Paris Internships

Valuable summer work experience in the French capital

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Internships

Broaden your knowledge of the French business world, perfect language skills, and enhance your résumé with a true multicultural experience in France.

Internship placements are thoughtfully organized for a mutually beneficial experience for both student and establishment. There are two options from which to choose:
- English teaching assistant. As an assistant bénévole, students can be placed at any level, elementary, middle, or high school.
- Work placement. Most fields of study can be accommodated with assignments in public and private organizations such as companies, agencies, government ministries, cultural organizations, political groups, media organizations, not-for-profit organizations, foundations, research institutes and think tanks.

Internships are unpaid, full-time (35-40 hours per week), and take place in a French language work environment. Generally, positions may be more research-oriented, a distinction taken into account in the individual placement strategy worked out with each student.

Influence Your Future Career Path

Develop clear goals and objectives for your internship and later, unpack your work experience and leverage it in résumés, interviews, and future positions.

Before the Internship

To achieve your goals for the internship experience, use one-on-one meetings with an APA advisor to refine the type of placement you prefer and outline your objectives. This time will also be used to prepare you for the French and European work environment.

During the Internship

Using various writing prompts, document, analyze, and reflect on your role throughout the experience. These assignments will be compiled into a report as a final evaluation of the internship.

Your mentor will stay in regular contact with you and arrange on-site workplace visits.

After the Internship

At the conclusion of the internship, each student will receive an official report that will take into consideration the final evaluation of the internship by the on-site manager, an evaluation by the mentor, and a grade for the written reports.

Recent Internships

Internship placements are made according to a student’s academic and work background and professional goals. Fields like international relations, medical research, communications, government departments, and non-profit organizations have all welcomed student-interns. Past placements have included:

  • Providing legal assistance to illegal immigrants
  • Developing activities for an event agency
  • Managing social media networks in the tourism industry
  • Teaching a class at an elementary school
  • Assisting a museum curator
  • Working on projects at the intellectual property office of a French luxury company
  • Producing film with the production director at a French animation company
  • Overseeing administrative tasks at a web-based video and music distribution company
  • Providing social work in an NGO to host and train refugees and asylum seekers

 

Take a closer look at recent student-intern experiences:

Camille: Locating transgenes in a cell biology lab

Name: Camille

Institution: Franklin & Marshall College

Major(s): Biology and French

Internship Year: 2019

Where did you work? Institut Curie

What tasks/projects did you have? I worked in a melanoma research lab, and I was tasked with working on a project to locate transgenes in mice using PCR. Editor’s note: Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a technique used to copy portions of DNA for analysis. Source

How did a semester in Paris prepare you for the internship? After my semester in Paris, I felt way more confident in my French speaking, which was incredibly helpful for my internship. While we had lab meetings in English, the majority of my interactions with my co-workers were in French, and having already been speaking French over the course of the semester I felt much more comfortable speaking with them.

What did you learn while on your internship? Since I had never worked in a cell biology lab before, I learned how to do PCR, and I got to learn how to work in cell culture. I also was able to see the differences in working for an American lab and working for a French lab.

Did this experience influence your future academic and/or career plans? How? I am still figuring out exactly what I would like to be doing after college, but I know it will be in the scientific realm, so it was great to be able to see what it would be like if I were to continue to work in a cell biology lab. It definitely helped to confirm my interest in cancer biology.

Alan: Global relations in an embassy

Name: Alan

Institution: George Washington University

Major(s): International Affairs & Economics

Internship Year: 2019

Where did you work? Mexico Embassy in Paris

What did you learn while on your internship? Interning at the Economic Service for the Embassy is Mexico in Paris was such a unique experience. I gained deep insight into multilateral trade relations and international diplomacy. I was able to use my academic experience and learned how to see France as an essential actor in Europe and globally.

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