Find Paid and Fully Funded Internships Abroad

Find Paid and Fully Funded Internships Abroad

Simple tips to help you find an internship.

Cutting through the tough local job market can be quite challenging for many international students. Paid or unpaid, that’s why internships are important in giving you real-world experience in the industry you want to work for.

However, for many overseas students, finding an internship can sometimes be just as difficult as it is to find a job. To help your chances of success, here are some simple tips that can help you land that dream experience.

Explore and weigh your options

There are myriad internship opportunities for international students. So take your time, assess your options, and choose what’s best for you. In addition, figure out whether it will be better to go through the internship process on your own or use an internship placement agency.

Contact organizations of interest

If there’s a certain company that you are interested in working for, search their website to see if they offer internship programs to foreign students. If you can’t find any information, contact the organisation directly through email and express your sincere interest in future openings. You can also check some online portals dedicated to helping overseas students who are seeking internship jobs.

Know your field of interest

Although there are lots of internships available in a wide range of industries (i.e. business, IT, and engineering), it is still important to examine your interests, field of study, and other potential internship areas where you can use your skills just in case there’s no available position in a field you want to pursue.

Speak with your institution

Every institution has different policies when it comes to internships. You may want to consult your international student support staff for available opportunities in the institution. Chances are they have the resources which you may not be able to access on your own to help steer you in the right direction.

Create a resume

Now that you have compiled a list of companies and fields of interest where you will likely apply for an internship, it’s time to build a mind-blowing resume. Make sure your resume highlights your core competencies and achievements and that they are relevant to the position you want to pursue.

Final Word

Internships are a great way to gain firsthand professional experience, while building new skills and connections. If you’re planning to study abroad or want to gain a more global perspective, consider pursuing an internship. These programs, usually tailored to college students, can help build cultural awareness, along with valuable hard and soft skills. But be wary of disreputable sources, instead utilize campus resources and personal networks for opportunities to intern abroad. 

The 10 Best Websites for Finding an Internship

With this, I don’t want to deter anyone from hunting for internships the way job seekers should go about their search, by first tapping their network, relying on personal referrals and targeting companies that attract them. But because online searches really can work for internships, and also help you focus on what you want, I’ve put together a list of the best sites for finding an internship:

1. LinkedIn: Not only should you use LinkedIn to hunt for internships, you should build a fleshed-out profile and reach out to everyone you know, especially professional contacts, on the 12-year-old Mountain View, CA professional networking site. Get people you’ve worked for to write you recommendations. Do include volunteer work.

To search for internship listings, go to the jobs tab at the top of the page and put “internship” in the search box. Then refine your search by filling in the boxes on the left side of the page. I searched for “marketing internship” and a New York City zip code came up with ten pages of listings.

One downside: You can’t filter for paid or unpaid positions.

The most valuable aspect of LinkedIn: instantly seeing which of your contacts works at a company or knows people who work there. I also recommend college students get their parents to search their own LinkedIn networks for contacts. Companies pay varying rates to list internships and jobs on LinkedIn (a 30-day posting in a City like San Francisco costs $499), so they are serious about hiring for many of those jobs.

2. GlassdoorFounded in 2007 and based in Sausalito, CA, Glassdoor gets its internship listings from several sources, including company websites, partnerships with job boards and directly from employers.

But its main attraction is that it offers an instant way to search for salaries, company reviews and descriptions of job interviews. Its interface is straightforward, though for smaller companies, the salary and review functions don’t always bear fruit. In the search fields I tried putting in “paid marketing internship” and in the location box, New York City, and I got 21 listings. When I clicked on the first listing that came up, for Inspired Marketing Associates in the Bronx, I found just two company reviews and no salary listings. But a paid internship for Major League Baseball had 37 reviews and one internship salary ($1,660/month).

3. Google: Don’t underestimate the power of a Google search. I put in “paid marketing internship New York City” and got hits for several of the sites in this piece and others I’m not familiar with, like FindSpark, which bills itself as having “the best creative internships & entry level jobs in NYC.” I like that you can filter for paid internships (I believe that by law, almost all internships should be paid, but that’s another story), though when I filtered for paid marketing internship, only one job came up, at Inc. magazine. Still, Google is a great shortcut.

4. Your school’s job listing site and alumni network: At my alma mater, Ca' Foscari University, there’s something called Ca' Foscari Alumni, where alumni post internship listings. If you can get access to a database like this, you will vault over other potential interns vying for these jobs. This is a first stop if you are a student.

5. Internships.comFounded in 2010, Internships.com is now owned by textbook rental and online tutoring company Chegg in Santa Clara, CA.

It offers 100,000 listings from 60,000 employers. Internships.com does not charge employers to list positions. When I searched for “paid marketing internship” in New York City, I got 10 listings.

One huge advantage the site offers: a “who” button that lets you see which of your Facebook friends have a connection to a company, either because they work there or used to work there. Facebook has no job listings and no other site I could find has the capability to match a job search with your friends’ résumés.

6. Internmatch.comFounded in 2009, San Francisco-based Internmatch has listings from 30,000 companies. It specializes in internships, and entry level jobs up to two years after graduation.

When I searched for “paid marketing internship” in New York City I got seven pages of results, even though not all of them were paid, there were some promising listings.

You can sign up and the site will send you notifications when new internships in your area of interest are posted. Employers can post up to 10 listings for free, after which they pay a fee. Some of the big companies who have listed on the site: Facebook, Zappos, Aflac.

7. YouTern An unusual site, YouTern tries to mentor and connect would-be interns using social media tools like Twitter.

Internship seekers fill out a profile and interact with mentors. Founder Mark Babbitt says he has relationships with recruiters at 100 companies and personally refers appropriate candidates. But internship seekers need to interact with the site before they get referred to jobs. YouTern also includes a jobs board powered by aggregator SimplyHired.

Babbitt says he has connections with many startups but also works with established companies like ad firm Ogilvy & Mather. YouTern launched in 2010 and is based in Lake Tahoe, NV.

8. Idealist: An excellent site to look for both internships and jobs in the non-profit sector, Idealist, based in Portland, OR, dates back to 1996. Run as a non-profit, it has listings for organizations around the world. The site currently lists more than 2,000 internships worldwide. A couple of current offerings for paid internships: a fundraising position in Washington, DC for the National Hispanic Council on Aging and a summer internship at the progressive Nation magazine and Nation Institute.

9. Global ExperiencesFounded in 2001 and based in Annapolis, MD, Global Experiences offers internships where interns pay instead of getting paid.

The plus: genuine work experience in foreign cities. Global Experiences works in eight cities—London, Paris, Dublin, Barcelona, Florence, Milan, Shanghai and Sydney. Prices range from $6,000 to $10,000 per internship stint. Company founder Emily Merson says that some colleges like Arizona State, University of Southern California and University of Illinois have partnerships with the company and pick up the tab. Students must apply but once they’re accepted, placement is 100% guaranteed.

10. CoolWorksThis site isn’t for internships per se, but rather for jobs, especially summer positions, geared toward young people.

According to the website, it offers “job opportunities in great places like national parks, various resorts, ranches, camps, ski resorts, and jobs on the water.” Founded in 1995 it’s based, rather exotically, just outside the north entrance to Yellowstone National Park.

Just one closing tip:

Wether you're looking for an internship of for a full-time employment, do it actively. Nothing comes without efforts.

The worst thing you could do is throwing your CV on the internet and hope someone will come and offer you the job of your life: it doesn't work like that.

Be consistent in what you do and results will come along. And if they don't, try harder.


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