it is very project-based. And we just recently hired one December 2011 grad out of the first class, and we've got two more coming from the May 2012 class in mechanical. I really like it that they had practical experience on these projects. And a number of these projects were with our existing clients. Those folks haven't started working yet, so I can't report back as to how effective they actually are, but that was very appealing—at least in my group—to see engineers who have basically operated as consultants through their courses. They've worked on about four pretty major projects where they had to go in and listen, see what the problem was to the client, come back to a team, and solve the problem. And these were multi-discipline teams. They needed some electrical and some mechanical, and then produce a product for them. That is one way that I've seen it work." | Metro |
| "Maybe not having the whole program being project-based, but having opportunities for students to have some real-life experience is important." | Metro |
| "Another thing that the manufacturers are trying to do—those that are a bit more progressive—is getting students into internship programs in manufacturing businesses so that they get some of that experience. And then, when they get back into the classroom, they're sharing their experiences. And that helps other students in terms of sharing what they're seeing, what the challenges are, and how they might need to spend time in other areas that they might not normally spend time in to make sure that they have a greater understanding of what is needed in the manufacturing environment." | Metro |
| "We have a work-based opportunity program with the welding programs." | Northeast |
| "This is the culture. Do you fit in here? If interns really like it there, the company is going to keep in touch with them and then get them back there. So, they're really looking at recruiting someone by offering an internship." | Northwest |
| "I work at [MnSCU], and we just added a two-year transfer electrical engineering degree. And everything you said really just confirms what the employers in that region are talking about. One of the creative solutions that they've come up with is that they want to kind of lock their hooks into the students at maybe [MnSCU] before they transfer. So, they're offering internships after the second year of college. These are students who are from the area and want to come back to the area. So, they're trying to get them after their second year of college before they transfer and start getting recruited by everybody else. So, they offer an internship and then they support them and keep in touch with them throughout their junior and senior year." | Northwest |
| "We've been doing a fair number of internships. Going to job fairs and career fairs and selecting some possible engineering candidates. Interviewing them, and then bringing them on as interns. It gives us an idea if they are going to be a good fit. How are they going to interact with people? That has worked well for us." | Northwest |
| "The one thing that I really like when I'm talking with students that are close to graduation is their senior project. They are doing something for a business. I don't necessarily care if it is for our business because it probably isn't because they are from different colleges. I just like it when colleges and companies are working together, and when companies are letting the students come in. We want to do that as much as we can. We want to get students in our facility; we want to give them a tour. We want instructors to tour. I think a lot of that is being done. We could always do more, but I think we just have to continue to do that. I love hearing about how students went into a company where they had some kind of issue or problem, and the students helped solve it. I love that companies are willing to do that with the colleges." | Northwest |
| "Employers here often value farm experience, so maybe [MnSCU college] ought to buy a farm here and have students out there sort of fixing stuff." | Northwest |
| "I think we do it all. We have done the internships. We've done outreach-type activities all the way down to like the third grade class." | Northwest |
| "Internships are a good way for us to test-drive interns and for them to test-drive us." | Southwest |
| "I think, in our industry, internships are pretty common. In fact, I can't even imagine hiring a graduate that hasn't had an internship because there are enough candidates out there that have." | Southwest |
| "We offer internships and scholarships for [MnSCU college]. But they don't actually go into the shop and run a mill or a lathe. They'll be doing design projects and things like that." | Southwest |
| "One thought I had, and this is again maybe to our industry, we hire a fair amount of interns and in our case it's a paid position. It's fairly well-paid for a student position. The one thing is if our workload isn't high enough where we can actually hire people, one thing students can do is maybe job-shadowing and things like that. It's not a request that I rarely have ever gotten, but it's something that we would certainly do and be open to. I mean, somebody could come in for a week or a few days—just to get an understanding of our industry. We'd certainly be open to that, but it's not a request we get very often." | Southwest |