Every morning this summer, junior biological sciences major Magdalen Ruth made her way to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda—a dense hub of biomedical research. There, at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases, she helped investigate a genetic mutation in a patient with a rare form of juvenile arthritis known as Still’s disease, connecting her UMBC training to work that could improve patients’ lives. She is one of four CNMS students whose recent internships at Maryland-based companies and agencies show how local opportunities are helping Retrievers build skills, find mentors, and advance discoveries that matter here and beyond.

“I feel like I’m doing really important work,” Ruth, a Meyerhoff and U-RISE scholar, says. “Getting to know the patient’s diagnosis and being able to see that what I’m working on is affecting an actual person in real time has been awesome.” The internship has confirmed her interest in pursuing a career in pharmacology. It’s also stretched her communication skills. While familiar with presenting her work to colleagues in Deepak Koirala’s lab group at UMBC, communicating her research to a mix of researchers and clinicians—who don’t all share the same jargon and expertise—taught her the nuance of communicating with technical and non-technical audiences. 

The Meyerhoff community helped make the opportunity possible. “I would not be in the place I am without Meyerhoff,” she notes. On campus, Ruth balances research and leadership as vice president of the STEM Ph.D. Society, a student-run organization designed to help students connect with scholarships, internships, graduate schools, and more. She also takes dance classes, is pursuing a music minor, and volunteers at her family’s Catholic parish—nurturing connections that ground her amid rigorous academic work.

Protecting lives, growing a career

Mark Harrison, a senior biological sciences major who started in chemical engineering, is in his third summer at Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG), a U.S. Army installation in Aberdeen, Maryland. His work involves designing and testing gas masks, bridging his early engineering training and his understanding of physiology. “I’m able to bring an understanding of what a warfighter may be experiencing in their body while wearing a gas mask in a way that others at APG may not,” Harrison says. 

His mentors at APG, Jon Sampson ’03, mechanical engineering, and Edward Parshley ’06, chemical engineering, value the perspective Harrison brings and have supported his growth. “They made it clear that they want to reach back and offer opportunities to those coming behind them,” he says. They are making good on that commitment: Harrison will stay on board at APG this fall, and the plan is to transition him into a full-time position after he graduates in December. “They were always asking me what I wanted to learn and then giving me related opportunities,” Harrison says. “I could ask anyone how something worked, and they’d take the time to explain it to me. I’m so grateful for the way they’ve invested in me.” 

Interning in a fast-paced, interdisciplinary environment has also changed how Harrison operates in the classroom. “I learned how to learn at APG,” he says. “Now I don’t have to spend as much time studying, because when I leave class I already have a good understanding of the material. I’m connecting the dots so much better than before.” For Harrison, the work has taken on personal meaning, as well. “I’m fighting right now to try to protect American lives—that’s why I’m here.”

Translating discovery into treatment

Zainab Idowu, a senior biochemistry and molecular biology major and a Meyerhoff Scholar, interned at pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca in Gaithersburg, Maryland, joining a robust group of Retrievers who’ve grown their skills there. Her project involved testing flow cytometers, which count and characterize individual cells and are used in manufacturing cell therapy treatments. Her goal was to determine the instrument and protocols that would be simplest and most effective for manufacturing teams to implement. The experience shifted Idowu’s focus toward translational medicine and reinforced her plans for an M.D./Ph.D. after UMBC. But the people around her made the biggest impression.

“I love everyone on my team,” Idowu says. “My managers, Ashley Ruddy and Jen Fox, were really insightful—giving me advice on what I want to do post-grad and what I should do my senior year to make sure I’m well-positioned for after graduation.” And when she had questions, the collaborative atmosphere showed her how scientists work together. “They were able to give recommendations and point me to scientific literature to help me along,” she says.

Opportunities through Meyerhoff gave her the chance to connect with AstraZeneca staff, which helped her secure the internship. “I was able to talk to them about my passions for research,” she says. Roles with UMBC’s chapters of the Society of Women Engineers, the international professional medical fraternity Phi Delta Epsilon, the National Society of Black Engineers, and the African Students Association have also enriched her UMBC experience. These organizations, she says, offered “a place to be ourselves, find new friends, and really build a home here at UMBC.”

The benefit of seeing both sides

Saeed Damadi recently defended his Ph.D. thesis in applied mathematics after beginning in electrical engineering. This summer at the FDA, he developed a mathematical model for how illicit drugs taken during pregnancy transfer to the developing baby through the placenta—increasing important understanding in a situation where human testing would be profoundly unethical.

While the math was familiar, Damadi welcomed the new challenge of jumping into biology. “I learned so many things, and I am still learning,” he says. Yet he found that his interest in how to describe randomness mathematically, which led him to complete a master’s in statistics on the way to his Ph.D., was highly relevant to studying the quirks of the human body. Looking ahead, he wants to continue work at the interface of biology and mathematics. 

“Hopefully in the future I can make a contribution by bridging fields,” Damadi says, “because you can computationally simulate millions of parameters and patients at once, which makes the rate of iteration and discovery much faster.” The work Damadi and colleagues do with simulations can help effectively target limited resources for expensive and lengthy clinical studies, he explains. 

Damadi and his wife, Sepideh Hematian, M.S. ’23, data science, and a former data scientist at the Maryland Department of Human Services, are planning to build their lives in California. They are both thriving, but “sometimes I get emotional thinking about UMBC,” Damadi says, “because after I arrived nine years ago from Iran, it became like a home to me and my wife.”  

Damadi has given back through his teaching. As an engineer, “I just learned how to use the mathematical tools without understanding what was going on behind the scenes,” he says. Whereas, in math, “you learn the origins of all the theorems and how they work, but not necessarily how to apply them. I feel super lucky to get to see both sides.” So, in undergraduate calculus and linear algebra courses, “I just wanted to explain to my students, ‘Why do you need these equations? Why are they important?’ and give them a feeling of gratitude.”

Gratitude threads through all four of these journeys—for mentors who reach back, for teams that invest in their members, for communities that feel like home, and for the chance to do work that matters. As Magdalen Ruth at NIH puts it, “I’ve just found myself in a great spot with UMBC. I feel really blessed to have had all the opportunities I’ve had. Being able to do these internships has seriously been great.”

Deep in UMBC’s climate-controlled Special Collections are 750,000 prints, negatives, and transparencies from The Baltimore Sun dating from the 1930s through the 1980s. 

