By Jenn D’Agostino

As the school year is nearing its second semester, the concerns of college students are beginning to shift their attention from final exams to the fast approaching summer ahead of them.

“As a rising junior, I really need to start looking for some kind of job or internship this summer, but I hope I can find one that also pays,” said Southern Methodist University sophomore Sarah Mosso.

Working as both a camp counselor and at her local barn last summer, Mosso was happily employed and made some good spending money for her year ahead. However, she now is feeling the pressure to look for an internship that might help her get a job upon her graduation in two years, but will leave her empty handed in terms of money.

While days of summer used to mean summer camp and days spent at the beach, college students are now more concerned with which major company they can land an internship for. Some students already feel left behind as sophomores seeing as some of their friends have already acquired internships at big name banks and clothing designers such as J.P. Morgan and Diane Von Furstenberg. With such growing competition, students are feeling forced to forget about money and instead look into working unpaid internships in order to appear more experienced on their resumes upon graduation.

While experience is important, a survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers in 2013 did not show much of a difference between job offers for students with unpaid internship experience and students without any internships at all. With 35.2 percent of students without any internships and 37 percent of unpaid interns receiving job offers, there is only a small margin between inexperienced and what might be consider experienced.

The same NACE survey, however, showed that almost double as many students receive job offers when they have paid internships on their resume, with 63.1 percent. Proving that to employers, a paid internship means much more on a resume than unpaid.

“It all depends on what’s involved in [the internship], ones that involve getting coffee don’t bare fruit for the student,” said Tony Pederson, the Belo Distinguished Chair in journalism at Southern Methodist University.

As both a professor and an experienced journalist himself, Pederson has watched the workforce, and more closely, the journalism industry change. He feels that competition with other students is not the only problem when it comes to the pressure students are under to apply for and accept internships without pay.

“Parents are driving their kids to have multiple internships… But, I feel that one really good internship after junior year is much more valuable,” said Peterson.

Many agree with Pederson and his “quality over quantity” view toward internships, however with the growing completion in the journalism field along with most others, it is not as easy to find such high-quality paid internships without any experience in a professional environment. With such growing completion and the rising threshold of entering the workforce, college students and recent grads are confused as to where they should start. Should one accept the “meaningless” unpaid internship in order to get to the paid that might lead to their dream job, or will that just slow them down?

While students are already paying thousands on their college courses, they are left wondering whether it is worth it to work without pay when percentages show that unpaid work may not even help acquire a future job offer.

“I waitressed at restaurant in Chicago last year, and I might go back for another year before I start interning… A lot of internships are looking for rising seniors anyway,” said Lauren Kelly, another sophomore at SMU.

Kelly, like many of her fellow students, would rather spend another summer making some money and relaxing while waiting for better internship offers as an upperclassman.

While Pederson does think that low-level internships can sometimes be pointless, he does still believe that some are well worth it.

“It would be a huge mistake to get rid of unpaid internships,” said Pederson.

He added that some internships are still valuable even when unpaid, such as in broadcast journalism, where most interns have an advantage being around a studio in action.

With survey statistics, professor opinions, and pressure from parents and their peers, current college students are left still questioning what might be worth it as the program, the pay, the industry, and many other factors play into what might be the right way to enter the workforce. However, at a university like SMU students do have a “leg up,” Pederson said.

With SMU offering year round internships and managing connections between employers and students of all grades, students like Mosso and Kelly hopefully will not run into any trouble if they decide to spend another summer as paid employees at their local restaurants and summer camps.