Internships Are More Important Than Ever. N.C. Universities Are Working To Keep Up

North Carolina universities are working to keep up with students’ rising demand for internships, amid a bleak job market and skepticism about the value of a liberal arts education.

Next to an academic major, the top qualities recruiters look for are overwhelmingly internship and industry experience, according to a 2026 report from the National Association of Colleges and Employers, or NACE. More than 80% of recruiters are seeking those resume lines, whereas factors like a school’s reputation, a student’s volunteer experience, or extracurricular activities are much lower on the list. GPA screening is also less important than it used to be, with about 42% of recruiters looking at grades now, versus 73% in 2019, the report found. 

North Carolina universities are noticing the same trend and trying to connect students with opportunities for practical experience. At UNC Asheville, between 50-60% of students complete internships each year, and the career center aims to reach 75% by 2030, director Lisa Mann said. The university pairs students with employers locally and across the state, using its network to find matches. 

“I think they’re getting the message loud and clear that to get hired, they need to be doing an internship,” Mann said. 

Some schools require internships for certain majors. At Elizabeth City State University, about a quarter of undergraduate majors require an internship, and the career center helps match students with employers. Amber Lennon, executive director of career and professional development at ECSU, said the university’s five-year strategic plan calls for 40% of its students to complete some type of internship by 2030.

At UNC Greensboro, programs like nursing and social work require fieldwork, but biology professor Randall Hayes said he wishes there was a similar requirement for the College of Arts and Sciences. 

“Those applied fields have, for a long time, had this very intense focus on, ‘Our graduates need to get jobs,’ and the old-school liberal arts people have not had that,” Hayes said. 

Hayes has taken matters into his own hands. He attends networking events in his personal time and keeps spreadsheets of nonprofit and small business employers to connect his students with. Hayes said less than 15% of biology students at UNCG go on to advanced degrees, and the remainder need support in their postgraduate plans.  

In Short Supply 

But there aren’t enough opportunities to go around. 

A 2025 report from Handshake, an online career network, found that securing an internship has become more competitive in recent years, with the average number of applications per internship posting on the site doubling between 2023 and 2025. Handshake is similar to platforms like LinkedIn or Indeed, but universities pay for student accounts and approve employers to advertise early-career roles.

In January 2025, 41% of students expecting to graduate that year had applied to at least one internship through Handshake, compared to 34% of students graduating in 2023. But over the same period, the number of internship postings available to students fell by 15%. 

Joshua Morelock is the human resources manager at System Logistics, a manufacturing company based in Western North Carolina. He said his team doesn’t post internship opportunities online because hundreds of people would apply. Instead, he attends career fairs and recruits at UNCA and Western Carolina University, and students email him directly to apply.

Still, Morelock received 60 applicants for this summer and hired 14 of them. The program started in 2021 with four interns and has grown each year since. System Logistics uses its internship program as a talent pipeline, often hiring more than half of each class to come back full-time.

“Internships mean that you have had some contact with the material, that you understand what it looks like to work in the environment, and you come with this mindset of, ‘I know what it looks like to be in the field,’” Morelock said. 

Networking, applying, and going through several rounds of interviews can take months in some industries. Wake Forest University junior Elle Yormak began the recruiting process in August 2025 for a summer 2027 investment banking internship. She started by reaching out to alumni at banks and applied for internships during the winter. Yormak advanced through interview stages and received an offer in March for next summer. She said Wake Forest’s alumni network was one reason she chose to attend the school.

Yormak met with counselors at the business school and followed their guidance throughout the recruiting process, she said, but it was overwhelming on top of schoolwork and extracurriculars.

Jake Fabrizio, a master’s student at UNC Charlotte, said one year he sent more than 400 applications. He completed four internships since arriving at UNC Charlotte for his bachelor’s degree, and will finish his master’s in December. 

“Yes, it will drain you if you let it drain you, but it’s also one of the most rewarding feelings when you know you have something,” Fabrizio said.

The Bottom Line 

Hayes said it’s difficult for some of his students at UNCG to plan far ahead and apply to summer internships in the fall semester, especially when they have other commitments, such as jobs outside of school. 

And securing summer housing, transportation, or pulling away from a part-time job are barriers to working an internship, especially those that are unpaid. NACE opposes unpaid internships and has called on Congress to require compensation.

At UNC Charlotte, the career center takes a “strong stance” against unpaid internships and does not promote them, said Amy Browns, associate director of employer and engagement and experiential learning. 

“I do see a fair amount of internships that come across that they’re very worthy internships for academic credit, but there’s no reason that they should be unpaid,” Browns said. “Particularly from for-profit companies is where it’s really concerning. But even nonprofits, we work with them to try to understand how important that compensation is.”

When employers can’t pay their interns, some schools find ways to instead. Duke University student Lauren Blake secured a summer internship at a nonprofit in D.C. and received funding from the school’s Stanback Fellowship Program, which she learned about through the career center. As a public policy major, she’s required to have an internship to graduate—“a valuable requirement,” she said. 

“Having this opportunity where it’s paid for and it’s solely for Duke students definitely makes it a lot easier to explore that without the pressure of having to get a high-paying internship to live somewhere else,” Blake said. She added that the career center helped her through the process.  

Similarly, the internship program at UNCA, launched in 2024, lets students sign up and work with the career center to make their application more competitive. The school sends their application to several of its partners and will offer a scholarship if the internship is unpaid.

“Students, especially students who are working to afford their degree, can’t afford to quit a job that is a for-sure paycheck to do an unpaid internship, or do an internship that may be paid, but it’s only paid for a certain period of time—that’s a risk,” Mann said. 

UNC System universities have a partnership with the State Employees’ Credit Union (SECU), which offers up to $120,000 per school for internship stipends through its Public Fellows Intern Program. Participating students can receive up to $6,000 while they pursue unpaid internships with local governments or nonprofits. 

But even paid internships can pose barriers. Browns said she knows two students who had to turn down opportunities that would have been paid through the SECU fellowship because they couldn’t find affordable housing in Charlotte for the summer.

Some universities also offer alternatives to internships that still provide work experience. Career centers at ECSU and UNCA use the hiring platform Parker Dewey to promote micro-internships, which are remote, paid projects that often last a few weeks. Schools also offer “gig internships,” or “project-based learning,” in which an outside organization offers a project for students to help with during the semester. 

Hayes said he’s been teaching at UNCG for 15 years, and he’s only seen the importance of practical work experience grow in that time.

“I thought it was valuable then, and I think it’s essential now,” he said.  

Correction: An earlier version of this story misspelled Elle Yormak’s last name.