Before faculty and students can use the collection, archivists must create finding aids. These inventory documents describe a collection—its origins, number of pieces, types of materials, their quality, dates, number of archival boxes, box measurements, and more. It’s a road map guiding users through each piece of a collection.

Reese Finnigan, studying the history of the Soviet Union and learning Russian, developed these archival skills working on The Baltimore Sun collection during her first year in the Master of Arts in Public History program. This year, when looking for summer internship opportunities, Finnigan was excited to find that the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Shapell Family Collections, Conservation and Research Center in Bowie, Maryland—a museum she had tried to secure a curatorial or research internship with for years—was seeking an intern with her exact skill set.

“In retrospect, this is the first year that I’ve had the skills and resume needed for this level of archival work,” says Finnigan, grateful that Maryland is home to such a prestigious research center with the largest concentration of Holocaust-related records in the United States, and to learn from archival experts with decades of experience. “The opportunities UMBC has given me to learn Russian, historical research, and archival skills dovetailed very nicely with the center’s Archival Affairs Division internship, which required knowledge of Eastern European history and languages.”

Needle in the digital stack

The finding aids for the Eastern European collection that Finnigan is working on do not always directly correspond to what is in the archive. Some materials are in the wrong order or are missing finding aids. Other times, some things aren’t listed in the original file but are actually in it. Finnigan also has to translate the words on the document, which could be a translation of the original language, depending on where the document was recovered from. It could be Russian, a Slavic language, or any language using the Cyrillic alphabet, which is used for various languages across Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, and the Soviet Republics of Central Asia. 

She spends hours cross-checking inventories, documents, photos, descriptions, and creating new spreadsheets that reflect the latest information. She then hands it off to another archivist to double-check her work. It’s a cycle of verification and refinement to align the finding aids with the accurate collections. The maze of finding aids is the result of different archival processes carried out across borders, countries, and decades. “The researcher should be able to come in and find something quickly without ever having to think too much about it. The easier they can find things, the better,” says Finnigan. 

A note from the past

Some mysteries are beyond languages and locations, stumping even a team of experts and bringing them together to do serious detective work. That’s exactly what happened when Finnigan noticed a small symbol on some original photos in a Lithuanian KGB (national security and intelligence agency) collection placed by the original archives. She asked archivists Julie Schweitzer, her boss, and Alla Dvorkin, her direct supervisor, but they hadn’t seen it before either. The mystery quickly spread throughout the building, ensuing a string of emails with experts weighing in, hoping to reveal the meaning of what looked like a small bean. They found that the symbol was a mark used in some European archival systems to note the poor quality of the writing or the photography.

Finnigan showing the mysterious mark she came across in a set of photographs.

“People often imagine archival work as simply preserving historical materials. In reality, a surprising amount of the job involves acting as part historian, part detective, part translator, and occasionally part conspiracy theorist—until someone finds the answer,” Finnigan posted on LinkedIn. “It’s a reminder that expertise is often collective. No single person knew the answer. The solution emerged through conversations, institutional knowledge, and a network of colleagues willing to chase down an obscure question simply because it mattered.” 

To preserve and share

In the last few weeks of her internship, Finnigan received additional training from Adam Fielding, a processing archivist who works primarily with personal papers. Fielding, who has been at the center for 11 years, began by showing Finnigan the Rudolph Daniel Sichel papers, an example of what a finished collection can look like once the personal papers have been digitized and preserved in archival boxes.

(Top) Finnigan with Fielding, Dvorkin, and Schweitzer (center), reviewing Rudolph Daniel Sichel‘s military uniform and personal camera. (Bottom) The Sichel collection archival boxes and Sichel’s camera and camera case.

The Sichel papers, donated by Rudolph’s children, consist of seven boxes with documents dating from 1903 to 1978, many of which connect Sichel to Maryland. Sichel was a “Ritchie Boy,” one of thousands of Jewish refugees who immigrated to the U.S., enlisted in the army, and trained at the Military Intelligence Training Center at Camp Ritchie near Cascade, Maryland, a little over an hour north of UMBC. 

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The additonal training gave Finnigan the techniques to work with non-digital items that require special care, like the folder Fielding tasked her with, full of primarily prewar family photographs related to the Kugelman family from Bedzin, Poland, dating between 1930 – 1942.

While putting these skills to use was exciting, the greater reward was seeing the impact of the team’s work. Finnigan’s interest in archival work is not only about preserving history but also making archives accessible to the public, which are two of the center’s priorities.

“There is no point in preserving all of this history if the public can’t access it. We want to preserve the history and make it easily accessible, whether through exhibitions, digital archives, or physical collections. Good archival work should essentially be invisible,” says Finnigan. This includes special handling and storage methods, like cold storage (35°F to 50°F) and cool storage (55°F to 65°F) to dramatically slow chemical decay, stop pest activity, and extend the lifespan of sensitive artifact and media collections.

“The collections at the Shapell Center are evidence of atrocities, of war crimes, of survival,” says Finnigan. “If the items are damaged, they can’t be replaced, and then that piece of history is lost.”

Learn more about internship opportunities at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s archives.

“Support” is one of the most frequently used words when UMBC students reflect on their internship experiences on and off campus. From resources offered by the Career Center, to guidance from professors, and even sometimes from peers who wind up working side-by-side, UMBC students depend on university support and the many shapes it takes.  

This summer, hundreds of Retrievers built upon the foundational knowledge they learned in the classroom and applied it to hands-on, real-world learning through internships. From getting front seat roles in bridge engineering and analyzing cyber threats to using inspiration drawn from campus, these UMBC students had plenty to write about for their “What I Did with My Summer Vacation” essays. 

The science of sticking together 

Mustafa Akpinar, a senior information systems major; Alek Read, a senior environmental science major; and Ty Allen, a junior mechanical engineering major, honed technical expertise, built teamwork and communication skills, and forged connections with peers and professionals on the Baltimore/D.C. biotech scene working at AstraZeneca. 

Akpinar worked as a cyber threat intelligence and threat detection intern, a position that closely aligned with his career trajectory. “This internship is a perfect fit for both my academic path and long-term career goals,” Akpinar says, noting how the role builds on his data communications and networks and database design courses.

