Anonymous wrote:My kid never interned...summers were busy.
She is now a well paid engineer at a defense contractor

If she only has a BSE and none of her summer work related at all to stem /engineering then she must be more than 5 yrs out, likely 10 yrs out. That is not how it works anymore. They need at least one summer stem job or research, unless they have extensive research or a local internship during the school year. The good news is that there are many paid engineering related jobs for college students, in government or industry or through universities. As long as they have above a 3.5 and do not target only the competitive ones, they are not hard to get.

Just sent a text to my Junior to see if she has applied to any internships yet…ChemE at Ivy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DD is a junior studying Mechanical Engineering and she is getting discouraged from all of the rejections for trying to secure an internship for this summer. She has excellent grades, prior internships and leadership in clubs so I am at a loss for why she is struggling. This seems to be the case for many of her peers as well. I thought the market for CS students would be difficult but not so much for kids studying engineering. Just wondering if others are seeing this...

She needs to target smaller companies. We were always hiring interns for paid positions. We were a small firm of about 6 engineers.

Where do you and other small firms advertise your internship opportunities?

Anonymous wrote:My DD is a junior studying Mechanical Engineering and she is getting discouraged from all of the rejections for trying to secure an internship for this summer. She has excellent grades, prior internships and leadership in clubs so I am at a loss for why she is struggling. This seems to be the case for many of her peers as well. I thought the market for CS students would be difficult but not so much for kids studying engineering. Just wondering if others are seeing this...

She needs to target smaller companies. We were always hiring interns for paid positions. We were a small firm of about 6 engineers.

My DC is a MechE major at a top 20 school. Really wants aerospace internships. But hasn't had any luck there. But DC applied broadly both last year and this year and has gotten internships at Fortune 500 energy companies.

My experience as a parent of CS kid...apply in Fall. Waiting for Christmas break is already too late.

Also, a misstep by my kid. He did not finish a semester early like the rest of his friends. They had jobs lined up and they started at the end of first quarter.

Thankfully, my kid did get a good job based on his three internships.

I think the same is true for engineering students. Internships are super important, you need to start applying in Fall, and also try to be a semester early applying for jobs so that you are not in the market with the rest of your cohort.

Anonymous wrote:My kid is Comp Eng at Brown, also having a very difficult time finding a summer internship. Has sent out tons of apps, that's about all he did over Christmas break. Still nothing, planning on doing research over the summer unless something pops up. It's tough out there

I was wondering if there was a difference in opportunities for Engineering students based on Engineering Program ranking?

my kid is at another ivy studying engineering and is experiencing the same thing and plans to do research if they can't get an internship for the summer

My kid is Comp Eng at Brown, also having a very difficult time finding a summer internship. Has sent out tons of apps, that's about all he did over Christmas break. Still nothing, planning on doing research over the summer unless something pops up. It's tough out there

My kid never interned...summers were busy.
She is now a well paid engineer at a defense contractor

Oh, for clarity, the various military labs and warfare centers are 90+% civilian. It is not joining the military, but instead merely working for the military services as a civilian.

I think OP missed the deadline for 2026, but search for "NREIP". Locally, NRL both designs and builds scientific satellites for the Navy. That summer internship program is still going on.

I forget the URL, but search also for "Naval STEM". There are at least 2 programs, one for HS students and one for college students. Applications are very competitive. US Citizens only - be sure to put US Citizen on the resume (usually towards the bottom).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:She's looking to get into industry, ideally aerospace or robotics but has applied for positions in anything requiring a MechE major. She plans to do research if she can't secure an internship. She's been applying on LinkedIn and each job has over 100 applicants so the odds are already less than 1%

Look in NoVA at the web sites (not just on LinkedIn) for Aerospace Corp, Mitre, Northrup-Grumman, Lockheed, Amentum, etc.

Most of those are hiring interns. Different employers have different due dates for applications. US citizenship is nearly always required in aerospace field.

Thanks for these leads, although she applied to some already there are some she was unaware of.

There are many Engineering internships but the best ones already closed applications

Anonymous wrote:She's looking to get into industry, ideally aerospace or robotics but has applied for positions in anything requiring a MechE major. She plans to do research if she can't secure an internship. She's been applying on LinkedIn and each job has over 100 applicants so the odds are already less than 1%

Look in NoVA at the web sites (not just on LinkedIn) for Aerospace Corp, Mitre, Northrup-Grumman, Lockheed, Amentum, etc.

Most of those are hiring interns. Different employers have different due dates for applications. US citizenship is nearly always required in aerospace field.