I am a sophomore in CS in Engineering at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I do okay in most classes (A’s and B’s), but the physics courses here have killed my gpa. I’ve gotten 2 Cs and a D. I don’t have much experience either. Is it terribly hard to get an internship? What can I do to make myself look better to potential employers?
You should be able to get an internship without too much trouble, though maybe not your first choice unless you get pretty lucky. The cutoff for a lot of work is a 3.0 GPA, with 3.5 being the cutoff for “premium” work. So you will probably be able to find something.
It’s a good school, so you might get some additional windfall from that factor. Very possible you’d get lucky and land a pretty high quality internship.
First, start NOW. Many internship windows open and close before students even start looking. NASA summer internships start posting in early November. Next, cast a WIDE net. Certainly choose favorites, dream internships if you will, but include others too. Any experience that gets you a look at possible types of future jobs and establishes your reputation of “playing well with others” is better than no experience. Don’t forget to parlay any and all family and friend contacts no matter how small you think they might be. Finally, know that being a sophomore will automatically disqualify you from SOME, but not all opportunities. Be organized and proactive. Good luck!
It depends on the CS job. Mine has returned offer from last year internship but she might not want to do that. She wants to diversify her skill set. I also told her to stay out of a certain companies and so that’s the hard part. Plus I’m unable to convince her to not eliminate some other companies right off the bat, but she doesn’t listen to me. So that’s also the hard part. I have a slightly picky kid.
You should be fine. Most intern/co-op postings I have seen set the threshhold at 3.00. As Eyemgh said, it’s higher at some firms, but most are fine with the 3.0.
Yes, many firms will not consider an underclassman for an internship or co-op, particularly the larger corporations, in my opinion.
OP, you attend a top notch school for CS. Didn’t you attend the UIUC Career Fair held on Sep 9 and 10? What was the outcome of your apps?
http://ecs.engineering.illinois.edu/recruiting-students/career-fairs/
My D2 is a Sophomore at GTECH, planning to major in ChemE. She handed out a few apps for Summer 2016 Internship at the GTECH Fall Career Fair. She interviewed with 3 on site (one later at their HQ in IL wherein she met folks from other Engg. schools). She mentioned that some companies (eg. SpaceX) were definitely looking for a GPA of over 3.5, but most were not. And there were fairly long lines for some. But other than that, it was fairly easy to land a gig for next summer. She had her first offer in hand within 2 days.
Good luck to you!