Read and Allen also used the summer to further their professional goals. Read contributed to sustainability efforts at AstraZeneca’s Frederick Manufacturing Center as an environmental health safety intern and Allen served as a site operations intern, applying his engineering skills to edit technical drawings in AutoCAD. 

Building bridges

As all of Baltimore and most of the country recalls, Maryland’s Francis Scott Key Bridge was struck by a cargo ship and collapsed in March of 2024. The impacts of this catastrophe are still felt throughout the region with travel complications, economic hardships, and more. Through a partnership between the Maryland Transportation Authority and the Maryland Higher Education Commission, three Retrievers and six other Maryland-based students had the chance to join the Key Bridge Rebuild Internship Program. 

Emily DiMarzio, a junior studying environmental science and geography, and Cristian Mena and William McConnell, both seniors studying mechanical engineering, all explored their individual areas of interest while actively helping to rebuild in their own community.

“It hurt when the bridge went down,” says McConnell, who grew up in Baltimore and now lives with his wife and three kids in Catonsville. “You could practically see it from our neighborhood, and now see that it is missing. So when the opportunity came along to apply for this internship, I jumped on it.” 

Bustling Baltimore

The UMBC Career and Internship Fair is a first foot in the door for many UMBC students seeking to make networking connections. This was precisely the case for Wonder Akpabio, a junior computer science major, who connected with a recruiter from T. Rowe Price who helped guide her through the interview process.

With a massive network of UMBC alumni, T. Rowe Price is already a well-known investment management firm with Retrievers, with the added bonus of being headquartered in Baltimore. Gabriel Farmer, another junior computer science major, was impressed with the outreach efforts the company did with UMBC, like sending recruiters to events and hosting online programming. 

“Anytime you ask a question, people are ready to help,” Farmer says. “It’s been a very good experience, and T. Rowe Price is definitely a place I could see myself continuing to work at.”

Connections across campus

UMBC is far from a sleepy campus in the summer, with hundreds of research, internship, and student-employment opportunities available. So, while others traveled far and wide to secure an internship in their area of interest, some Retrievers saw the home-field advantage right in front of them. 

Giovanna Orfali, a visual arts senior from São Paulo, Brazil, spent this summer behind the camera as a digital content intern at both the Maryland Center for History and Culture and UMBC’s event and conference services. Humanities Scholar Kendal Howell stepped off the plane after studying business management abroad in France this past spring and into the office as an intern at UMBC’s Division of Student Affairs for their new academic partnerships and high-impact experiences unit.

Second-year gerontology doctoral student Claire McDonald also had the opportunity to conduct new research, working with Rowena Winkler, the new assistant director for graduate student career development at the UMBC Career Center, who was seeking graduate students to conduct a 10-week qualitative research project. Caleb Ruck ’22, modern languages, linguistics, and intercultural communication, and M.A. ’24, intercultural communication, continued his work becoming the first year-long graduate assistant for the Center for Social Justice Dialogue.

A numbers game

With so many resources available to help students land their dream internship, it’s not surprising to see the statistics of success—85 percent of recent alumni engaged in applied learning like internships, research, service-learning, or leadership during their time at UMBC. Thanks to the work they’re putting into their futures as a student, 93 percent graduate with firm plans for employment or graduate school within six months of graduation.

“I’m continually inspired by the way our students engage in applied learning to launch their careers,” says Marykate Conroy, associate director of internships and employment. “UMBC students are entering the workforce prepared and in demand.”

UMBC’s Career Center offers a comprehensive suite of resources including SteppingBlocks to explore alumni career paths and outcomes, UMBC Careers Unleashed Podcast for stories and insights, the Internship and Research Success Practicum course to complement student work experiences, Handshake for employer connections, and the UMBC Career Connectors network of faculty and staff linking the classroom to careers.

The annual Career and Internship Fair will be held on Wednesday, September 17, from 11:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. in the Retriever Activity Center. “Get engaged, ask the big questions, push yourself to achieve your goals, and influence the world. The UMBC community will be right there with you along your journey,” recommends Tanzila Malik ’26, women’s studies, who spent two years interning with the Women’s, Gender, and Equity Center.

Read more about where internships took Retrievers this summer. 

Menstrual health can be a financial burden that many people quietly carry. On average, menstruating people spend $20 a month on period products, a total of around $18,000 in their lifetime. When I first started attending UMBC, on campus, like most places, I noticed that products aren’t freely accessible in bathrooms, leaving many students struggling to meet basic needs. But I would quickly learn, from my classes and my student work position, that at UMBC, you’re never “just a student,” but also a person who can create change.

That realization first took shape in the spring of 2023, during my freshman year. I was taking Dr. Kate Drabinski’s gender and women’s studies class on feminist activism, in which I worked with a group to advocate for free menstrual health products on campus. Looking for guidance, I reached out to the Women’s, Gender, and Equity Center (WGEC). But what started as a class project turned into a deeper connection with the WGEC, ultimately leading me to apply for a student intern position that would last for four semesters.

Pushing past imposter syndrome

​When I began working at the WGEC, my initial assumption was that my role would primarily involve routine administrative tasks, such as managing the front desk, greeting visitors, and answering phone calls. Instead, as I became more immersed in the role, I was given the space to take on responsibilities that extended beyond administrative duties and required deeper involvement, such as facilitating a discussion group for women of color. After taking on these important tasks, I began to feel a sense of imposter syndrome—I felt unqualified to meet the expectations. Still, I pushed myself to take on the responsibilities of the job.

For the two years I worked there, my supervisors, Lauren Allen, director, and Zoe Brown, program coordinator, consistently encouraged me to go out of my comfort zone and grow both personally and professionally. I picked up skills on public speaking from the various activities the WGEC is involved in—from presenting my research on intersectional feminism at URCAD, to hosting panels, workshops, and discussion circles.

Working at the WGEC also allowed me to put my passion for social justice to use. Such as planning and engaging in the Take Back the Night (TBTN) rally to support survivors of sexual violence and raise awareness on campus. Despite the difficulties of navigating imposter syndrome, UMBC gave me many opportunities to make real change as “just a student worker.”

The skills I developed through working at the WGEC gave me the confidence and abilities to pursue other avenues—another step in learning to elevate my student voice. In March of 2024, I was a participant in the Alternative Spring Break (ASB) trip through the Center for Democracy and Civic Life. Again, I had the opportunity to advocate for causes I was passionate about, in this case, specifically focusing on the incarceration system and improving life after incarceration. The lessons I learned during that five-day trip were invaluable.

