Internship impressions

While not required by our core (mandatory) BCT curriculum, we are strongly encouraging all students to pursue one or two internships (or a co-op) with a field-related company at some point during their studies. Internships are typically scheduled for the entirety of a student’s final summer(s) at UMass (before Senior year) and co-ops (or study abroad semesters) are best scheduled during Junior year or even earlier. Such experiences are a great resume-builder and often lead to permanent jobs with the employing companies.

The following options can be pursued:

  • A summer “internship” job: You can simply work (typically for pay) at a relevant company. This does not provide you with credit (or a mention on your transcript), but gives you excellent work experience. As a result, there are no additional costs associated with this option. Make sure you mention this employment on your resume, though.
  • A credited internship: You can set up your (typically paid) summer (or winter) job as a formal internship if you follow the instructions in the next section. Going this route allows you to have the internship mentioned on your transcript (as BCT 398 or 498). You will also get pass/fail credit for the internship (from 1-14 credits with one credit per week of 40-hour work). Because this happens outside of the regular semester, you will, however, need to pay for the credits through our continuing education system (see below for current rates). Faculty sponsors will also set up academic requirements that you need to fulfill and the quality of the internship must be approved by them.
  • A co-op: This consists of a full-semester (plus summer, if desired) placement at a relevant company and can be extended up to a total of nine months. BCT’s curriculum requirements can typically be rearranged to accommodate such a semester co-op as long as you started as a freshman or transferred into BCT in your Sophomore year. You can find more information about co-ops on this Career Services page.

For all of these options it is best if you first pursued the job opportunity (e.g. at our BCT career fairs or by looking for them in Handshake) and then approached your advisor (who can also serve as faculty sponsor). However, feel free to contact your BCT advisor or the CNS Career & Professional Development Center to discuss all options and avenues to find job opportunities. We also have many resources listed on our Careers & Employers page.

Is your internship in/near Newton, MA? UMass provides housing and food as well as an academic and social program at our new Mount Ida campus. More information…

How to Set Up an Internship for Credit

To set this up, follow these steps:

If you are looking to add experiential learning to your portfolio, follow the below steps:

  1. Talk to your advisor and discuss how many internship credits you should register for. This can be less than the number of weeks that you actually work (if you just want to get this listed on your transcript) or it can be for your full internship (if you can use those credits e.g. to graduate early). Also discuss the deliverables that they expect you to
  2. Log in to your student account on SPIRE.
  3. Click on the Academics Tile.
  4. Under the Forms and Academic Requests tab, choose Experiential Learning Request. 
  5. Here, click the Create a New Request button. 
  6. Fill out all the information. Items marked with an asterisk are mandatory fields.
    • Select the respective department from the Instructor Department dropdown to then choose your desired instructor from the Instructor dropdown.
      • Department is “Environmental Conservation”.
      • Check with an instructor before entering. This will usually be your advisor, though.
    • The start and end dates are mandatory but a rough estimate is okay since they can be edited later.
    • Click the ? next to fields to view more information on them.
    • Enter your home address in the Student Living Address section, and the organization’s address in the Work Address section.
    • If you wish to attach any relevant documents, scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Attach Document button and choose a file from your device. 

If you have any questions or issues while submitting your experience, check this website and please reach out to  for help.

Summer undergraduate internship credits are currently $275/credit plus a $85 registration fee.

Got a Great Internship Picture?

When you are doing an internship, please take a picture of yourself at work or on a jobsite and send it to us. We would love to feature you (and your projects) in our social media feeds. You can submit those pictures here (UMass login is required):

https://bit.ly/send-bct-picture

CNS Internships Survey

The folks in CNS, our college, are maintaining an internships survey that shows you where others have pursued their internships and how they liked it. You can find the BCT results here.

BCT Internships Blog

We encourage BCT students to report on their internships/practicums/jobs with various BCT-related companies on our Internships Blog. This is done in the hope that it will be useful for all of our students to see what their fellow students are doing and what the “real construction world” looks like. The blog can be accessed by anyone with a UMass account via the following link (i.e. you may need to log in using your NetID):

websites.umass.edu/bct-interns