D had 5 unpaid internships over a period of 3 years. 4 for credit(s). Not illegal here, apparently. I see no reason why OP shouldn’t try it if he is interested. One of the things D has made clear from all her work is that money is not her ONLY driving force. Of course, that attitude is not the norm, as seen here.
No and no. They are looking for free labor and it is not legal. If I were you parent I would tell you to get a job as a babysitter, dog walker, cashier, any job where you could get paid. As a free labor, how serious do you think this employer is going to make sure you are productive and well supervised? You could end up wasting your whole summer.
One of my kids was offered a job at a summer camp for less than the minimum wage when they were charging top $$ for their services. I told my kid that I would prefer if she were sitting at home eating bon bons than to be giving away free labor. She ended up getting a job at the legal aid where her Uni paid for her internship. It wasn’t that much more money, but it was within her interest and it paid a minimum wage.
Unpaid internships for college credit are fine. Unpaid internships for government agencies are fine. Unpaid internships for private companies are not fine.
I don’t see how you could take on this internship being as you are under age 21.
^^Why? It’s not a job tasting the beer. Many states allow 18 year olds to serve liquor, to work in restaurants, to drive trucks delivering liquor.
@sylvan8798 I think my situation is different from your daughter, considering I wouldn’t receive college credits for this internship. But did your daughter intern for established companies that have some sort of reputation? The position I’m looking at is with a new start-up company.
Bottom line, if what the beer company is trying to do is technically illegal, I’d rather not work for them.
I have nothing against unpaid internships, so long as the student can afford to forego the summer earnings and pay any additional costs of the internship (housing, transportation, etc.) and, most importantly, the internship will benefit the student. At a minimum, an internship should provide meaningful work in a field related to the student’s course of study and some mentorship. To be a “legal” unpaid internship, you should earn college credit for it as well (although I view that as a disadvantage since you’d likely have to pay for the credits). If you’re an accounting major, I don’t see that experience in social media will do you much good. I’d be more inclined to get a paying position, even if it’s lifeguarding or waiting tables.
My guess is you wouldn’t learn much from this internship, it sounds like a new or small company that doesn’t have the resources to do social marketing so they are looking for some tech savvy kid to come in and do it for free. Lots of small businesses do this…have some high school or college student set up a facebook page, a twitter account, set them up on review sites and fluff some reviews, figure out how to get their name to come up in google searches. You aren’t getting paid and it doesn’t add much value to your career in accounting. It sounds like just busy work for you. If they can’t even pay you minimum wage, that says they don’t have the resources to offer you anything.
If you aren’t making money, is there a volunteer agency (like Second Harvest Food Bank, etc) that could use some office help? If you want to make some money, you can look at malls, outlets and summer activity places (theme parks, tourist type places) for summer gigs.
Unless you really needed the money, I would take the internship with a smaller potential growth firm over a minimum wage hourly position. A few months ago, I had a meeting with the owner of a couple of new car dealerships. I asked him how he got in the business, and he said that when he was in college studying to be an accountant, he got a job washing cars at a local dealership. When he graduated, he got a job being an in-house accountant at the same dealership. He did this for various dealership groups and got to know the entire operation backwards and forwards, until he saved enough to buy his own dealership when he was 35. Now he owns multiple dealerships and is easily worth $10,000,000+.
If you think you might be interested in this industry, take the position, but since you are unpaid, ask them to teach you the entire operation. Learn how to clean the fermentors, go out on sales calls, make some deliveries, etc. Just don’t let yourself be cooped up in front of a computer.
I think it has the potential to be a good resume builder and opportunity to learn something about social media. When you apply for an accounting internship next year this will be more impressive to have on your resume than Old Navy. At a minimum, probably a good idea to explore it further and see what the scope of the internship is - maybe a day or two a week would be ideal and I’m sure the “social media” work will be more challenging than you might think. Social media done right can drive incremental business and is much more challenging than you may think.
If they don’t already have someone doing social media that will provide training it doesn’t sound like it’s legal
http://smallbusiness.findlaw.com/employment-law-and-human-resources/unpaid-internship-rules.html
My response is a bit different – I would assume that this position (especially if it is part time and with flexible hours) would be highly desirable to some (beer-loving, communications internship-seeking) applicants. I don’t think you would be competitive. They would want people to know about beer and beer culture. The OP is like an unfashionable person applying for an internship at a boutique.
Who says an unpaid internship is more impressive than folding sweaters at Old Navy?
I hire for a living, and I think that holding down a job-- any job- and learning the ropes of an entry level position is extremely impressive. Some of these glamorous internships are nothing more than Daddy or Mommy calling a friend and getting the kid an empty swivel chair in a conference room for the summer. Sitting in on meetings where you have nothing to contribute and no meaningful work to do isn’t impressive.
OP- it could be a good experience, it could be a waste of time. I think you need to explore what they want you to do and see if you will have time for an actual paying job this summer as well.
The first thing that I would do is ask your professor about the legality of the position. Don’t most colleges have placement centers that help vet these types of opportunities? I know many business schools that have their own separate center from the university’s general placement center. If the internship doesn’t sound legal, your school has an obligation to inform the business owner of such.
If the internship appears to be legitimate, you may want to look into it a bit more. How well do you know the company? Who is responsible for the internship (i.e. what is their actual position in the company)? What are their plans over the summer that you’ll be involved in supporting?
We’ve had a large number of craft brewing companies open here over the last few years. Some are fairly large scale in their operation, with distribution to local bars and stores. Others are essentially brew pubs that don’t sell any products outside of their premises. Many are involved in different events throughout the summer (BBQ contests, local fairs and festivals, etc.). Participating in these could be a lot of fun and give you some insight into how these types of events are run. It could also get you into some places for free. I’m making some REALLY BIG assumptions here though. Only the person planning for the internship can provide the details.
Finally, since it’s an unpaid internship from a company that doesn’t sound like it has much experience with interns, you may want to see if you can modify the experience to match your major. Maybe you could shadow the person running their books to understand what GAAP apply to social media budgeting and expenditures.
“The first thing that I would do is ask your professor about the legality of the position”
Personally, I would not do this. Either consider the position or don’t. But I wouldn’t start questioning the professor about it if he passed it along to you, whether that might be technically valid or not.
Some of the responses seem to be written as if the OP had been offered the job rather than merely being sent a notice about a job opening. This notice might be in wide circulation.
Ask your professor why he sent this info your way…and why HE thinks it would be a good opportunity for you.
The owner of the brewery sent an email about the internship to every marketing professor at my college. My professor mentioned the internship during class and asked if anyone was interested. I was the only person to raise my hand lol…so she forwarded the owner’s email to me.
Honestly, I doubt my professor had many thoughts regarding the position, she was basically just passing along info to her students.
Heck no. You need a job that pays you for your labor. Your work is worth something. Unless you can do paid work on the side, and this job as a hobby, say no.