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While working a remote internship the summer before her sophomore year, senior Taylor Ladwig felt a sense of unease about the process. She said the internship was “poorly organized,” and she didn’t feel a true connection to the company she was working for.

“I wish in that moment that I could have … known to steer away from that experience and look for something else, rather than commit to (an internship) and regret it down the line,” Ladwig said.

Ladwig and her friend, senior Annie Levin, are the co-owners of Good Intern, an online internship review service “for students by students.” Their website gives students a place to post reviews about previous internships they have had and also connects them with companies they may want to intern for. Ladwig and Levin are working on Good Intern for their Bandier Program capstone project.

As they were planning the business idea over the summer, Levin said she and Ladwig reflected on their time as freshmen and wanted to create a service that could have helped them. In Bandier, students are required to have three internships before graduation. Many of the services students use do not properly explain the details of the internships and what the students will be doing, Levin said.

“We wanted to give space for students to talk about the workload, and also three hard skills that they’re learning throughout the internship process,” Levin said.

After launching the website, Levin and Ladwig began posting on social media, inspired by different job posting videos they had seen on TikTok and Instagram. Levin said this is just a small step in their larger goal to mass market their services, hoping they can eventually partner with businesses to provide information about their internship opportunities.

“We have that student user base that’s being started to get built,” Levin said. “Now we’re starting to pitch out to broader campus communities and businesses.”

Levin said she has been “cold emailing” around 20 brands a week to be potential clients for Good Intern. While this has been a very nerve-wracking experience, it has been beneficial to their growth as business owners.

Lisa Steele, Bandier’s managing director, said the program has already started using the Good Intern software to compile a list of internships to help students with the application process.

“Good Intern has created a streamlined approach to this data collection that is invaluable,” Steele said. “We have implemented this into our formal data collection and so our current students know the pros and cons of each opportunity as relayed from previous interns.”

Ladwig and Levin have been together for every class of their program and feel as if they’ve “done all of college together.” Ladwig said their bond has helped them throughout the business process, as they can be transparent with each other about each step.

Throughout the process, Good Intern has partnered with the Newhouse School of Public Communications’ Career Development Center to help build a relationship with students. Levin said they’ve also connected with students in the Whitman School of Management to write reviews of real estate and finance internships.

They hope to continue to build their library of reviews for majors outside of the business and entertainment world too.

“There are so many opportunities out there for students to choose from and this data through Good Intern provides an even further educated guide to making those decisions,” Steele said.

As their business experience grows, Ladwig and Levin hope their team can expand as well. Ladwig said working with more people can provide Good Intern with opportunities for community outreach and further connections with students. Levin said the experimental phase of the business is very exciting and she is grateful to learn more about running a business every day.

“We are just shooting darts right now and seeing where everything is starting to stick,” Levin said. “It’s fun to get to experience and start to grow business and play around with new things to see where people resonate the most.”

Published on November 15, 2023 at 10:37 pm