Job & Internship Search

GAIN A CLEAR UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT YOU ARE SEEKING

Many believe that if you look for "anything" you will have more options. This will have the opposite impact on your search, as many employers look for individuals interested in their industry and company.

Ask yourself:

• What type of position are you seeking?
• What are your geographic preferences?
• What are your work and lifestyle values?
  
• What are your assets in terms of skills and interests?

UNDERSTAND THE NATURE OF THE JOB MARKET AND WHAT IT MEANS FOR YOUR SEARCH

Most job and internship postings can be found on job search sites and employer websites, however, assistance from connections who already work for the employers you are considering can increase your likelihood of securing interviews. These contacts, whether they are UD alumni, family, friends, or professional associates, can help you identify the hiring managers, refer your applications to human resources, and recommend you for positions.

Networking is what ultimately connects most students with their job and internship opportunities, and is an essential part of the job search that should be used in combination with submitting applications through websites.

STEP 1 – MANAGE YOUR IMAGE: RESUME, COVER LETTER:

• Check out our resume & cover letter guide with templates to ensure that your resume has been created correctly and will be noticed by employers (especially in Handshake)
• Don’t forget to get feedback! Drop-in hours vary by day. Please visit bit.ly/udel-dropins for more information on this week's schedule!

STEP 2 - MAKE A LIST OF PROSPECTIVE INTERNSHIP/JOB SITES:

• Gather information from the career outcomes website, The Vault, Handshake, PathwayU, LinkedIn, and academic departments. You can also use Career Shift to organize your search (all of these resources are available to via the Handshake; just click “Resources” under Career Center” on your homepage).
• Find industry/career field occupation titles and industries, job/internship resources, organizations, and much more on our Career Community webpages.
• Use Handshake or other industry specific database recommended in your Career Community to find positions that match your professional goals.

STEP 3 – NETWORK, NETWORK, NETWORK:

• Network with friends, family, faculty, and other contacts.
• Use online networking sites such as the UD LinkedIn Alumni page.
• And remember, it’s about quality, not quantity.
• Get advice and resources to help you build your network on our Network & Informational Interviews page.

STEP 5 – APPLY:

• Now it’s time to return to Handshake, LinkedIn, and the industry specific job boards to apply for those opportunities you have identified.
• Whether you use Handshake, LinkedIn, or other online job board, it’s important to be diligent. For best practices on how to identify fraudulent posting and what to do if you think you are being scammed, click here.
• Always submit a cover letter and resume tailored to the specific position.
  
• Whenever possible, address your cover letter to a specific person. If you are unable to obtain a name, use “Dear Hiring Manager.”
  
• Communicate professionally at all times. No slang, shorthand, emoticons, etc.
  
• If you find a job posting on a third-party website, check the company’s website to see if the job is also posted there. If so, submit your application through the company website.

NOTE: Persistence and perseverance are key components of a successful job search – remember it’s a process and finding a job does not happen overnight.

STEP 6 - INTERVIEW:

• Make sure you are putting your best foot forward and practice, you can start this process anytime with our online practice interview tool Big Interview.
• Use our Interview Guide to learn how to prepare.

STEP 7 - DECIDE:

• Evaluate your offers, then select the position which best fits your goals.
• Write an acceptance letter to the selected organizations and send rejection letters to others.

No matter where you are in the process, professionals in the Career Center are here to assist. Make an appointment specific to your needs in Handshake. Categories include explore your industry, meet your network, gain practical experience and more.

• Handshake: Handshake hosts thousands of job and internship opportunities. Additionally, log in to your Handshake account to access other great resources, such as CareerShift and Glassdoor for even more great opportunities!
• CareerShift: Find career opportunities and access in-depth information about potential employers.
• LinkedIn Job Search Engine: Search Linkedin for jobs and internships associated with your network, and access many other career opportunities.
• Buzzfile: A comprehensive employers-by-major resource.
• Vault: Access rankings of top companies, industry-specific guides and jobs and internship listings.
• Wayup.com: A job and internship site featuring part-time, summer, and entry-level opportunities.
• Zip Recruiter: An online employment marketplace, connecting millions of employers through mobile and email services.
• Job Lift: A job search platform that scours over 4,000 partner job boards and uniformly compiles employment offers on one site. Sign up to receive regular job alert emails.
• Juju: A “job search engine” which indexes jobs listed on thousands of sites.
• Ripple Match: Jobs and internships for early career candidates.
• QuadJobs: Find local jobs that fit your schedule with QuadJobs! A resource for finding flexible, pre-professional job opportunities
• Parker Dewey: A platform featuring micro-internships - paid, project based work to gain professional skills and enhance your resume.
• Idealist.org: Connect with job, internship, and volunteer opportunities in various non-profit and social impact fields.
   

