Internships
An internship is a career-related learning experience that provides students an opportunity to gain “real world” experience and to explore a variety of career fields.
The academic internship program at Purchase College is designed to give students practical experience in their area of academic study or other fields of interest. Time commitments for on-site experience typically range between 3 and 10 hours per week during the course of the semester (see credit-hour equivalencies chart below).
For more information, visit the Purchase College Career Development Center and access their Student Guidelines.
Student Eligibility Requirements
- 30 units of credit completed (at Purchase or transferred)
- 12 credit maximum for academic internships
- must be in good academic standing
Registering for Academic Internships
- Identify internship and develop a contract together with your site supervisor. Contact the Purchase College Career Development Center (CDC) for help navigating this initial step.
- Contact your faculty sponsor. Your faculty sponsor coordinates the academic portion of your internship, including required assignments and activities. The designated faculty sponsors for Liberal Studies is Professor Dawn Gibson-Brehon (Dawn.Gibson-Brehon@Purchase.edu).
- Submit your online Learning Contract on Purchase JobScore.
- Confirm site supervisor and faculty sponsor approval of Learning Contract. It is the responsibility of students to review their Learning Contract in Purchase JobScore, and make sure that both the site supervisor and faculty sponsor approve it.
- Confirm that Learning Contract is officially registered with the Office of Registrar. Once the Learning Contract has been approved by the site supervisor and faculty sponsor, students will receive an email confirming approval from the Career Development Center. The completed Learning Contract will be forwarded to the Registrar for final registration.
Number of Credits per Internship
The number of credits awarded for internships are based on how many hours students work at their internship site over a semester. The maximum credits for any single internship per semester is 4. They are calculated as follows:
- 4 Credits = 150 hours/semester (10 hours per week for 15 weeks)
- 3 Credits = 112.5 hours/semester (7.5 hours per week for 15 weeks)
- 2 Credits = 75 hours/semester (5 hours per week for 15 weeks)
- 1 Credit = 37.5 hours/semester (2.5 hours per week for 15 weeks)
Internships undertaken in summer session, which is less than 15 weeks, require a proportionate increase in hours per week.
Short course internships
Students can register for a short Academic Internship in the fall and the spring semesters as a “Short Course.” These are 1 or 2 credit internships (38 - 75 hrs. total) that, for the spring semester, will begin by mid March and for the fall semester by mid October.