I was so impassioned by this experience that I applied to become a leader for next year’s cohort of ASB participants. This time, the group focused on environmental justice and sustainability efforts in Baltimore City. We met with community leaders, organizations, city officials, and local communities directly impacted by the issues.

Discovering my self-reliance

Participating in these opportunities through the WGEC and the Center for Democracy and Civic Life instilled the belief that I could pursue significant endeavors. As a first-year student, I thought of UMBC as just another educational institution. Through participating in campus initiatives, I came to discover that UMBC is a community of change-makers, from our administration, to our faculty and staff, to the students. We’re always pushed to think outside the box and question everything we think we already know.

Taking on leadership roles while being supported by the WGEC has allowed me to transform self-doubt into self-reliance, something I didn’t pick up on until college. I drew confidence from trusting that my supervisors and peers recognized strengths in me that I hadn’t fully seen, which reinforced my belief in my own potential.

Although my project advocating for free menstrual products has yet to come to fruition, the work continues. Through other student groups, SGA committees, and proposals, I have hope that this vision will be realized. In the meantime, the WGEC has many free resources available.

My advice to fellow Retrievers is, get involved. It’s never too late to explore all the opportunities available at UMBC. Always remember that the connections you make and the lessons you learn here will stay with you long after your academic journey is over. Get engaged, ask the big questions, push yourself to achieve your goals, and influence the world. The UMBC community will be right there with you along your journey.

Learn more about UMBC’s Center for Democracy and Civic Life, and the Women’s, Gender, & Equity Center.

Tanzila Malik is a senior majoring in women’s studies and a 2025 UCM intern. 

In the early morning of March 26, 2024, the massive cargo ship Dali lost power as it left the Port of Baltimore. The ship collided with one of the supports holding up the Francis Scott Key Bridge over the Patapsco River and the bridge collapsed, killing six construction workers and severely disrupting the flow of people and goods around Baltimore. In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, officials began the process of planning for a new bridge, and now UMBC students are getting an up-close look at the massive project.

A year and half later, three Retrievers visited the bridge site, observing as workers demolished parts of the remaining structures in preparation for building a new bridge. Emily DiMarzio, a rising junior studying environmental science and geography, and Cristian Mena and William McConnell, both rising seniors studying mechanical engineering, were all selected to join The Key Bridge Rebuild Internship Program this summer. While their trip to the bridge this August was partly photo-op, it also represented their experiences throughout the summer, which included regular trips to the bridge and surrounding sites to learn about the ongoing work there.

The Key Bridge internship program launched this year as a partnership between the Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) and the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC). This summer nine students from four Maryland universities, including Retrievers DiMarzio, Mena, and McConnell, got hands-on experience in project management, environmental analysis, construction oversight, and community outreach.

“It hurt when the bridge went down,” says McConnell, who grew up in Baltimore and now lives with his wife and three kids in Catonsville. “You could practically see it from our neighborhood, and now see that it is missing. So when the opportunity came along to apply for this internship, I jumped on it.” 

Bridge building boot camp

At the start of the internship, the students were divided into teams based on their interests. McConnell and Mena were on the structural and geotechnical team, which worked to review, analyze, and visualize data that was collected earlier in the year while boring into the layers of sediment where the structural supports for the new bridge will go. DiMarzio was on the environmental compliance team that performed reviews of permitting documents and requirements and observed how the requirements are met during construction.

A large part of the process was coming up to speed fast on the bridge-building process.

“I’ve learned so much—I feel like a bridge expert after this summer,” laughs Mena. 

McConnell noted that all the interns on the structural and geotechnical team came from mechanical engineering backgrounds. “It was nice for us to be exposed to and learn a lot about the civil engineering field,” he says. 

The interns went on regular trips outside the office to see the bridge-building process in action. They visited the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, which was being redecked, and visited the Key Bridge site multiple times.

They also visited the Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center in McLean, Virginia, where they saw how researchers were testing a 3D model of the new bridge to better understand how the force of waves will affect the sand around the bridge’s supports. 

“I thought that was super cool,” says Mena. “That was one of my favorite project sites.”

“The UMBC students are great to work with,” says Jason Stolicny, the deputy director of project development at MDTA who served as their supervisor this summer. “They show a genuine interest in learning and gaining exposure to new things.” 

Community outreach

As part of the internship, DiMarzio, Mena, and McConnell also worked together to develop a hands-on workshop for students at Cherry Hill Middle School in Baltimore as part of the UMBC Summer Math Program through the George and Betsy Sherman Center. They prepared a presentation on different bridge types and the workers who come together to build and maintain them. They also worked with students to design and build model bridges. The workshop was part of a summer enrichment program that UMBC runs in partnership with Baltimore City Public Schools. The interns’ workshop fit into a curriculum about bridges that Malaysia McGinnis ’21, geography and environmental science, and M.A. ’24, secondary education and teaching, a teacher at Cherry Hill and Sherman Scholar, had designed for the summer program.

The interns agree it was rewarding to make connections with kids in the Baltimore community.

“There was one kid that stood out to me because during the whole presentation, he looked like he was asleep and so he kind of reminded me of myself,” says Mena. “So after the presentation I partnered up with him in the activity. He was super bright and answered all the questions I asked him. Hopefully, I inspired him to see his career choices and to continue learning and growing.”

MDTA plans to continue the Key Bridge internship program until the bridge has been rebuilt, which is currently anticipated to be in fall 2028. 

“It was an honor to be part of the first group of interns,” says McConnell. “I hope we helped set the stage for future interns to have really great experiences too.”

Mena contemplates what it will feel like to see the new bridge spanning the river: “That’s going to be quite a sight. I think it’ll be pretty meaningful because even though I contributed in a very small way, it’ll stand in our community as something bigger than ourselves and a symbol of what we can do when we put our minds together.”

Used to working in beautiful sunny weather, Giovanna Orfali, a visual arts senior from São Paulo, Brazil, spent this summer behind the camera as a digital content intern at the Maryland Center for History and Culture (MCHC). A seasoned filmmaker and photographer, this internship was an opportunity to expand her professional network and bring a fresh perspective to Maryland history by creating short-form social media content to share the center’s unique exhibits and events with audiences across the state.

