The school year is rapidly approaching and summer internships are winding down, but for some college students, there is no time to relax. The search for their next internship is already underway.
Hope College rising junior Jacob Gehring plans to start looking for next summer’s internship in September, shortly after wrapping up his work on underwater robots in Hawaii. He hopes to use what he learned from last year’s search to avoid dead ends. Gehring had applied to more than 100 internships throughout his sophomore year before landing this summer’s unpaid research position at the University of Hawaii.
“Last summer, I tried to apply to as many as I could, and it kind of worked to brute force it,” Gehring said. “I think this year, I’m going to try and work my connections a little better from the start.”
Gehring’s experience is not unique. It reflects the increasingly competitive internship market college students must navigate, according to data from Handshake, a college career platform. Internship postings on Handshake remain more than 15% below pre-pandemic levels, according to data from Randy Tarnowski, Handshake’s economist and director of research.
But applications have moved in the opposite direction: The median internship received 27 applications in 2025, up from eight in 2022. Additionally, students are applying faster and starting sooner. In 2025, 32% of seniors had applied to at least one internship by the end of September, compared with 18% in 2022.
As competition ramps up, Michigan students and colleges alike are forced to get creative to find success. Colleges are offering expanded career services, funding for unpaid internships, and programs to help match students with businesses. Students are learning, through experience, the importance of networking, mass applying and working fast.
Gehring’s path to robots in Hawaii was long, having started in October. His stroke of luck came when he turned to Shonn Colbrunn, executive director for the Boerigter Center for Calling and Career at Hope College in Holland.
“I had like zero luck applying to anything in Hawaii, just because I didn’t have any connections there, and I was out of state,” Gehring said. “I ended up going to the Boerigter Center where Shonn gave me a bunch of resources for finding alumni from Hope in Hawaii and reaching out.”
For him, networking really was the way to get the door open: “I was really surprised with how helpful alumni were, and how big of a boost I got from having someone be like, ‘Yeah, let me talk to this person and see if they can do anything to help.'”
Colleges step in as competition grows
Hope College was key in helping him navigate the competition, part of a broader effort by colleges to connect students with internships.
At Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, its Center for Digital Engagement has partnered with regional fintech startups on summer internships since 2015.
Amy B. Hietapelto, dean and professor of management at EMU’s College of Business, said the program places 48 interns a year across 24 startups. Competition has grown sharply: applications have averaged more than 400 a year since 2020 but approached 700 each year in the past two years.
The paid interns work in pairs with fintech startups on projects within the companies. The program also offers coaching, networking, professional development sessions and alumni talks — something rising Eastern Michigan senior Laleh Walker, who worked for the Kiss App, found unique and rewarding.
Hietapelto said that preparation is becoming increasingly important as students compete for internships and, eventually, full-time jobs: “I don’t think you can successfully have the majority of your students have internship or internship-like experiences if you don’t also provide them with these other opportunities to develop career readiness and additional skills that’ll help differentiate them.”
Beyond the program, Eastern Michigan offers students career services that include workshops on cover letters, interview preparation, LinkedIn and personal branding, and career databases and fairs. These services are important to stand out in a tough market, Handshake’s Tarnowski said. Simply hitting the apply button is no longer enough.
“The more touch points that you establish with an employer or opportunities for internships, whether they’re career fairs or through their career services department, the better,” Tarnowski said. “These are often less utilized than you think but a huge resource.”
Michigan State University does the same. Kennedy Allen, a rising senior there, said she regularly uses MSU’s career services: “It is important to make sure you’re talking to your adviser and going to the different workshops. You don’t have to do this alone.”
During workshops and one-on-one meetings with students, different university career centers emphasize advice that aligns with Handshake’s data.
“We are encouraging students to apply very quickly — within the first four days,” Hope College’s Colbrunn said. “If it’s been out there and posted for two weeks, then you probably are too late. The other thing, which is super critical, is networking. I also want our students to be fluent and proficient in using different AI tools, and I want them to absolutely talk about that on the resume, and in the interview.”
Colbrunn also said that even with all the help from colleges, internships can be hard to come by. “Every season we have students that land internships and do great. But then we also have other students that are doing all the right things and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have an internship, but they don’t get one. They’re just hard to find right now.”
The ‘socioeconomic implication’ of unpaid internships
Another way universities have helped out has been through providing funding for internships. While Handshake’s Tarnowski said that “unpaid internships have continued to be a rarity,” they are still out there, as students like Gehring take them to get experience.
Such internships are impossible for certain students, said Troy Kase, director of the Career and Internship Center at Albion College.
“There is a socioeconomic implication that employers don’t think about when they when they put out unpaid internships,” Kase said. “They need to think about who can afford to do an unpaid internship. It’s not a kid from a family that doesn’t make a lot of money.”
Some universities have created programs to change that. At the University of Michigan, the Zell Lurie Institute for Entrepreneurship provides funding for students interning at startup businesses. They work with startups founded by the institute or students and also student startups. This year, they received 174 applicants to the three pathways and funded 27, including that of MBA student Ifedayo Omotunde for an internship with Detroit Venture Partners.
Calla Vandehaar Johnsen, a rising senior at Hope College who hopes to pursue marine biology, ended up with a two-part internship, paying for one while receiving a grant from the college for the other.
After she was not selected for a few competitive opportunities, Johnsen ultimately found a program in Cape Town, where she spent five weeks scuba diving and conducting research on South Africa’s marine ecosystems. The experience included monitoring kelp forests, shark populations, fish and invertebrates. Researchers also used artificial intelligence to identify individual sharks from photographs and track their movements and behavior. “It was a cornucopia of knowledge,” Johnsen said.
But the experience, accounting for factors like travel, was expensive and unpaid. To offset these costs, Johnsen applied for an environmental grant through Hope College. This grant ultimately turned into an internship for the second half of the summer with Hope’s Sustainability Office, allowing her to bring what she learned in South Africa back to the college and surrounding community.
A mutually beneficial relationship
As internships give students like Johnsen valuable experience, for employers internships are an opportunity to evaluate potential employees before making a permanent hiring decision. Chris Holman, CEO of the Michigan Business Network, said internships are one of the main ways he finds entry-level employees.
“Internships are the very best way to get startup talent or entry-level talent,” Holman said. “You get to see their work culture, ethic, etc., and they get to see yours. When the right talent comes by, businesses will hire.”
Many students in Eastern Michigan’s program ultimately receive employment offers from the companies where they intern, Hietapelto said, though not all do.
Vincent Fodale, a rising senior at Kalamazoo College, is one of those interns hoping for a return offer. Fodale began applying for internships in October last year and intensified his search in December and January, setting a goal of submitting at least five applications a day. He ended up receiving an offer from Amazon in April after many months of stress.
“Internships are a grind,” Fodale said. “I think it really comes down to who you know and how much effort you put into it. I made a lot of phone calls to my mom, like, ‘Hey, I’m not getting internship this summer.’ It came really late.”
Fodale worked on two projects throughout the summer. One involved training about 900 employees on improving the facility’s stowing process. He estimated the project has helped the facility save about $700,000 through the training.
The experience has given Fodale a chance to see the impact of his work firsthand, and is why he hopes to return.
“I’m in a place where I feel important, where I feel like I’m making a difference,” he said. “I can see the difference that I’m making.”
atisch@detroitnews.com
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: The summer internship scramble starts earlier — and gets tougher
Reporting by Alyssa Tisch, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Alyssa Tisch, The Detroit News | USA TODAY Network
