Metzger, S. V. (2004). Employers' perceptions of the benefits of college internship programs. Journal of Cooperative Education and Internships, 38(1), 45-52.
The purpose of this study was to explore employers' perceptions of the benefits of college internship programs in order to establish an institutional benchmark for program evaluation and development. The findings aided career service practitioners in providing information to students, administrators, and departmental internship coordinators and assisted the university in improving and fine-tuning its internship program. A survey instrument originally developed by Kane (1981) was utilized to seek information about employers' perceptions of the benefits of college internship programs. The instrument was mailed to 468 local employers who had established internship programs. Descriptive statistics were utilized to analyze the demographic information and questionnaire statement responses. Responses to the two open-ended comment questions were grouped into categories based on the themes that emerged from the data. Over half of the employers either moderately agreed or strongly agreed with all of the statements with the exception of two statements. The open-ended comment question responses indicated areas in which college internship programs could be improved and also included general comments regarding employers' perceptions of the benefits of college internship programs.