The Artichoke: Sophomores disappointed by unchallenging summer internships

Sophomores are reportedly returning to Wellesley unsatisfied by their summer internships, and citing a lack of personal and academic struggles throughout the break as justification for their present unhappiness. 

“Every year, we tell first years not to have such high expectations from their first summer internships, and every year they do anyway. Every year, they return upset,” explains Center for Work and Service (CWS) counselor John Yu. “It might be something in the water.”

Water or not, many students tend to ignore guidance given by  the CWS. “The CWS? Ha, ha!” commented English major Christina Crimple ’15. “That’s my way of saying the CWS is a joke. They got me the job, but still. They just don’t understand how many things I need to accomplish. If I don’t take every advantage of my first summer internship, my whole life plan will collapse.”

Like many sophomores, Crimple ignored advice from the CWS as well as numerous professors and upperclasswomen that the summer before her sophomore chance could be her last chance to relax for several years. She chose to intern at Holler, Holler & Jacks, a high-end corporate law firm in New York City. “They had me copying and stapling three-to four-page memos. I feel like I could’ve done so much more.” 

Crimple added, “I wanted to write case briefings. I wanted to meet with clients and try my hand at brokering an international business deal. Once in the elevator I overheard one of the senior partners talking about what he should buy his wife for their anniversary, but he didn’t even listen to me when I tried to give him simple advice.”  

When asked to comment, her supervisor Josh Jingle, himself a senior intern at the firm, politely stated that Crimple was very energetic but possibly a little overenthusiastic. “She really, really wants to be a lawyer. I think she doesn’t quite understand that she’s 19, and doesn’t have an undergraduate degree yet—let alone a law degree or any relevant training. But she was definitely professional. I swear she has more suits than I have hairs on my head.”

Some students’ ambitions did almost reach fruition. Rae Redder ’15, who is a Political Science and English double major also on the pre-med track, was reportedly fired from her publishing internship for signing authors without her boss’s permission. “They asked me to read manuscripts and file them into genres. I read and categorized all day. But I just wasn’t challenged enough, so I decided to take matters into my own hands. There were some really good books,” said Redder regretfully. 

According to Yu, Redder was not the only Wellesley student fired this summer from an internship for being too ambitious. 

“This happens a couple times every summer,” said the CWS counsellor. “I don’t know how we have so many businesses still looking for summer interns from Wellesley. It’s probably because they understand how not being at Wellesley stresses the students out. Last year a rising sophomore broke her leg trying to get biological samples from a bald eagle nest, even though she’d been told that only highly trained professionals went near savage birds of prey. They get so crazy that if they weren’t so qualified, I would be out of a job.”