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How can college students track down internships? Here are the top four sources:

1. Use your network of friends, family, former bosses/co-workers – everyone you know – to let them know you are interested in an internship this summer. Networking is a great tool for uncovering some hidden opportunities.
2. Use your college’s resources, including the career services office, the alumni office, and your teachers. All of these folks should be able to provide you multiple internship leads.
3. Use the Internet. There are quite a few internship Web sites out there, some where you can apply for an internship directly.
4. Use your imagination. If you have a certain niche or a certain set of companies you would love to intern for, then research those companies and apply for internships either from the company’s Web site or through a mail campaign using a cover letter and resume.

In all cases, once you decide to apply for an internship, please make sure your resume is tailored to each internship opportunity and that your cover letter (in about three to four paragraphs) makes the case that you are the ideal candidate for the internship.

By the way, internships are a MUST for college students who want to have the best employment opportunities upon graduation. Employers want to hire college graduates that already have a proven track record of success.

And, of course, for students who are not exactly sure of their career paths, internships are a great way to get a glimpse of a career path – and help you decide if that career is right for you or not.

Finally, internships are also wonderful opportunities because they grow your skills and employability, expand your network, and may even give you a permanent job offer upon graduation.

Use these resources from Quintessential Careers to help you:

• Internship Resources
• Cover Letter Resources
• Resume Resources

Given our litigious society, employers are getting more and more tight-lipped about what they say about former employees – so that it does not come back to haunt them.

That said, most employers will state that you were terminated, and some may state whether you were fired for cause or simply terminated… so, you need to face the fact that in many cases, a prospective new employer may very well know you were fired.

But I think you need to spend less time worrying about what a former employer might say about you and more time on how you are dealing with being fired – and what you have learned from the experience.

From my work with job-seekers, I know that getting terminated – whether for cause or downsized – is tough on the ego, so you need to pick yourself up off the ground, shake off the termination, and go right back out there and seek new employment. Don’t let the termination affect your job-hunting. Do not bring it up in your cover letter, resume, or interview.

But do be prepared to address the issue if it is raised in an interview. Your prospective new employer is going to want to know what you have learned from the experience – and you need to be prepared with a good answer. You never want to sound bitter – and you never want to badmouth a former boss or employer.

Read my article, Getting Fired: An Opportunity for Change and Growth, published on Quintessential Careers.

Transferable skills are an essential job-hunting concept to master for all job-seekers, but especially for recent college graduates and career-changers. What are transferable skills? Simply put, they are skills you have acquired during any activity in your life —- jobs, classes, projects, parenting, hobbies, sports, virtually anything — that are transferable and applicable to what you want to do in your next job or career.

Your first step is identifying the set of skills that employers in conservation biology seek. You can do this by compiling a collection of jobs from various employers – and making a list of the key skills they seek.

Your next step is then looking into your past and present for any experiences where you may have used or mastered those skills.

Your final step is then carefully showcasing those transferable skills in your cover letters, resumes, and interviews.

I think volunteering is a much more likely option for you this summer than internships – because you are still needing to catch up on those core science classes, but don’t rule anything out until you try. I have found that employers often interview (especially for internships and volunteer positions) candidates with diverse backgrounds because they seek a well-rounded staff.

Read more about transferable skills in this section of Quintessential Careers: Transferable Job Skills.

Technical theatre is all the stuff that goes on behinds the scenes – stage management, lighting, sound, props, wardrobe, scene design, etc. And as long as there is continued demand for theatre, there will be demand for the professionals who are responsible for just about everything but the acting.

My advice is to conduct some informational interviews with professionals working in the theatre. Informational interviews are where you sit down (in person, by phone, or electronically) with someone in a job that interests you. Ask as many questions as you can about how s/he broke into the field, how s/he sees future employment trends, how you can best prepare for a career in this field, etc. The goal is information. A side benefit is adding the person to your network. And in some cases, the interview may result in you being invited to apply for an internship.

I would also talk to the professors who teach the technical theatre courses. Ask about careers and ask about the placement of recent grads and other alums.

I haven’t seen any news indicating the demise of theatre in this country, but I think it’s a bit cyclical and tied to the economy – when people have jobs and are confident about their future, they are more likely to spend more money on entertainment, such as the theatre. But ask your professors and the professionals in the field – they will have the inside scoop.

Here’s a really cool site for technical theatre: www.theatrecrafts.com.

And for books about technical theatre, check out: TheatreBooks: Technical Theatre.

Dr. Randall S. Hansen is currently Webmaster of Quintessential Careers.

Dr. Hansen is an associate professor of marketing at the School of Business Administration, Stetson University. He has been a published career expert for the last 10 years and an employer and consultant with hiring/firing decisions for the past 15 years.

Through his experience as a professor of marketing, Dr. Hansen uses proven marketing techniques and applies them to job-hunting. He is currently working on such a book. Some of his work can be seen at his personal Web site.

He and Katharine Hansen co-wrote the very successful job-hunting book, Dynamic Cover Letters, published by Ten Speed Press. You can order copies from Barnes and Noble of this cover letter bible. He is also author of several career-related magazine and journal articles.

Finally, Dr. Hansen has been an employer and has firsthand experience in the hiring process. He also stays active in the field by reading magazine and journal articles and by talking with employers on a regular basis.