Colorado State University recently created a program with consulting firm Parker Dewey that will allow students to find micro-internships, which are “short-term, paid, professional” assignments, according to the company’s website. The program was launched to students in late March.

According to Parker Dewey’s CSU webpage, micro-internships are normally completed within 5-40 hours and are due after a week to a month. 

Matt Leland, employer relations manager for the CSU Career Center, spoke about how employers from all over the country can post micro-internships and project-based jobs on the platform. Employers post a description of the job, the amount of time it will take and how much the job will pay. 

According to Leland, more than 90% of job internships on Parker Dewey are remote. A variety of employers use the Parker Dewey platform to post micro-internships, including local businesses and Fortune 100 companies.

According to Brittany Koonce, an employer relations specialist with the Career Management Center in the College of Business, Parker Dewey vets the companies, makes sure payments are accounted for and educates students about the work.

These micro-internships give students an opportunity to gain experience through short-term work rather than a more traditional internship or job.

“It gives people a chance to develop some really cool experience in a short amount of time and really very specific, very marketable information to put on a resume,” Leland said.

Parker Dewey micro-internships also provide students with flexibility by giving students a chance to be paid for the work they do, work on many different projects and possibly allow them to balance work with school more easily.

“That’s a really cool thing about this,” Leland said. “It just provides opportunity maybe for some students who wouldn’t necessarily have it. And it’s just more flexible.”

Leland spoke about how students can do many micro-internships over a summer instead of only one traditional internship, which could be “a really marketable thing” because it shows experience doing actual paid projects for employers.

However, micro-internships also give students some of the benefits of a traditional internship.

“Like with an internship, it also gives students exposure to a workplace culture and, you know, just kind of the inner workings of an organization and (gives them) a clear idea of what it might be like to work there,” Leland said.

The program allows opportunities for all types of work. Leland spoke about how they’d like for there to be opportunities for science, technology, engineering and math students, as well as business, liberal arts, natural resources and agriculture students. According to Koonce, they hope the program is appealing to all students.

“We’re really encouraging employers that would appeal to students from all eight colleges,” Leland said.

Students can visit CSU’s Parker Dewey webpage to create an account and begin searching and applying for micro-internship opportunities. The program is available to alumni as well.

“We’re really hoping that this can help supplement students in their career search and their experience here at CSU,” Koonce said. “To not only be getting experience from full-time internships and seasonal internships but also this micro-internship concept of being able to balance that with their school load (or) maybe their other work that they might have, that’s just really getting them some valuable experience in some areas that they’re looking to pursue before they graduate.”