Ask for internship instead of full time position?

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>So I have an in-person interview with an engineering company tomorrow after getting them to expedite the process since I got a full-time offer elsewhere last week (but that position is not ideal at all). I finished my undergrad studies a year ago and during my phone interview with them last Monday, I did not mention my plans to return to graduate school this August to pursue a phD in Physics. They may have asked me about my future grad school plans during my phone interview. If they did, I lied and said that I don't intend to start for another few years or so. If thats true, do you think they would remember that? If so, they would realize I had lied during the phone interview</p>

<p>Instead of hiding my grad school intentions and trying to get a full-time position, should I instead be open about it and ask for an internship instead? </p>

<p>It actually would be nice to intern there this summer and then continue to intern there whenever I have summer breaks, and then finally get a full-time offer from them when I graduate. But companies usually only want to hire interns in order to see if they want to hire them full-time after they graduate, right? Would they be willing to wait 5 years to finally take me on full-time? </p>

<p>I do not need tuition reimbursement from them as I will get funded in my Phd program. I also want to study full-time so I don't want to work there during my studies. Plus, the school and the company are far away from each other. I was just thinking that an internship might be better as opposed to a full-time position as I could possibly learn more things and gain more skills and get good references in case I want to work there after I get my phD in 5-7 years. Is this correct? Then again, I may have already lied to them about my grad school plans </p>

<p>The job description did mention they are looking for interns. But don't companies prefer their interns to be MS students instead of phD's? I do not want to run the chance of them thinking that I want to be hired as a full-time position, then notifying them I want an internship, and then having them say that they only want me as a full-time worker but not as an intern.</p>

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<p>Anyways, I decided to not take any chances of burning bridges, so I canceled the interview with them. As for that other offer I still had, I realize theres a chance that I may not like the job after a month or so and may want to quit because of it. Even if I don’t mention my grad school plans, would I really make them angry if I quit after a month or so even if I seemed enthusiastic about the work at first? I know at one of my previous internships, an intern quit after the first day! Thats because she realized what kind of position it would be and how it would not help her gain relevant skills for her career. If a similar thing happens to me in this job, would they understand me wanting to quit after a short period of time?</p>