CHECK YOUR CAREER COMMUNITY PAGE FOR INDUSTRY SPECIFIC JOB & INTERNSHIP RESOURCES.

While there are many great job and internship opportunities available to you, unfortunately not every company or posting can be trusted. Please use the guidelines in this policy to make informed and careful decisions. 

Fraudulent Job & Internship Posting Warning & Disclaimer

Please feel free to contact us if you notice any suspicious activity or have any questions. 

Employers continue to hire students for part and full-time opportunities during the academic year, and there are a host of resources to connect you with job, internship and gig opportunities. Many students find work during the year in local businesses. These experiences can refine your interpersonal skills and demonstrate your work ethic. Use your network (family, friends, neighbors, etc.) to ask who is hiring. Also consider contacting local temporary staffing agencies.

• Handshake: Thousands of new job and internship opportunities are posted each month by recruiters looking to hire students and alumni from UD.
• Winter Term Internship Program: Apply for three-to five-week internships offered by UD alumni and employers over Winter Session.

• Indeed, ZipRecruiter and LinkedIn: Search for local and remote jobs, internships and other opportunities.

• Parker Dewey: Find virtual micro-internships (short-term, project-based work) at a variety of organizations. 
• Covintern is a crowd-sourced list of remote internship opportunities created by a student at Indiana University.

• QuadJobs: See postings for flexible pre-professional work opportunities for college students.

• Internships.com: Search an aggregator of internship experiences.

• CareerShift: Explore a database of job and internship opportunities, along with alumni and organizational contact information for networking.

• Industry Specific Job & Internship Posting Sites: View the sites posted in your career communities of interest.

• WayUp: Use this resource of job and internship opportunities with a focus on entry-level positions.

• Idealist: Hunt for internship opportunities with nonprofit organizations.

• Translation Jobs: Look for opportunities in translation, interpretation, localization, online teaching and more. 

• Remote Job Sites: Find websites that list remote work opportunities.

HOW DO I MAKE THE MOST OUT OF THE INTERNSHIP?

1. Learn the organization. Take a tour and read the literature. Learn how you fit into the big picture.
2. Establish goals/learning objectives. Sit down with your supervisor and establish mutually agreed-upon goals so you know what is expected. Make use of a Learning Contract, available at the Career Center.
3. Be conscious of office politics. Learn the power structure and who reports to whom. Maintain confidentiality and avoid gossip.
4. Don't isolate yourself. Ask questions and observe people and their job functions. Think of your current position as a stepping stone. Notice jobs that give you additional skills and experiences toward your career goals. Be visible by doing your job well. Remember the "Three E's - Enthusiasm, Energy, and Excellence." These qualities will make a positive impression on your employer.
5. Deal directly with your supervisor; don't go around him or her. Introduce new ideas gradually and avoid trying to change too much too soon. Ask for more responsibility. This initiative will prepare you for better positions in the future.
6. NETWORK! Build bridges with the people who are doing what you think you'd like to be doing. They may be able to help you in your current position or lead to contacts for future job opportunities.

AFTER THE INTERNSHIP

1. Write a description of the internship and your key responsibilities and accomplishments. Use this to update your resume and be prepared to discuss the experience during future interviews.
2. Stay connected with your colleagues through email, LinkedIn, or in-person from time to time.
3. Stop by the Career Center for Drop-In hours and have your updated resume reviewed.

Participate in a short term project based during Winter Session. The experience will expose you to a career area of interest and assist with building a strong professional network.

All Winter Term Internship opportunities will be posted in Handshake from mid-September until late November. Search employer name 'UD Winter Term Internship Program' on Handshake to see and apply to all winter opportunities.

2023 Winter Term Internships will take place:

Tuesday, January 3, 2023 through Friday, February 3, 2023

Example of Past Winter Internship Opportunities Include: Forensic Internship with the Defender Association of Philadelphia, Training Coordinator  Intern with The Melini Group, Winter Intern with the Office of U.S. Senator Christopher A. Coons, Software Engineering Intern with SevOne, and Marketing and Development Intern with Newark Charter School.

For more information contact udcareers@udel.edu.

Offered in June, the job shadowing program allows students to learn more about various professions, receive career-related advice, and reflect on the ways in which their education can prepare them for life after college. Job shadowing may include workplace tours, meeting with key members of an organization and involvement in daily workplace activities. This program matches students from UD with alumni and employers who are currently working as professionals for a one-day in-person job shadow OR a one-on-one virtual, one-hour-long informational interview. Please note this is not a paid opportunity. 

