Tips, Quips and Tallies

INTERNSHIPS: No Age Restriction
by Marlene LeMon

Internships are coming more and more into focus in today's job market. The benefits are numerous for both employer and intern. Students gain an introduction to the workforce and specific career direction. Employers gain by filling their own talent pipelines with potential employees who know the company mission and culture.

However, Blair S. Walker broadened the definition of internships in an article in the May 1, 2009, AARP Bulletin titled "wOw! Internships Are Not Just for the Young.” He writes, "The word 'intern' rarely conjures images of mature, white-collar workers seeking new job skills. But that's the picture Manhattan-based Women on the Web (www.wowowow.com) is seeking with its executive intern program."

The wOw website creator is 67-year-old Joni Evans, CEO of the Web site for women over 40 who says, "We're in a time where lots of our women friends are being fired or their husbands are being fired or, for the first time, they're thinking that they'd better work because their 401(k)s are being diminished." The organization “is giving about 30 participants a crash course in editing and Web technology skills” and has offered unpaid internships to women 40 and over since March of this year.

You can visit http://www.wowowow.com/ and click on "Think Up" for more information. Many 30- to 50-year-old transitional students either changing career paths or finishing college for the first time are excellent candidates for internship programs because they are mature, serious about learning and willing to stretch themselves for whatever it takes to be employed in today’s job market.