Orfali is a recipient of the #YouAreWelcomeHere scholarship that offers tuition support for international students. She came to UMBC with experience as a television video editor and videographer and has used her skillset working on a wide range of projects. She produced and edited “Arthropod Biodiversity and Applications,” a full-length instructional video course for the Department of Biological Sciences, and works part-time as a photographer for UMBC athletics events. When Orfali is not at the MCHC, she produces digital media for UMBC’s event and conference services, her second summer internship site.

“When I began taking classes back home, no one was interested in editing audio, so I volunteered. I learned to say yes to all opportunities. At the TV station, I filmed interviews, exercise classes, and tourism commercials,” says Orfali. “I did the same when I came to UMBC. Being open to learning all aspects of audiovisual production has made me more confident and helped me make a lot of connections in and outside of the classroom.” Orfali’s short film “A Shared Story of Distance” was chosen to represent UMBC at the 2023 Maryland Film Festival Day: Student Shorts Showcase.

Hundreds of Retrievers like Orfali maximize their summer by putting their hard-earned skills to work in collaboration with campus and community partners. The 2025 arts, humanities, and social sciences summer interns are getting it done, one sunny day at a time.

Designing a career

No matter where a Retriever is in the world, they can search the online student job platform Handshake for thousands of summer internships, including on-campus opportunities. This was crucial for Humanities Scholar Kendal Howell, who stepped off the plane after studying business management abroad in France this past spring and into the office as an intern at UMBC’s Division of Student Affairs for their new academic partnerships and high-impact experiences (APHIE) unit. James DeVita, assistant vice president for APHIE, says his group needed materials and resources to help stakeholders understand the value of developing and engaging in high-impact experiences. So he turned to the experts in student experiences—the students themselves.

“We wanted to add to the number of on-campus internships. It was wonderful to have created a new professional experience for over 25 students, whose research will directly benefit their peers in a multitude of ways,” says DeVita. “By the end of the internship, the interns had collectively reviewed over 30 publications and drafted six resources in addition to completing the mapping research and related presentation.”

“The student-led research team studied high-impact practices for scholars programs, including UMBC’s, and synthesized academic research of these practices on student success in higher education,” says Howell, an Africana studies and sociology senior, with a minor in entrepreneurship. She focused on entrepreneurship, education abroad, work-based learning, and student leadership opportunities. “The information we gathered will help inform campus leaders in improving UMBC’s scholar programs. This was my first internship, and I loved it!”

Second-year gerontology doctoral student Claire McDonald also had the opportunity to conduct new research. Trained in quantitative research in psychology, McDonald gained qualitative methodology skills in her spring sociology class as part of her training to conduct research about aging in the LGBTQ+ community, a growing area of research. She is utilizing the mixed-methods LGBTQ+ Social Networks, Aging, and Policy Study, one of the few datasets on this topic, and hopes to add to her dissertation qualitative data from interviews with older LGBTQ+ adults in Baltimore for a mixed-methods project. Impressed with McDonald’s rigor, her professor recommended her to Rowena Winkler, the new assistant director for graduate student career development at the UMBC Career Center, who was seeking graduate students to conduct a 10-week qualitative research project. 

“I recruited over 100 students, conducted 11 individual interviews, and three focus groups to learn how and why graduate students use the Career Center and why they don’t,” says McDonald.  Winkler appreciated the partnership. They co-facilitated two of the focus groups together. “I watched Claire build rapport with the students. She was very open-ended and asked great prompts and follow-ups,” says Winkler. “I’m happy she had the opportunity to hone in on some of these skills that she learned in her class.”

From intern to staff

Professional growth and community building throughout the summer help students maintain ongoing growth at every stage of their learning process, leading to new jobs in other organizations, extending their internship to another semester, or a promotion from an intern to a staff member.

Like Howell, Handshake helped Orfali find both her summer internship at the MCHC as well as a spring internship in media production and audiovisual at the CATO Institute, a think tank in Washington, D.C. She impressed the MCHC team so much that they have extended her internship through the fall. “I learned a lot about working at a nonprofit that values the importance of history and culture, as well as collaborating with the external affairs team to create content for marketing purposes,” shared Orfali on LinkedIn. “This experience made me very interested in producing informative and educational videos and documentaries.”

As students advance in their academic careers, they can access paid, hands-on learning opportunities by serving as graduate assistants. Over the last eight years, Caleb Ruck, a language, literacy, and culture doctoral student and two-time alum, has climbed UMBC’s student worker ladder, including as a graphic designer and social media manager for UMBC’s Initiatives for Identity, Inclusion, and Belonging. He served as a special projects intern for the Center for Democracy and Civic Life and moved to the front of the classroom as a graduate teaching assistant for the modern languages, linguistics, and intercultural communication department. 

Ruck is now the first year-long graduate assistant for the Center for Social Justice Dialogue where he is helping develop and establish programming and procedures, such as co-facilitating a first-year seminar on the intricacies of dialogue around social identity, race, power, privilege, and oppression, and co-facilitating Building Bridges Across Difference: A Dialogue for Every Day for staff and faculty. 

This summer, Ruck focused on professional development by attending the National Intergroup Dialogue Institute, hosted by the University of Michigan’s program on intergroup relations, and preparing to welcome the first group of interns he helped interview.

“The skills I’ve acquired in this job make me feel more competent and prepared to co-facilitate dialogue, especially in student, staff, and faculty-facing contexts,” says Ruck ’22, modern languages, linguistics, and intercultural communication, and M.A. ’24, intercultural communication. “I want to be a faculty member, teach, and conduct research on social identity topics. Being able to navigate dialogue across differences is key.”

The UMBC Career Guide has templates and resources for students to help with internet and job search at every stage of their internship and job search. Listen to more tips on UMBC’s Careers Unleashed podcast.

In the heart of the BioHealth Capital Region—spanning Maryland, Virginia, and D.C.—more than 2,300 life science companies, 78 federal laboratories, and 35 million square feet of laboratory space create a vibrant hub for biotechnology and pharmaceutical innovation. For UMBC students interning at AstraZeneca, a global leader in healthcare, this summer offered a chance to bridge classroom learning with real-world challenges. Through their work, Mustafa Akpinar, Alek Read, and Ty Allen honed technical expertise, built teamwork and communication skills, and forged connections with peers and professionals on the Baltimore/D.C. biotech scene.

