Internship FAQs – Career Center – Carleton College

Frequently Asked Questions

Please stop by the Career Center to learn more about how you can find, fund, and secure an extraordinary internship!

	Internship	Externship	Research	Fellowship
Objective	Provides direct experience to connect career and academic interests	Provides direct experience to connect career and academic interests	Systematic investigation calculated to develop or contribute to generalizable knowledge	Provides direct experience or opportunity to conduct research in a chosen area of interest
Activity	Maximize participation with ongoing observation; enhance existing skills and abilities and discover new skills and abilities	Maximize observation, with some opportunity for participation, usually in the form of a shorter‐term, focused project	Maximize independent work and personal initiative through academic research	Maximize independent work and personal initiative, through research, volunteering, and/or travel
Reflection	Develop learning goals and engage in reflection activities	Develop learning goals and engage in reflection activities	May or may not involve learning goals and reflections	May or may not involve learning goals and reflections
Supervision	Provide close supervision with regular feedback and mentoring between supervisor and intern	Provide close supervision with frequent formal interaction between supervisor and extern	May or may not have a supervising element	May or may not have a supervising element
Length	Longer‐term (at least 6 weeks and 240 hours)	Shorter term (1-3 weeks)	Can be either shorter or longer term	Can be either shorter or longer term
Timing	Require sustained length of time, often over summer break	Winter Break	Varies	The majority — though not all — are completed during summer or winter break
Compensation (from host site)	May be paid or unpaid	Unpaid	May be paid or unpaid	Unpaid
Funding/Award Eligibility	May be eligible for Carleton funding to offset associated travel and accommodation expenses	May be eligible for Career Center funding to offset associated travel and accommodation expenses	Projects connected to academic work may be eligible for funding from the Office of Student Fellowships or some academic departments	Fellowships administered by Carleton are awarded competitively through the Office of Student Fellowships.

Yes! A few select on-campus internships are available. Please contact the Career Center to learn more.