Students must submit their application between Wednesday, April 17 - Wednesday, May 1, 2024.

For more information contact: jobshadow@udel.edu

• Center for Interim Programs: The first and longest-running independent gap-year counseling organization in the United States.
  
  
• Gap 360: Paid jobs, adventures, volunteering, fun & tours.
  
  
• GoAbroad.com:  Provides the most comprehensive international education and alternative travel databases.
  
  
• BUNAC: Offers a range of exciting work abroad and volunteer abroad programs.
  
  
• Go Overseas: Search for gap year programs abroad.
  
  
• Backdoor Jobs: International, short-term opportunities and short-term adventures. 

• Idealist: Find volunteer opportunities, nonprofit jobs, internships, and organizations working to change the world.
  
  
• AmeriCorps: Each year, AmeriCorps offers 75,000 opportunities for adults of all ages and backgrounds to serve through a network of partnerships with local and national nonprofit groups.
  
  
• Peace Corps: Volunteers travel overseas to make real differences in the lives of real people.
  
  
• Public Allies: Advancing new leadership to strengthen communities, nonprofits, and civic participation.
  
  
• United Nations Volunteers (UNV): The UN organization that contributes to peace and development through volunteerism worldwide.
  
  
• American Red Cross: Provide compassionate care to those in need, through five key service areas: Disaster Relief, Supporting America’s Military Families, Lifesaving Blood, Health and Safety Services, and International Services.
  
  
• Peace Brigades International: An international NGO that promotes nonviolence and protecting human rights.
  
  
• The International Volunteer Programs Association (IVPA): An association of non-governmental organizations involved in international volunteer work and internship exchanges. IVPA is an association of volunteer sending organizations but does not organize or run its own volunteer programs.
  

• Teach For America: Developing a movement of leaders who will help drive change at every level of our education system toward the goal of closing the achievement gap.
  
  
• City Year: Teams of diverse young people called corps members serve full-time in schools for 10 months working to improve student attendance, behavior and course performance in English and math.
  
  
• Inspired Teaching: A state-accredited, 24-month teacher preparation program that prepares, supports, and certifies highly-qualified individuals to become early childhood and elementary teachers in the District of Columbia.
  
  
• The New Teacher Project (TNTP) Teaching Fellows: TNTP's rigorous Teaching Fellows and TNTP Academy programs prepare people without formal education backgrounds to be effective in challenging school environments.
  
  
• University Child Development School: The Resident Teacher Program offers a year-long, intensive, hands-on teaching experience.
  

• TEFL.com:  The world's largest real-time database of English Language Teaching Jobs.
  
  
• International Schools Services:  Dedicated to supplying international schools with everything they need to provide their students with a world-class education.
  
  
• Leading Out: Global Teaching Network: Opportunities to teach in Australia and Overseas (certification required)
  
  
• International Association of Teachers of English as a Foreign Language: Linking, developing and supporting English Language Teaching professionals worldwide.
  
• WorldTeach: Witness firsthand the challenges and rewards of education in a developing country.
  
  
• CIEE: Paid teaching positions in seven countries (Chile, China, Dominican Republic, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, and Vietnam).
  

• Transitions Abroad: The guide to paid and volunteer work abroad, living abroad, study abroad and cultural travel overseas.
• Projects Abroad: Offers volunteer opportunities, internships, and language courses of the highest quality. 
• InterExchange: A nonprofit organization devoted to promoting cross-cultural awareness through work and volunteer exchange programs. 
• Art History Abroad: Enjoy Italy and see a wealth of beautiful art while having fun.

• Outward Bound: Outward Bound offers courses in some of the most spectacular and inspiring settings in the United States and in Central and South America, successfully preparing students to confront the challenges they face today with self-confidence, tenacity and compassion.
  
  
• The National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS): Real wilderness expeditions, teaching outdoors skills, environmental ethics, and leadership in some of the most wild classrooms in the world. 
  
  
• Green Corps: Train organizers, provide field support for today’s critical environmental campaigns, and graduate activists who possess the skills, temperament, and commitment to fight and win tomorrow’s environmental battles.
  
  
• Student Conservation Assocation: Places over 2,000 interns in a diverse array of businesses, public land agencies and nonprofit organizations throughout the U.S.
  
  
• World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms: A worldwide network of organizations. We link volunteers with organic farmers, and help people share more sustainable ways of living.