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Developing and Managing Internship Programs in a Higher Education Institution: the Case of Juraj Dobrila University of Pula

Internship enables students dig deeper into the real business world and enriches their studying experience. Internship programs are valuable to both students and organizations. At one side students get valuable skills and competences that build their employability, apply theoretical knowledge in practice and learn more about their profession. Business organizations have the possibility to reach the pool of human resources – possible future employees. In many scientific institutions in Croatia, such as universities and faculties, internship has not been integrated within the undergraduate and/or graduate study programs as a regular course required for graduation. This activity is more practiced in colleges and private higher educational institutions that offer professional study programs. However, things started to change recently pushed by the real sector that lacks human resources (particularly in tourism) and external environment (i.e. EU funds that focus on human resources and upgrade of skills and competences). The purpose of this research is to analyse experiences of graduates of interdisciplinary study program Culture and Tourism concerning their internship practice and to get feedback from the real sector on the organized internship programs. In order to obtain results authors have conducted a survey using a questionnaire on the sample of 78 graduates (alumni students) and 89 industry representatives. The questionnaire was distributed by e-mail. Results have shown that students value internship program and consider it useful but suggest more internship hours and stronger cooperation between university and the industry. On the other side, industry representatives believe internship programs help students in developing their relationship and responsibility towards future jobs. However, they strongly support the views that cooperation between industry and academia is of extreme importance and are willing to cooperate on various levels and ways. At the end of the paper authors list suggestions for future development and management of internship program in a higher education institution

internship programs, coordination, management, cooperation, industry, academia

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