Seeking a placement

To start with, you should think about which country would be most suitable for you. Factors such as your knowledge of foreign languages, your interest in a specific foreign culture or country, or the countries that your company of choice has branches are likely to play a role, or existing contacts that you might know, or within your personal network, e.g. via family members, fellow students, friends, etc.

You can either search for an internship entirely off your own bat and apply directly to a company, or seek assistance from an organisation that arranges internships – that will depend on your budget, your confidence in your own abilities, for example, and needs thinking about in advance.

It’s worth enquiring with previous employers (e.g. where you’ve been an apprentice) and asking around the companies where relations or acquaintances work. Useful information and contacts can often be gleaned through talking to your classmates and friends – you never know what unexpected opportunities for a foreign internship might crop up this way.

Jobs board for Bavarian universities of applied sciences

In the age of electronic media, we have all but moved away from posting paper notices of vacancies. Instead, we have joined forces with many other universities of applied sciences in Bavaria to run a central virtual jobs board, overseen by Nuremberg Institute of Technology. Companies and organisations seeking staff and interns can post their vacancies in this forum, both for Germany and abroad – And as a student you can browse these offers whenever and wherever you like. Link to universities’ jobs board.

Placement officers

The placement officers for each of the degree programmes at Kempten University of Applied Sciences have contacts with companies in Germany and abroad, and in many cases other professors have links abroad through their teaching activities. It is often worth asking around.

Self-service portal (“SB-Portal”)

Academic Registry keeps a database of all companies where students have completed internships, which you can search specifically for contacts abroad via logging in to the SB-Portal. It can be worth applying ad hoc to companies  that have already had interns from Kempten University of Applied Sciences. 

Other current vacancies
 

The website “Bayern in der Welt” is run by the Association of Bavarian Industry in conjunction with the Bavarian government with the aim of helping students in Bavaria to find internships abroad and attracting international applicants to study or complete a work placement in Bavaria. You can also look for vacancies (in German) at Study & Work International. 

What about India? The Bavarian-Indian Centre advertises vacancies for internships on its website: https://www.bayind.de/en/. To find out exactly what internships are being offered by which companies in India, go directly to: Bavarian-Indian Centre – internship vacancies

You can either look for companies’ contact details or search for specific adverts amongst the many job and internship vacancies sites. Germany’s foreign trade chambers are also worth checking, as they have contacts all over the world and can also help arrange internships. The associations for specific professions (e.g. “VDI” for engineers) also keep lists of useful addresses and other sources of information.

You can also find a collection of links to sites advertising vacancies and further information here.

The German-Israeli Chamber of Industry and Commerce has launched a New Kibbutz Programme offering numerous internships in fledgling companies in Israel, a country known for its flourishing start-up scene! You can find details on the programme’s website.

The campaign is supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst – DAAD). You can apply for funding towards internships arranged via the German-Israeli CIC. Further information is available on the DAAD website .

The Erasmus Student Network (ESN) has joined forces with the European Commission to produce an online platform to help students wishing to complete an Erasmus+ internship link up with companies throughout Europe. Students create profiles with their personal and academic/vocational details to search for internships, and companies can advertise vacancies this way.

There are many organisations that arrange foreign internships. Some of them help to prepare interns and offer guidance before, during and after work placements. Some are non-profit-making and charge nominal fees simply to cover their costs, while others are commercial businesses seeking to generate profit that charge varying levels of fees. You can find various contact details under Related links, a comprehensive group of internship boards covering the whole world on the DAAD website, right at the bottom of the page on “General internship boards”.

Commercial mediators charge different levels of fees for their services, and a large number of organisations arrange work placements abroad. For these reasons, it isn’t possible for us to offer recommendations or evaluate quality. It is therefore important for you to research your options thoroughly in advance and compare what’s on offer.

Please consider the following points:

• The level of fees
• How much you will be paid during the internship
• Whether the arrangement fee covers any additional services, such as preparation (meetings, intercultural training), local representatives, and/or debriefing
• Whether first-hand reports are available from other interns placed by the organisation

You can find further quality criteria to check foreign internships and mediators for under the DAAD page links above and in the Quality check for foreign placements.