Summer Engagements
Columbia Engineering offers plenty of opportunities for students to stay engaged through the summer. Whether you're looking for internships, courses, professional development, design challenges, research projects, or more, you can always contact your Career Placement Officer for help finding the best option for you. We know student learning doesn't stop at the end of the semester, and we're looking forward to staying connected with all of you this summer.
Ways to Engage
Securing a summer internship is a great way to explore potential careers or industries, and to start gaining professional experience now. Although we recommend beginning your internship search as early as possible, the window to find summer placement can extend as late as July. Explore available opportunities on Columbia Engineering Career Connect, or you can always contact your Career Placement Officer for support in your search.
The Professional Development and Leadership (PDL) program empowers and educates Columbia engineers to maximize performance and achieve their full potential to become engineering leaders of today and tomorrow. The goal is to enhance the Columbia Engineering education by providing enrichment and development opportunities. We assist students with in a number of ways, including:
- Obtain skills to find and keep a role
- Learn how to grow and cultivate a career
- Recognize effective leadership
- Learn to become an effective team player and follower
- Cultivate ethical behavior and values
… and we strive to have fun while doing these things!
Summer PDL sessions are available to all members of the Columbia Engineering community including current (BS, MS, PhD) students, admitted incoming students, and recent graduates.
Columbia Engineering students seeking to enhance their summer experience have the option to engage with organizations through a variety of industry projects. These projects seek to tackle a wide range of business challenges allowing students to test and hone their technical skills in a real-world setting. Our Career Placement Officers secure projects from a diverse array of organizations and can help students find the experience that best match their unique professional goals.
There are many opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students to become involved in research with faculty at Columbia Engineering during the Summer. Students at Columbia have opportunities to conduct intensive research, work on projects that translate ideas into products, and investigate solutions to the biggest challenges in engineering alongside leading experts in their fields.
Today, Columbia Engineering continues to aspire to bring our engineering impact to the service of humanity. Our vision—Columbia Engineering for Humanity—sets a bold path for a sustainable, healthy, secure, connected, and creative humanity. It is exemplified by the pioneering work our faculty and students are doing across departments and disciplines, in partnership with sister schools, institutes, government, and industry.
As we aspire to have a positive impact on our world, Engineering for Humanity is our collective vision. This summer, we are excited to be offering opportunities to enable you to take action on this vision—to engage you in a current challenge and enable you to dive into a problem and explore creative approaches and potential solutions—by participating in a Columbia Design Challenge along with peers.
Each design challenge promises to be an intense and fun, fast learning experience where students will take a deep dive into various subjects. Join SEAS faculty and experts in the field to tackle important societal needs. Student teams will be supported by faculty and mentors along the way; there will also be prizes awarded to the top designs. Be inspired this summer, join a team, and confront a real problem!
The Dean’s Office invites students who are spending the summer doing research in labs on campus to participate in our Summer@SEAS program. Summer@SEAS is a summer enrichment program comprised of weekly seminars and presentations on a variety of topics including faculty research, scientific writing, presentation skills, occupational health and safety, as well as panels on graduate school and industry. Seminars take place during the work day and faculty encourage their students to participate in these programs.
The Global Engineering Track (GET) is an elective specialization, available to all incoming Master of Science students at Columbia Engineering.
Participation in the Global Engineering Track (GET) provides students the opportunity to obtain real-world experience during their studies and prepares them for post-graduation career opportunities.