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Internships Expand LearningJust as research opportunities can start early, so can internships. The Freshmen/Alumni Internship Program (F/ASIP) began in summer 1998 when about 20 first year students took a spring seminar that helped them find internships, develop professional skills, and paired them with alumni guides at companies. Anthropology Professor Arthur Steinberg, who also directs the freshman Integrated Studies Program, founded the program to help students balance the sometimes difficult first year at MIT. "We really want them to know that applying themselves at MIT or any other university is well worth the effort. This program will hopefully give freshmen a boost for the rest of their MIT experience, and on into the future," Steinberg told the Tech. Alumni enjoy reconnecting with MIT and they get a jump on recruiting. And the work is real. A sample F/ASIP job is working at Sandia National Laboratories on computational modeling for geosciences simulation of solid-fluid flows. Industry experience is strongly encouraged for electrical engineering and computer science students who may join the VI-A Internship Program and complete four internship assignments en route to SB and MEng degrees. Participating companies run the technology gamut including electronics, communications, control, computation, computer science, and instrumentation. Communications Satellite Corporation in Clarksburg, Maryland, may beckon some students while others are drawn to IBM's research lab in San Jose. Aero/Astro Internships Lock In AcademicsThe new aero/astro internship program designs work experiences to match the year's academics. The department's vision of a new engineering education stresses fundamentals set in the context of Conceiving-Designing-Implementing-Operating (CDIO ) real world systems and products. Classroom and laboratory experience link directly to internships. Ideally Implement/Operate (IO) jobs are developed for students that complement the sophomore year's core engineering curriculum. Conceive/Design (CD) jobs that complement the junior year's experimental and design subjects follow a year later. MIT Engineering Internship Program, a joint undergraduate and graduate program, facilitates hands-on experience for a broad range of opportunities in Aeronautics and Astronautics, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Materials Science and Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Nuclear Engineering, and Ocean Engineering. TPP Graduate InternshipsTechnology and Policy Program graduate students who wrestle with policy concerns across many technical fields stake out summer internships in the federal government, private industry, consulting firms, and numerous international organizations. Recent internships have taken place at the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy, NASA, the Far East Development Corporation in Singapore, and the World Bank. Leaders for Manufacturing (LFM) Program is a graduate-level academic and research program sponsored by the Sloan School of Management, the School of Engineering, and over 20 industry partners. As part of their curriculum, students participate in several plant tours and a 6.5 month internship leading to the completion of a thesis. Just back from Finland, Laura Kennedy worked on business processes to support ABB's global network of 400 factories. "This experience has better prepared me to be a leader in the future," says Kennedy, "I worked very closely with some high-level leaders and became intimately aware of the challenges they faced and the possible solutions that they developed." (Read more in an interview with Laura Kennedy.) Absolute policy junkies may pursue Washington Summer Internships, which were founded in 1995 to give undergraduates the opportunity to explore science and engineering policymaking at the national level. Interns work at Congressional offices, federal agencies, think tanks, advocacy groups, and MIT's own D.C. office.
go on to Part 3: Professors of Practice
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Institute of Technology