Semester Internships

SiPN´s Semester Program – Focus on Social Sciences, Humanities and Business participants can choose to add an internship experience (for academic credit), it can either be a ful-time experience, or a part-time in combination with 2 or 3 regular courses. A SiPN promoted internship can be combined with a regular or intensive Portuguese language course too. You choose!

Full-Time Internship

 up to 24 ECTS

Internship
+ 2/3 Courses

up to 30 ECTS

Internship + PT Language Course

up to 30 ECTS

All SiPN promoted internships – SiPN´s Experiential Learning Program, which entail research and internships are for academic credit. In essence, they will work just like any other class, with rigorous academic supervision. Pricing and included amenities are the same, see preferred session (semester or summer).

 

SiPN internships entail a very rigorous academic supervision by a local faculty member in addition to a tutor at your place of work, who will assess the validity of the experience for academic credit. Besides the academic component, our faculty member will oversee our student´s experience and will meet with them regularly in class, as well as serving as a promoter of outside activities which will include visits to various sites and organizations in the city to promote a sense of reflection and overall enrichment of the experience.

Testimonials

Types of internships

SiPN provides a unique range of opportunities for students looking for an international internship.

These opportunities run the gamut from placements with governmental organizations, NGOs, INGOs, or for-profit companies. The opportunities listed below provide variable academic credits through our partner universities, for a minimum commitment of 15 weeks during our semester editions (those seeking placements for longer should contact us). The majority of our placements do not require Portuguese, if students possess Portuguese language abilities than the possibilities are even greater.

Moreover, some of our internships allow for part-time placements of 10h/week during the semester, so that students could conceivably combine a part-time internship with two (preferable) or three of our regular classes.

Full-time internships require at least 20h/week over at least 15 weeks, and typically earn 12 ECTS (up to 6 US credits). All of our internship partners have been screened by SiPN and academic credits are awarded in accordance with a course syllabus developed by the instructor of record.

Take a look at the types of internships and organizations that are involved in SiPN´s Internship Program (aka SiPN´s Experiential Learning Program). Please note that these are just some examples, SiPN has many more host organization in its internship placement portfolio.

Management, Mkt & Business

STEM & Life Science

Humanities, Arts & Design

Social Science & Public Policy

SiPN Internships examples of placements

You can find some of the organizations that integrate SiPN’s Experiential Learning Program; This entails internship and research opportunities for academic credit. 

The organizations below have hosted SiPN-promoted experiences in recent years.

Internship Placement

When interest to applying for a semester internship, students should be ready to send SiPN the following documents during their application phase:

  • Updated Resume
  • General Cover Letter/Letter of Motivation – open format, this is where students describes the kind of internship they are looking for, as well as highlighting their achievements and ambitions
  • Updated Student Transcript of Records – unofficial version will be accepted
  • SiPN Internship placement questionnaire

Students interested in taking on this opportunity will start their SiPN semester application just like a student who only wants to take regular classes (click “apply now”!). It is only later during the process that they will indicate their interest in the internship option, that is when SiPN requests the materials enumerated above.

After SiPN validates students´internship application materials, it might ask applicants for an extra meeting to clarify some aspects, this is not always the case. A first round of contacts with potential hosts for our student is then initiated (students are not involved in this phase). Once we have encountered one or two options that have shown interest in hosting SiPN´s applicant, SiPN will establish contact between the HR person at the host and our student for an interview/conversation to make sure expectation are met on both sides. If both parties then validate the possibility with SIPN, we will register student for that class (International Internship for Students in Mobility). Frequently, the interview is done during the first days after student’s arrival.

During the second-week of the program (after the orientation week), student is introduced to SiPN´s faculty of record for internships who furnishes student with all the information to kick start his practical component days after.

Learning Objectives and Grade Assessement

Student performance will be evaluated based on the following syllabi (syllabi might be slightly adjusted):

  • International Internship for mobility students (Part-time 150h, 10h a week/15weeks, 6ECTS) – Download Syllabus
  • International Internship for mobility students (Full-time 300h, 20h a week/ 15 weeks, 12 ECTS) – Download Syllabus

If our students or their academic advisors would like to receive a packet with full information on how the experience is handled from an academic standpoint, please send us an e-mail. We do not make it available for download here as it contains SiPN intelectual property.

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