Collegiate internships play a significant role in the professional development of undergraduate students. They provide students the opportunity to experience real-world expectations embedded within actual vocational environments under the support of their collegiate faculty. Although there are a number of common reasons why internships are utilized in each academic area, the requirements for the experiences are substantially different across disciplines and level of coursework. The environments for business and social entrepreneurship, service-oriented and servant leadership and civic engagement are distinct. The purpose of this paper is to explore some of the commonalities and differences that exist for internships across collegiate academic disciplines at the undergraduate level, introduce the concept of iterative reflective practices and identify their salience for programs from an interdisciplinary perspective. The focus on this presentation are the liberal arts including humanities, social science, and applied liberal arts disciplines leading to entrepreneurship internships in profit and not-for-profit sectors. This presentation was for the Academy for Business Research during the Spring 2018 Conference in New Orleans, LA.

1. An Examination of Collegiate Internships in the
Entrepreneurial Leadership Setting: Requirements
for designing the undergraduate experiential
learning course
Peter H. Hackbert, Berea College
Academy for Business Research Spring 2018 Conference
Renaissance Per Marquette Hotel
New Orleans, LA

2. Review of the Literature
In the US, 90% of universities now offer for-credit internship or work-
integrated experiences (Divine, Linrud, Miller & Wilson, 2007; Weible,
2010)
Internships are associated with greater perceived attractiveness of job
applicants to recruiters (Taylor, 1988)
Graduates with internship experience obtain jobs more quickly and
more easily (Knouse, Tanner, & Harris, 1999),

3. Review of the Literature
77% of employers responding to 2009 Annual Job Outlook Survey
preferred students with experience (NACE, 2010)
Interns provide a ready and willing source of inexpensive, qualified and
usually highly motivated labor (Gault, et al., 2000).
Interns who are converted to entry level employees save firms $6,200
in training costs and 16% in total saving over hiring non-interns (Vault
Reports, 2006).

4. Top six challenges for hiring managers in decreasing
seriousness with number 1 being the most serious challenge.
Source: Career Services and the Collegiate Employment Research Institute by Michigan State University.

5. Internship Cycle
Design
Students
University Company
Feedback
Allows for the interpretations of
documentation and outcome reporting

6. Method

7. 626 internships between 2015 - 2017

8. Berea College Internships 2015-2017 by
Academic Discipline
Berea College Internships 2015 - 2017 by Academic Discipline
No. % No. % No. %
AFR 7 1 EDS 60 10 PSJ 15 2
ANR 24 4 ENG 8 1 PSY 31 5
APS 2 0 GER 3 0 SEN 5 1
ARH 3 0 GST 27 4 SOC 24 4
AST 5 1 HHP 24 4 SPN 5 1
BIO 36 6 HIS 2 0 TAD 14 2
BUS 67 11 HLT 10 2 THR 3 0
CFS 40 6 INT 3 0 UGR 55 9
CHM 14 2 MAT 1 0 WGS 9 1
COM 46 7 NUR 19 3
CSC 22 4 PHY 6 1 Total 626
ECO 19 3 PSC 17 3

9. 75% received full or partial funding
by the college

10. 48% of interns were in non-profit
organizations

11. 19% reported they received a
full-time job offer

12. Consistency, timeliness, initiative, and
commitment to quality work were significant
predictors of over-all-intern (job)
performance.

13. Companies of high performing interns
indicated a greater likelihood to show
preference to hire interns over non-interns
and willingness to offer higher pay to former
interns than average or low performing
interns.

14. Discussion

15. Type Business Program Liberal Arts and
Sciences
Entrepreneurial
Leadership
Internship arranged between
intern-site vs arranged through
school (i.e. career services,
faculty contacts).
Faculty contacts Intern-site contacts Faculty contacts, intern-site
contacts, and career /
internship services
Program requirements Determined by the faculty,
the internship site
supervisor, and the student
Determined by Internship
office, the internship site
supervisor, and the student
Determined by the faculty,
the internship site
supervisor, and the student
Clarity and planning in
internship duties vs “do
whatever is needed or asked”
Internship position
description
Inconsistent internship
position description
Internship position
description
Reflection and feedback
provided during or after the
internship
Reflection and feedback
provided during the
internship
Reflection and feedback
provided after the
internship
Reflection and feedback
provided during the
internship
Implied opportunity of future
full-time employment vs no
implication regarding future full-
time employment.
implied opportunity of
future full-time
employment
No implication regarding
future full-time
employment.
No implication regarding
future full-time employment.
Compensation of the Intern Paid by the internship site Paid by the university Paid by the Program

16. Source: The Experiential Learning Cycle (Kolb, 1984)

17. The Learning Cycle
Frame
Pre-exposure
to content
Direct
Experience
Immersion
through
situations
Processing
Reflections on
the
experience
Synthesis
Application to
new contexts

19. Reflection Prompts - 1
Framing the experience
- Formulate an ideal self and personal vision for the future
- Job functions or industries for possible career fit
- Identify strengths and weaknesses
- Develop plan to practice new patterns / behaviors
- Identify specific learning goals
What ?
- What did you observe during the first visit / week?
- What did you find most challenging / most surprising?

20. Reflection Prompts - 2
What ?
- Describe the people and peoples values you work within the company
- Job functions or role do you play at the site?
- What strengths and weakness emerged at the site?
- What does it feel like to come into a setting and leave your different roles?
- What specific learning goals are aligned to the work in the company?
So What?
- What did you observe during the first visit / week?
- What did you find most challenging / most surprising?

21. Reflection Prompts - 3
So What ?
- What are you learning about your strengths and weaknesses?
- What values, opinions, decisions have been made or are changing
through the experience
- What has surprised you about the company and the people you work
with?
- How does this experience contribute to your civic responsibilities,
political consciousness, professional development, spiritual fulfillment,
social understanding, intellectual pursuit, global citizenship?
- Describe a social problem that you confronted during the experience.
What are the root causes of the problem? Explain your involvement
may or may not contribute to its alleviation?

22. Reflection Prompts - 4
Now What ?
- How important to you to stay involved in this company or problem?
- How will this experience contribute to your academic major?
- What feedback did you receive on your weaknesses and what action
do you plan?
- What changes would you make in the experience if it were repeated?
- How will you take what you have learned into action?
- Where do you go from here?
- What’s the next step in the process?

23. Review of the Entrepreneurship Internship
Literature
Environmental turbulence in startups requires universities to find hands-on
or experiential learning approaches to prepare future entrepreneurs (Nabi,
Walmsley & Holden, 2013).
New curriculum approaches are including work-integrated learning
opportunities to incorporate the workplace setting (Alpert, Heaney & Kuhn,
2009; Anderson, et al., 2012; Wan et al., 2013).
Empirical support for the positive influence on internships on the
development of entrepreneurial intent and self-efficacy (Botha & Bignotti,
2016)

24. Benefits of Entrepreneurial Leadership
Internships: Linking theory to practice
Minority and female entrepreneurship
Opportunity recognition
Sustainable business models (BMC)
Social networks
Self-efficacy

25. Conclusions and Next Steps
• Experiential education plays a vital role in student
development and career preparation
• Internships provide a means to fill the gap between
expectation, intern satisfaction and career employment
• Empirical evidence supports that interns transfer
knowledge and enjoy significant advantages in job offers
and higher compensation
• Mentoring before, during and after the internship provides
feedback and knowledge transfer to multiple actors

29. Source: The Experiential Learning Cycle (Kolb, 1984)