Internships: Applicants Must Pay (or Receive Credit)

All broadcast journalists in training know that part of the "work out" at any J-School is interning in a broadcast news outlet. The opportunity is comparable to a beginning level job with a real news operation and exposes students to a professional newsroom, an experience not available inside the classroom or even on-campus. Of course there is a catch, most internships are unpaid. Therefore, someone decided that receiving academic credit would be ample compensation for students. They were wrong; credit is not an acceptable trade for all the efforts of an intern, these students must be paid for their hard work. News organizations that gave hourly wages to their interns would offer less spots and therefore create a more competitive environment. In turn, the students chosen would take on more responsibility and walk away with a greater experience. In the end, soon-to-be professional journalists would be better prepared when that first day on the job arrives. The quality of journalism would be raised and the public could count on the next generation to manage and uphold the Fourth Estate.

Currently, "federal labor law requires that students" who are interning either get paid by their employer or be enrolled in an internship for-credit course, the USC Career Planning and Placement Center says. But this is not fair. Internship sites act as if they are looking out for students by insisting that their interns receive credit. While it is the law, the language used on their websites suggest that news outlets believe they are doing interns a favor.

On the websites of two popular internship destinations among USC students, ABC News and KNBC, this language is evident. ABC News says that "Applicants must receive academic credit in return for the internship." The same message is delivered by KNBC, the station says that because interns are not being paid they "must" earn credit.

The problem arises when meeting this requirement takes students beyond the normal amount of coursework. This occurs when students intern during an academic term in which they are taking on a full load of courses or when participating in an internship over the summer. Which happens to be the case for many students in the Annenberg School.

At USC, a full-time undergraduate student is defined as taking 12-18 units a semester. Students have the choice to register for any amount of classes in that range after paying for that semester's tuition, which at USC is no small feat. Based on the curriculum at Annenberg, many students choose to take all 18 units and are forced to register for more units to be eligible for an internship during a given semester.

The best course for students in this situation would be JOUR-090x, "Internships in the Media." While it does not count towards degree credit it is geared towards journalism majors. Students can take up to 8 units in this class during their time at USC, taking one unit for each internship. This is perfect for students taking 16 units during a semester (the norm at USC). It is problematic for students taking 18 units as they need to pay for this additional unit. At the undergraduate level, one unit will set them back $1,121. Suddenly, that "unpaid" internship is quite costly. Students not wanting to pay that much can go to a nearby junior college like Santa Monica College, where the cost for an internship course might be anywhere from half to one-fifth of that at USC. But for an Annenberg major, this credit would equate to nothing as it will not advance their studies towards a degree at their school or a junior college.

Even if students have the funds for this additional unit, it is time consuming. For those students taking on a full-load, they have busy schedules that require them to be engaged not only in journalism but other disciplines on-campus. Other departments may not be as sympathetic to internships and will expect students, regardless of their major, to give ample attention to their classes. At the same time, these journalism majors who are taking 18 units are enriching their journalism education with areas of expertise to aid them in their careers. The extra units allow for student to pick up additional minors and majors to complement their journalism education. They also fall within the J-School guidelines for accreditation.

Which leads to a potentially larger problem for students who decide to take their internship credit at Annenberg. As an accredited institution, there are certain guidelines the school must follow. These standards, set by the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, have specific requirements for the makeup of degrees in the country's leading institutions. Under "Curriculum and Instruction" the council explains that students must "take a minimum of 80 semester credit hours or 116 quarter credit hours" outside of their major and "a minimum of 65 semester credit hours or 94 quarter credit hours in the liberal arts and sciences." At USC, that means a Bachelors of Arts in Broadcast Journalism, which totals 128 units, will only have 48 coming from the School of Journalism. This requires Annenberg students to spend their units in the J-School wisely, in some cases, making them choose between internship credit and upper division courses designed to improve their technique and style or offer them historical perspective.

The Broadcast Journalism major at USC totals 40 units. So students are allowed to take up to two more courses in the School of Journalism. Since most courses are 4 units, if students use one of those 8 remaining units for internship credit, they will be restricted to only one 4 unit course and one 2 unit course, which are limited in selection. If they register for internship credit three times, they will not have room for that additional 2 unit course. Again, this may force students to choose between classes and internships. This should never be the case, internships are supposed to supplement the education in the classroom to create the proper training for future broadcast journalists.

The Bottom Line: Paid interns will be better interns who will become better journalists. An arena with fewer, more competitive internships would create more meaningful opportunities for students and better prepare them for their career. The stereotype of interns getting coffee and making copies would be eliminated. Instead, students would be getting better training and experiencing more while in a professional setting. Viewers and news consumers could rest assured that the state of journalism would be at a new high rather than a low. All would be better if interns got paid for internships, rather then having to pay for them.