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Teaching in Engineering Education

Innovative Pedagogies

Internship and Industrial Placement

Please cite as follows: Chan, CKY (2015). "Internship and Industrial Placement", Engineering Education Enhancement and Research Asia (E3R Asia).

Examples of Engineering Internship and Industrial Placement

Students often have high hopes and dreams on the companies that offer them work experience, without understanding or realizing the company and job nature. Their expectation may often be mismatched and thus, be disappointed. The experience of internships and placements highly depends on the employers. Some employers may provide highly structured guidelines and job nature for each intern, allowing the interns to work in different departments to learn and experience the different job natures of the company. This ensures student expectations are matched. It will also help the company to promote a good image as a prospective employer and attract future employees.
In university, student projects are often well-defined with sufficient budget, practicality and do not involve too many stakeholders. However, this is not the case in industries, and even companies with highly structured guidelines as they may not always be able to provide the best working experience for students, as priority, practicality and budget cut may affect a project. 

The CLP Power Hong Kong Limited has provided great details regarding what they expect the engineering student specialized in their relevant fields to do. 

Job duty for civil engineering intern

For civil engineering intern, the job duty is to assist in construction management on new and rehabilitation work and carry out small scale study on particular topic related to power generation. They expect the intern to compile PowerPoint, and be able to apply the learning skills or knowledge regarding construction materials, soil mechanic, fluid dynamic and structural analysis.

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For mechanical engineering intern, the job duty is to support the administration of the Gas Projects Knowledge Management Portal, research under the direction of GPKMC Task Force on the latest gas technology, prepare technical write-up and extract relevant gas related materials available in the public domain for internal sharing, and to provide technical supports in LNG Terminal development. They expect the intern to have special skills in sound engineering basics and practices, technical writing skills (knowledge in portal design and taxonomy), and communication skills. They hope the intern will possess learning skills such as project management skills, implementation of knowledge management, and technical knowledge on natural gas application in power industry (LNG terminal/power plant design and construction, O&M, etc.).

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Job duty for electrical engineering intern

For electrical engineering intern, the job duty is to study the existing process and research on international best practices in carbon footprint monitoring for construction work, enrich and refine existing computer tools on carbon footprint calculation and associated cost monitoring for transmission cable installation projects. They expect the intern to have good engineering judgment, an analytical mind and skills in communication when interviewing stakeholders like CLP staff, contractors, and cable suppliers.

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Job duty for electronic engineering intern

For electronic engineering intern, the job duty is to continue the implementation of the Telecommunication Work Management System (TWMS) enhancement and to devise scenarios, test cases and carry out User Acceptance Test for the enhanced TWMS. They expect the intern to have computer skills, critical thinking skills and a logical mind.

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