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Student Internships And Employment Opportunities After Graduation: A Field Experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Stijn Baert
  • Brecht Neyt
  • Thomas Siedler
  • Ilse Toback
  • Dieter Verhaest

Abstract

Internships during tertiary education have become substantially more common over the past decades in many industrialised countries. This study examines the impact of a voluntary intra-curricular internship experience during university studies on the probability of being invited to a job interview. To estimate a causal relationship, we conducted a randomised field experiment in which we sent 1,248 fictitious, but realistic, resumes to real job openings. We find that applicants with internship experience have, on average, a 12.6% higher probability of being invited to a job interview.

Suggested Citation

  • Stijn Baert & Brecht Neyt & Thomas Siedler & Ilse Toback & Dieter Verhaest, 2019. "Student Internships And Employment Opportunities After Graduation: A Field Experiment," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 19/974, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.
    • Handle: RePEc:rug:rugwps:19/974
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    20. Drydakis, Nick, 2016. "The effect of university attended on graduates’ labour market prospects: A field study of Great Britain," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 192-208.
    21. Stijn Baert & Sunčica Vujić, 2018. "Does it pay to care? Volunteering and employment opportunities," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 31(3), pages 819-836, July.
    22. Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "Are Emily and Greg More Employable Than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 991-1013, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Isaac Kofi Mensah & Muhammad Khalil Khan & Deborah Simon Mwakapesa, 2023. "Factors determining the entrepreneurial intentions among Chinese university students: the moderating impact of student internship motivation," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 10(1), pages 1-15, December.
    2. Thomas Bolli & Katherine Caves & Maria Esther Oswald-Egg, 2021. "Valuable Experience: How University Internships Affect Graduates’ Income," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 62(8), pages 1198-1247, December.
    3. Neyt, Brecht & Verhaest, Dieter & Baert, Stijn, 2019. "The Impact of Internship Experience During Secondary Education on Schooling and Labour Market Outcomes," GLO Discussion Paper Series 425, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    4. Di Meglio, Gisela & Barge-Gil, Andrés & Camiña, Ester & Moreno, Lourdes, 2019. "Knocking on Employment´s Door: Internships and Job Attainment," MPRA Paper 95712, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Internship; hiring; human capital; signalling; field experiment.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • J23 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Demand
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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