A survey of internship programs for management undergraduates in AACSB‐accredited institutions

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to survey the current status of internship programs for Management undergraduate students and to introduce a well‐established internship program.Design/methodology/approachA web page analysis was conducted on 473 institutions that have AACSB (the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) accreditation in the USA. The list of these institutions is from the AACSB web site (member school list) as of July 2010. A description of a well‐established internship program is provided. The 15 item questionnaire is developed to get the students feedback on the required internship course described in this paper. Based on that survey and web search findings, suggestions for internship course improvement are provided.FindingsMost schools (96.5 per cent) offer some type of internship course but only a few schools (4.5 per cent) require students take an internship course. The pass/no pass grading system was preferred by a majority of universities (85 per cent). Students need to work an average of 169 hours for three credit internship courses. The most popular prerequisites are: GPA of 2.5 or higher; permission from an advisor or coordinator (62.5 per cent); and various other restrictions such as school minimum accumulated credit hours (22.5 per cent) and specific courses (33 per cent). The well‐established program introduced has dedicated advisors to supervise the required internship courses.Practical implicationsInternship program advisors/coordinators can assess the compatibility of their internship program with the introduced program. In addition, universities can benchmark against the introduced internship program to improve their current programs or establish a new program.Originality/valueIf any universities want to improve their current internship courses, or establish an internship program, the paper's findings offer some guidelines.