<p>Practically everyone I know who isn’t planning on grad school (they’re doing research in the summer instead) has some kind of internship before senior year. Though I will add that I don’t have a representative example from all engineering majors. I have no idea how many Civil Engineering majors from my school got internships for instance. </p>
<p>However, I think it’s probably easier to get a full time job than an internship, just based on the numbers. There are fewer internships and more people competing for them. </p>
<p>That said, I don’t quite understand the road blocks the TC is putting up. Unless his job pays pretty well I don’t understand the huge issue with leaving it for an internship. Minimum wage jobs are relatively plentiful, once the internship is over he could find another. Even if his job is hard to replace, even at $4 or $5 an hour less it seems like it would be worth taking an internship. </p>
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<p>My company says they’re trying to grab top talent but can’t compete with Amazon and Google and the like. I don’t think they’re doing so bad though. A lot of the people I work with are substantially smarter than me, enough so that I wonder how I ended up here. But I don’t think a single one of them would have taken this job if Google or Amazon was an option. They aspire for better just like students do, but I think they accept that they can’t get the best , and that one step down will work just fine. Everyone has be critical of themselves and their value and be realistic. I went to a good school but one with practically 0 location bonus for my majors. No one I know was complaining about the job market. </p>