<p>I just applied to a summer internship program with a government agency. I sent in the materials required on Thursday the 24th, then I sent the internship coordinator a follow-up email on the 28th just to make sure that she received it. The application deadline's on March 1st.</p>
<p>She replied to my follow up email on March 1st said that she received my documents and my application is in the review process, and they will contact me soon.</p>
<p>This is the first real internship that I applied to and not sure what I should do next.</p>
<ol>
<li>How long should I wait before contacting the coordinator again? </li>
<li>What should I say when contacting her?</li>
</ol>
<p>Any answers or useful tips would be greatly appreciated, thank you.</p>
<p>why do you want to contact the coordinator again? They said they would contact you soon.</p>
<p>You should apply to more internships. The gov internship I am currently with got 500 applicants for the summer session (there are 12 spots). Don’t count on this one coming through. Apply to everything you can find that you are remotely interested in.</p>
<p>This is the first time I applied for a real internship so I’m not sure if I should just wait or contact them again. </p>
<p>This one I’m applying for shouldn’t be as bad as 500 applicants for 12 spots, but I’m definitely applying for other places soon. This one just happens to be the one that I’m most interested at.</p>
<p>I’m actually filing out the applications for two other places right now.</p>
<p>I would give it a couple weeks before you contact her again. Sometimes the government moves very slowly, and if it is a paid internship, there might be potential issues with the federal budget situation (but there might not be).</p>
<p>It’s for U.S. Commercial Service/Department of Commerce at one of the foreign U.S. Consulate.
It’s unpaid and they are not assisting with airfare, housing, and other expenses. Therefore I suspect that there won’t be 500 people fighting for 12 spots like you mentioned.</p>
<p>The expenses is not a problem for me, but I really want the experience. That’s why I wanted to know if there’s anything I should do now and when I should do it :)</p>
<p>You might want to check their website to see if they say something like “Unfortunately, due to the large volume of applications we receive, we cannot inform applications if they have not been selected for an internship,” or something like that. A lot of the places I’ve applied for say that, and a career counselor at my university told me that you really shouldn’t contact them if that’s the case. You just know after a few weeks pass that you probably aren’t getting an offer. Can anyone confirm this?</p>
<p>They didn’t say anything on the website, but they did mention that every location handle things a little differently.</p>
<p>I applied for two different locations, and got different responses. </p>
<p>One of the coordinators said that they will only contact the selected applicants, and if I don’t hear from them by March 15th, I should look else where. Just like the situation you described.</p>
<p>The other coordinators said that my application is in the review process and they will contact me soon. (Although I’m not sure how soon is soon, since it’s been a week already lol)</p>
<p>I won’t contact the one with the March 15th date of course, but not sure what I should do with the other one. :)</p>
<p>If they’ve essentially told you “Don’t call us, we’ll call you,” then you really should just wait. They may well be culling through hundreds of applications, as mentioned. One call (the one you made) is fine, but calling back endlessly won’t help and may hurt.</p>
<p>I’m just about finished with a Forest Service AmeriCorps internship and can attest to their very competitive nature. Good luck!</p>
<p>I just talked to one of my friend who have done several different internships at different kind of organizations. She suggests that one email is fine since it’s been about a week, but don’t keep on send emails just like you mentioned. (I have been communicating with them through emails since they are located outside of United States.) </p>
<p>I sent the email earlier tonight and hope I will hear from them within a few days lol.</p>
<p>I also applied to two other places now and will probably apply for a few other ones soon. </p>
<p>If I couldn’t get the summer internship at this place I might apply again for the Fall program in a few months, it might be a little less competitive since most people stay in school during the Fall semester. (I’m a little ahead of my graduating plan so I can afford to take one semester off if I take class in summer and/or winter.)</p>
<p>Well, hope everything work out for the summer so I don’t have to do extra planning. </p>
<p>How do you like your Forest Service AmeriCorps internship? Sounds a lot more adventurous than the one I’m applying for :P</p>