Building technical mastery

At AstraZeneca, UMBC interns are diving into hands-on projects that align with their academic training and career ambitions. Akpinar, a senior information systems major, works as a cyber threat intelligence and threat detection intern, analyzing potential cyber threats and sharpening detection systems using tools like Splunk. 

“This internship is a perfect fit for both my academic path and long-term career goals,” Akpinar says, noting how the role builds on his data communications and networks and database design courses. “Long term, I want to work in cloud security or threat detection,” he adds, “and this internship gives me practical exposure to both.” 

Alek Read, a senior environmental science major, contributes to sustainability efforts at AstraZeneca’s Frederick Manufacturing Center as an environmental health safety intern. His projects include measuring biochemical oxygen demand in wastewater and ensuring environmental compliance, directly tying into his passion for sustainable innovation. 

“This experience has helped me explore how large companies manage their environmental footprint,” Read explains. “It has been exciting to see how environmental practices are applied in real-world production settings.” He’s also learned about the environmental permitting process, he says.

Allen, a junior mechanical engineering major, is a site operations intern at AstraZeneca. He applies his engineering skills to edit technical drawings in AutoCAD. The role offers him a practical glimpse into the day-to-day life of an engineer, Allen says, allowing him to apply classroom knowledge in a professional setting. “It’s a great way to experience what being an engineer is like outside of school,” he shares.

Communicating for team success

Beyond technical skills, the interns are developing essential relational skills like collaboration and communication. Akpinar highlights the collaborative nature of his work, saying, “One major takeaway is how critical collaboration is in cyber defense—threat intelligence isn’t done in a vacuum.” His ability to share ideas with mentors and teammates has grown, and his suggestions are taken seriously and encouraged by his team, Akpinar says.

Read collaborates regularly with teammates across departments, giving him ample opportunities to practice clear communication. Plus, his teammates trust him to set task deadlines independently, boosting his project management skills. Similarly, Allen values the confidence his team has in him, explaining that as long as he checks in regularly, he can manage his work as he sees fit. Developing the ability to manage one’s workload independently and coordinate with colleagues across an organization are valuable skills that will serve these interns well in any future career.

A launchpad for future careers

The internship experience extends beyond individual tasks, offering opportunities to connect with fellow interns and industry professionals. Akpinar has enjoyed bonding with other UMBC interns across diverse roles at AstraZeneca. “It’s been great having that shared experience—we support each other and exchange insights from our different teams,” he says.

Read especially appreciated an AstraZeneca UMBC alumni and intern mixer, where he networked with former UMBC students now thriving at the company. These interactions not only broaden the interns’ perspectives on the kinds of careers available in the region, but also help them build lasting professional connections that could serve them in the future. Touring manufacturing facilities and participating in inspections was another highlight for Read. 

For Akpinar, Read, and Allen, interning at AstraZeneca is more than a summer job—it’s a stepping stone to their future careers. From protecting digital assets to advancing sustainability and engineering innovation, their work has the potential for real-world impact well beyond the BioHealth Capital Region. As they grow in their roles, these UMBC students are building skills, forging connections, and laying the foundation for success in the booming biotech industry.

When students think of working in technology, they may dream of moving to Silicon Valley and landing jobs at companies such as Google or Meta. But the traditional tech giants aren’t the only employers offering careers to computer science grads.

“When I first started applying for summer internships, I was like, ‘Let me apply to Google. Let me apply to Apple. Let me apply to Uber,’” says Wonder Akpabio, a rising junior in computer science. But she also took a look at companies outside the stereotypical tech world—and found an internship that felt just right in UMBC’s own backyard. This summer Akpabio worked as a global technology intern at the Baltimore-headquartered investment management firm T. Rowe Price.

Akpabio was one of four UMBC students who interned at the company this summer. She worked on testing and updating software the company uses to report the daily value of a type of investment instrument called an exchange-traded fund. Gabriel Farmer, another rising junior computer science major who interned at T. Rowe Price this summer, worked on a team supporting the internal email and text message communications software at the company.

“Once we leave, they’ll continue to use and build on what we did, so it’s definitely been fulfilling,” Farmer says. 

A company with Baltimore roots

T. Rowe Price was founded in 1937 in Baltimore and in the subsequent decades grew to include clients, staff, and locations throughout the U.S. and the world. In 2025, the company moved its global headquarters into newly built office space in Harbor Point in downtown Baltimore. They also operate a 72-acre suburban campus in Owings Mill, Maryland.

“T. Rowe Price has strong connections with UMBC and Maryland,” says Farmer. He appreciated the large network of Retriever alumni working there and the outreach the company did with the school, for example sending recruiters to HackUMBC. 

In the spring, T. Rowe Price hosted an online program, called “Launching Your Legacy,” designed to introduce undergraduate students to career paths within T. Rowe Price, and the asset management industry in general. Farmer applied for and attended the two evening sessions. “I was able to meet people who worked there, and it gave me a better idea of the company. Since I participated in the program, they offered a lot of help throughout the summer internship application process.”

Akpabio also made a personal connection to the company when she met a recruiter at the UMBC Career Fair who guided her through the interview process.  

Once arriving for their summer jobs, Akpabio and Farmer were each assigned two mentors within the company and given many opportunities to network with other interns and with more senior colleagues. 

“Anytime you ask a question, people are ready to help,” Farmer says. “It’s been a very good experience, and T. Rowe Price is definitely a place I could see myself continuing to work at.”

On left, Wonder Akpabio and Bintu Jalloh at the T. Rowe Price intern orientation. On right, a group of interns attends an Orioles baseball game together. (l-r): Bintu Jalloh, Roselyn Ojo, Sarah Floyd, Wonder Akpabio, Aracely Saenz, and Kate Martinez Palmero. (Photos courtesy of Akpabio)

Learning on the job

Both Farmer and Akpabio say they learned valuable lessons during the internship. 

“The main thing I took away was the value of allowing yourself to make mistakes,” says Akpabio. “At the beginning, I was afraid I might break something, so I quickly asked for guidance. Now, I try to rule out possible problems myself first. I find I retain information better when I let myself struggle a bit longer.”

Farmer says his most important take-away from the internship is the importance of networking. “Many people I met had experienced a point in their career where they felt lost. And it was the people they made the effort to build a connection with who helped them out of it.”

Farmer and Akpabio are still exploring career possibilities. Akpabio says she could see herself eventually transitioning to the business or trading side of a company like T. Rowe Price. 

