Report: Competition for college internships is getting tougher

The availability of internships is on the decline, even as more students are seeking them

February 20, 2025

Internships give college students the opportunity to explore career options, create social capital, gain real-world experience, and, possibly, that first job. For employers, internships are a way to support their talent pipelines and hiring strategies.

Landing one of these coveted opportunities has become more competitive, according to a new report from Handshake , a platform that describes itself as an “early career network.”

The Handshake Internships Index surveys over 6,000 students and recent college graduates and identifies trends to watch this year:

Internship postings on Handshake dropped over 15% between January 2023 and January 2025. But as of January of this year, internship applications for the Class of 2025 rose to 41% – compared to 34% of the Class of 2023 students nearing the end of their undergraduate careers.
The report finds “Internships in technology and professional services receive about twice as many applications compared to the overall average, and internship postings in both industries have dipped by more than 30% since 2022.”
Typically, September and January are strong months for intern recruitment on Handshake, but some employers are conducting their searches all year. These include smaller employers and some larger employers in specific industries including government and transportation.
Students (82%) are likely to accept a full-time internship if they feel they are being fairly compensated while fewer (63%) are open to an offer even if they don’t consider the pay to be fair.
Students rely on internships to help determine long-term career goals.
Students (79%) who completed an internship note the experience had a moderate or significant impact on their level of interest in working for their internship employer – with most willing or likely willing to accept a full-time job offer.

Additionally, about 12% of undergraduate students have not had an internship and do not expect to do so before graduation. Most of these students indicate they’re primarily limited either by time (33%) or by opportunity (33%) – meaning they’ve applied for internships but were not selected. A smaller share (14%) say they are unable to pursue an internship because of financial constraints.

“Every internship has the potential to be transformative. The more opportunities we can provide for students at this early stage of their careers, the stronger our future workforce will be,” states the report.

Read the full report – Handshake Internships Index – here.

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Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.