2008 Woodie Awards
Video related to this article is available below.Issue date: 2/19/08 Section: News
Paying a hefty price for summer
Sara Himeles
One option for Communications majors pursuing unpaid summer internships is to enroll in the department's "Communication Internship Seminar," in which students meet virtually with a professor on Blackboard to "analyze the communication processes they observe firsthand in their internships," according to the course description.
But the online course comes with a heavy price tag: the fee of one credit-unit during the summer session at Penn amounts to $2,741, plus a "general fee" that could range from $180 to $250, according to the College of General Studies Web site.
Some students believe the course and the credit are worth the price.
"I probably wouldn't have thought about [my internship] as much or as critically through the Annenberg perspective if I hadn't taken the class," said College senior Ali Wiezbowski, who enrolled in the seminar last summer to complement her internship at NBC Universal.
"It was frustrating because it was a really expensive summer, but because I was getting academic credit, that justified paying for it," she explained.
But other students detect a paradox in the logic of the arrangement, which pushes unpaid interns even further into the world of debt.
"It would be like paying to be unpaid," said Reich, explaining why she chose to accept the transcript notation instead of registering for credit.
Rose said the happiest solution for students and the University alike would be for employers to honor undergraduate labor with a paycheck, or at the very least provide a stipend for small costs such as transportation and lunch money.
"I wish companies would pay our students because their work has a real monetary value," she said.
But the online course comes with a heavy price tag: the fee of one credit-unit during the summer session at Penn amounts to $2,741, plus a "general fee" that could range from $180 to $250, according to the College of General Studies Web site.
Some students believe the course and the credit are worth the price.
"I probably wouldn't have thought about [my internship] as much or as critically through the Annenberg perspective if I hadn't taken the class," said College senior Ali Wiezbowski, who enrolled in the seminar last summer to complement her internship at NBC Universal.
"It was frustrating because it was a really expensive summer, but because I was getting academic credit, that justified paying for it," she explained.
But other students detect a paradox in the logic of the arrangement, which pushes unpaid interns even further into the world of debt.
"It would be like paying to be unpaid," said Reich, explaining why she chose to accept the transcript notation instead of registering for credit.
Rose said the happiest solution for students and the University alike would be for employers to honor undergraduate labor with a paycheck, or at the very least provide a stipend for small costs such as transportation and lunch money.
"I wish companies would pay our students because their work has a real monetary value," she said.
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