“There is a lot of uncertainty in the tech world right now,” Farmer says. “Looking beyond the big tech firms and trying the T. Rowe Price internship was a great experience.”

This summer, UMBC students have hit the ground running in exploration of possible post-graduation opportunities with internship placements across a wide range of industries and career fields that include companies such as NASA, House of Ruth, Morgan Stanley, Art with a Heart, Doordash, and more. 

With the help of UMBC’s Career Center, hundreds of students have continued their educational pursuits beyond the classroom with summertime experiential learning opportunities that provide hands-on, real-world exposure to professional roles that are specific to students’ individual career interests. These students are joining a record number of Retrievers who have completed applied experience opportunities—internships, research fellowships, service learning, study abroad, student teaching, and leadership positions while at UMBC—before graduating, says Christine Routzahn, Career Center director. 

“Our students pursue applied learning in significant numbers, and these experiences have an impact on their career success following graduation,” says Routzahn.

Expanding existing skill sets 

Luna Siesko, a rising senior studying visual arts, didn’t journey too far from UMBC’s Catonsville campus to continue developing her skills in photography and the arts as the intern for the Baltimore County Arts Guild. She expanded her experience in social media content development, website posts, space management, and event planning for the local nonprofit.

“I’ve always had this dream of having my own studio space, and some sort of exhibit space for my work,” Siesko says. “And so this internship has been really applicable to that—making sure that the space is managed and accessible, and everything is running smoothly.”

Parag Shinde, a biotechnology master’s student, spent his summer interning at Vici Health Sciences, a pharmaceutical research and development firm in Elkridge, Maryland. After emailing his resume to dozens of local companies in the spring, Shinde landed an analytical chemist role at Vici, testing drug compounds for purity, shelf-life, and many other attributes before they can be formulated into medications or other medical treatments. 

“You can gain knowledge through books, but then you actually go to a company and start doing something, and you feel like you know nothing. My plan was to work here and get physical experience, as much as possible,” says Shinde. 

Left: Parag Shinde got the hands-on experience he wanted this summer at Vici Health Sciences. (Photo courtesy of Shinde) Right: Ortisemoyowa Ikomi (front left) with fellow interns and staff in a lab at AstraZeneca. (Photo courtesy of Mark Benesch)

Ortisemoyowa Ikomi, chemical engineering, also explored her career interests in pharmaceuticals with an internship at AstraZeneca. Ikomi, a rising senior, connected with an AstraZeneca representative at a recent UMBC Career Fair and learned about the opportunity to work on the company’s management of a new drug manufacturing plant in Rockville, Maryland. In Ikomi’s eventual internship, she investigated a software tool that could track construction progress.

“It’s not traditional chemical engineering, more within the realm of project management of large-scale engineering projects. I definitely enjoyed it,” Ikomi says. “I’ve learned so much during the internship. The experience has made me think I’d like to continue working in the engineering project management sphere.”

Career explorations in space

Leah Narat, business technology administration, landed a business intelligence internship at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center—an opportunity she never previously thought she could achieve, says Narat. 

During the internship, Narat, a senior, worked on computer systems that help keep NASA missions safe and its employees engaged. In one project, she created and updated databases to track awards given to NASA employees. The agency will use the information to maximize employees’ recognition and success and guide them toward career paths that best take advantage of their strengths.

“It’s been great to have this real world experience, where I can get my hands dirty and decide: Is this the type of work I want to do?” Narat says.

In Baltimore, Katherine Carver, physics and mathematics, secured a placement in the Space Astronomy Summer Program at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) at Johns Hopkins University. This is the second internship role Carver landed at Johns Hopkins since attending UMBC—as a first-year student in 2023 she secured a Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory CIRCUIT internship. 

During her STScI internship, Carver, a rising junior, has been digging into developing open-source software that allows astronomers anywhere to analyze data arriving from the James Webb Space Telescope, the most powerful space telescope ever launched.

Carver shares that while she was able to secure these highly competitive internships, it didn’t come without a lot of rejection.

“Shoot for the internships even if you feel like you won’t get them. Be persistent, ask around, talk to your professors. And then once you are there, take maximum advantage of every opportunity,” she says. 

International experiential learning

After several semesters volunteering at the Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter (BARCS), including an internship working with BARCS medical professionals, Liz Willman, biological sciences, took her skills and education in animal care overseas for a six-week summer internship with the Scottish National Wildlife Rescue Center. 

Willman, a senior enrolled in the pre-vet track, worked with wildlife animals for the first time—rehabilitating birds that were injured or abandoned by their parents when they were still too young to care for themselves, performing daily exams, and helping to build their strength to prepare them to return to the wild.

“It wasn’t only a new experience for me to be working with wildlife, but it was also wildlife that you don’t see in the U.S., like finches native to the United Kingdom,” she says. “It has just really reaffirmed that I’m not just trying to live out my childhood dream—I’m meant to do this.” 

Robert Barry, a rising senior majoring in ancient studies and visual arts, also looked internationally for a place to dig deep into his skill set. He traveled to Greece for the second summer to work at an archeological site with Michael F. Lane, associate professor of ancient studies and field director on the Kopaic Cultures, Economies, and Landscapes research program.

After joining Lane’s six-week summer archeological fieldwork team last year, Barry returned to Greece as a trench supervisor with more responsibilities. This opportunity allowed Barry to develop his leadership skills and get more experience collaborating with fellow researchers on an international level. 

“Last year, I was digging and following directions from my supervisor. Now, I’m giving the orders and having to be responsible for the health and safety of everyone else while getting the job done,” says Barry. 

Opening doors 

While many Retrievers have found success in securing internships that closely align with their majors, there’s a long list of UMBC students who have also found success with internships that may not have initially been on their radar. These nonlinear internships are helping students to “get to their longer-term goal,” says Marykate Conroy, associate director of internships and employment in UMBC’s Career Center. “Diverse experiences also may open doors for students that they didn’t even see as possible.”

These internship opportunities have proven to yield positive outcomes. The Career Center’s class of 2023 survey found that after graduation, 93 percent of the university’s new graduates go directly into the job market, continue their education by pursuing an advanced degree, or both. 

Preparation for these opportunities typically start with a search on Handshake, UMBC’s job and internship search platform, or a visit to the Career Center’s Internship and Career Fair. The center will host its Fall 2024 career fair on September 18, from 11:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. 

