MAC SLAVIN EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Amanda Mulholland often worked 16-18 hour days for the Rockford Thunder, a National Professional Fastpitch team, virtually eliminating any time available for another job. The business administration major was participating in an unpaid internship, a situation nearly half of business majors find themselves in, causing her to be very strict with her budget and plan ahead for the three-month period.
The Labor Department has recently started enforcing the standards of unpaid internships. The United States Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division has six criteria to distinguish a trainee from an employee. Interns are considered trainees.
Jo Dorrance, Wartburg College’s Internship Coordinator, doesn’t forsee Wartburg running into any problems with the enforcement.
Dorrance said a majority of Wartburg students participate in unpaid internships.
“One thing that is special is we live in a small environment ... [companies] and Wartburg have developed, either through my participation or a faculty’s, a pretty personal relationship with site supervisors,” she said.
The relationship with the site supervisors allows students to recieve a beneficial learning experience, she said.
“It’s unlike some of those students who are going to New York City and landing an internship at a film company that their school knew nothing about,” she said.
David Nuetzman is currently participating in an unpaid internship with the Waverly Health Center, and said he wouldn’t feel more motivated if he were being paid.
“It’s worth it, because I am learning about the health care industry, in the field of accounting at least, and it’s giving me ideas for where I may want to work in the future,” he said.
Dorrance said she makes sure students participating in the internship understand if they receive credit, it’s similar to sitting in any other class for a semester.
Between the learning contract she and the student create, and her relationship with the site supervisors in the Cedar Valley she isn’t worried about student’s being affected by the Labor Department’s stepping up enforcement.