Issue date: 1/28/08 Section: News

Almost two weeks into the spring semester, the Penn InTouch shopping season is nearing its end and students are quickly turning their eyes and ears to a new order of business: the summer.

Love it or hate it, the season of the internship search is here, the time when many students feel the burn of Penn pre-professionalism.

"It's not everywhere that you have 20-year-olds vying for 100-hour-a-week jobs," said College junior Alison Nadle, who applied for internships with McKinsey & Company in Dubai and Bahrain. "It's a lot of stress, it's a lot of pressure and I think it's a really weird culture, to be honest."

According to Director of Career Services Patricia Rose, the pre-professional culture at Penn is a reflection of its three professional undergraduate schools and its "pragmatic and ambitious" student body.

Despite On-Campus Recruiting's focus on junior-year job candidates, even freshmen are a part of the craze.

Wharton freshman Andrew Dudum, for example, has applied for four positions in investment banking, as well as tapped connections through family and friends.

He said he hopes an internship this summer will give him the opportunity to meet professionals in the field, sit in on meetings and get a sense for his career interests and how the industry works.

"I don't want to be a second-semester senior looking for a job or not sure what I'm interested in and have to take a couple of years to figure that out," he said.

Continued...

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