Read more about where internships took Retrievers this summer. 

UMBC students are known for the strength of their diversity: not just in their personal backgrounds, but in the breadth of their academic interests and professional goals. 

Accordingly, Retrievers’ summer 2022 internships spanned a vast array of subjects and disciplines, from history to mechanical engineering, and working in fields ranging from groundwater all the way up to outer space.

The four UMBC students profiled below vividly embody this wide spectrum, but they all have two things in common. Each completed their internship before starting their junior year, and each has the same advice to new students: Visit the Career Center sooner rather than later.

“It is never too early to start,” agreed Christine Routzahn, the Career Center’s director. “Internships offer students an opportunity to gain experience, build their career readiness skills, and develop professional connections that can help them succeed in competitive career paths and graduate programs.”

Up and Away

“I found the Career Center’s resources really helpful in crafting and perfecting my resume,” said Madelyn Pollack ’24, a history major with public history and Judaic studies minors in the Honors College and Humanities Scholars programs whose internship was at—of all places—NASA. 

“I had an interest in space,” Pollack explained, “But when I applied, I wasn’t expecting a call back—I wasn’t expecting to get to do this.”

It turned out that her internship’s responsibilities included a rich variety of opportunities to apply her passion for history: Pollack had a seat at the table in publishing meetings, she got to research and publish key moments of aerospace-related history on the space agency’s official social media outlets, and she was even able to create a research-based presentation on orbital debris and public opinion.

Pollack said that taking an internship early in her college career helped her further focus her academic interests and refine her idea of what kind of historian she wants to be. 

“As a history major, I didn’t have an idea of a specific focus I wanted to take” within the field, she said. But, “if you ask me now what my dream job is, I would say if a job opens up [at NASA] in the next three years or so, it would be really nice to be a historian over there.”

Pollack already has a start on that goal: Based on her success as a summer intern, NASA recently hired her as a continuing intern part-time starting this fall.

First Things First

Ian Nana ’24, mechanical engineering, said one of the biggest misconceptions his fellow students seem to have is that there’s no point in doing an internship until you know exactly what your academic and professional goals are.

“I definitely recommend to any new student: Even if you’re not sure exactly what you want to do, go to the Career Center your freshman year,” said Nana. “You might try one internship and be like, ‘Okay, I like this—I might do this.’ Or, ‘I don’t like this.’”

Even if it’s the latter, Nana said, just having that first experience on your resume makes you a much better candidate for the next internship or job opportunity.

“When I came [to UMBC] for my first semester, I went to the Career Center,” Nana said. And although he didn’t immediately see exactly what he was looking for, he reminded himself that an internship that strengthens general work skills can be just as valuable as field-specific experience, so he applied for a broad spectrum of internships.

“When I applied to other ones, even though they weren’t related to engineering, they showed teamwork. They showed collaboration—how I deal with people,” Nana said. “College is great, but what [employers also] want is experience, because that’s really what is going to make you valuable.”

Nana also encourages students to start looking for opportunities where he did: at UMBC’s Fall Career and Internship Fair. This year, the fair—held on Sept. 21—will host 140 organizations, many of whom are seeking a wide spectrum of summer 2023 interns, from first-year undergraduates to advanced graduate students.

Routzahn highly recommends that all students participate in upcoming Career Center events and activate and upload their resumes to Handshake,UMBC’s new job and internship platform. Top employers are posting incredible internships, part-time, and full-time jobs daily. 

Nana, who worked this summer as an engineering intern at Intralox—a global firm that specializes in designing and creating computer-controlled conveyor-belt systems—should know: Though he had to overcome steep technical challenges, including learning a whole new programming language, his success speaks for itself.

“My manager told me to definitely come back,” he said. “When you see your skills actually being applied and you do something and it works, that’s the best feeling.”

All in the Details

Alexander Bauserman ’24, history, echoed his fellow 2022 interns’ recommendation to visit the Career Center early, often, and with an open mind.

“I would say go as soon as you have the opportunity,” Bauserman said. Even if there’s not an obviously perfect alignment between a given internship opening and your major, he added, “The value of these internships is that sometimes they offer unexpected skills.”

Bauserman spoke from recent experience: He was able to tap into a longstanding personal interest, strengthen his core skills, and develop new ones in his virtual internship at the Maryland Pesticide Education Network, which gathers and disseminates information on the harmful effects of various pesticides and advocates for organic and other alternative agricultural land uses.

“I’m actually a history major, and even though this [internship was] environmental, I actually had an interest in environmental science in my high school years,” he said.

That passion served him well as he dove into the highly detail-intensive work of reformatting environmental science abstracts, checking links on the organization’s website, and learning how to leverage search engine optimization.

“They’ve all been new skills that I’ve gained, because I didn’t really work in any of these areas directly before, but they’re very useful, and I’ve been able to add them to my resume, so I’m very pleased with that,” Bauserman said.

Learning While Doing

Terra Miley ’25, chemical engineering, definitely didn’t waste any time looking for internships: She started as a first-year student. “I’d definitely heard from upperclassmen about how helpful the Career Center is,” she said. “Once you make your first appointment, you realize how helpful it is.”

Miley interned at Potomac Photonics, Inc., a digital and micro-manufacturing firm based at the UMBC Technology Center, “basically learning how to do everything.”

“I was doing a digital workspace for the company, so I was able to get exposed to a lot of different projects and machines and pretty much all of the work they do,” she said.

Miley added that the internship also boosted her confidence that her academic journey—she’s on a bio-technology/bio-engineering track—is the right one for her.

“A lot of the parts that [Potomac Photonics] made were for medical companies, which is kind of what I want to get into. And it made me realize: I am definitely interested in that.”

So interested, in fact, that she’s already made an appointment with the Career Center to get set up with an internship for next summer. “I wanted to try to get an actual research opportunity for next summer and they gave me a giant list of opportunities … that I can look at,” Miley said.

Such resources, Miley said, make the Career Center ”super helpful.”

Routzahn said student success stories such as Miley’s, Bauserman’s, Nana’s, and Pollack’s are happily the norm at UMBC. 

“Most employers use internships as a recruiting tool to find their future full-time employees,” she noted, adding that “55 percent of our recent graduates who were employed at graduation indicated that they accepted full-time offers with an organization that they interned or worked for while at UMBC.”