While COVID-19 has thrown a wrench into a decade-old internship program sending mostly Southern students to Germany, the pandemic is also helping organizers innovate to achieve their longer-term vision.
The German-American Exchange program since 2009 has helped more than 220 college students learning German language and other disciplines arrange three-month summer stints working in Germany for companies like Bosch, Porsche, UPS and others.
Amid the travel restrictions, visa issues and health uncertainties of 2020, the May-to-August program was postponed for the first time, along with a transatlantic investment conference held in Washington, Munich and Atlanta that engages candidates and generates corporate sponsorships.
The goal has always been to give university students hands-on international experience while earning academic credit, offering a leg up in a competitive job market while pointing to the practical benefits of their newly acquired German language skills, said Sebastian Meis, a Baker Donelson attorney involved in the program since its inception.
“We had lots of interns from Europe, but we understood right then already that it’s significantly more difficult for Americans to go study in Europe for various reasons,” Mr. Meis said, citing the semester structure, funding challenges and the fact that many American students had never traveled abroad before.
Mr. Meis worked with Christoph Rückel, fellow attorney and German-American Exchange board member, to start the program while they worked in the Atlanta offices of Germany’s BridgehouseLaw. Both have moved on, Mr. Meis and a few colleagues to Baker Donelson and Dr. Rückel to his own firm: Rückel and Collegen.
Since the program started, German companies — from multinational automakers to century-old firms from Germany’s so-called “Mittelstand” — have benefited from a steady stream of ambitious young workers. Schools like Emory University and University of North Carolina, along with a growing array of newer entrants like Auburn, Syracuse and Virginia Tech have join up to offer German students a venue for cross-cultural experience.
But there has always been another motive: Growing the talent pipeline for German firms operating in the South. While the region serves as a key node in German automotive manufacturing in the U.S., many of the hundreds of German investors here still find it difficult to source technically and linguistically capable recruits locally.
This year, by necessity, meeting that need will take on a more literal dimension. Unable to travel to Germany, interns will be placed for the first time at German subsidiaries in the South. So far, six have signed up, with a few more slots left to be filled.
Mr. Meis says the program show students “that they don’t have to move to the Northeast or to California to have an exciting career with an international company.”
He also believes placing interns with German firms locally will pave the way for another anticipated extension of the program derailed by the pandemic — bringing German students, first from the University of Bonn, to the South.
Program organizers hope to begin engaging program alumni this year, many of whom work in Georgia or the metro Atlanta area. They goal is to have them share how their participation in the German-American Exchange shaped their career paths.
Indeed, the internship experience has adapted over time with input from previous participants, educators, companies and supporting organizations like the German-American Chamber of the Southern U.S. Inc., the Alabama-Germany Partnership and the Joachim Herz Foundation, a Hamburg-based group that funds exchange programs with Atlanta.
Early on, it became clear that students needed more cultural and logistical preparation, especially when after one intern asked to come home after one month. Turns out, he didn’t know that German stores close much earlier in the day and ended spending most of his food budget at a local gas station.
German partner companies have also grown more selective of interns, Mr. Meis said.
“Back 10 years ago, it was enough just to have an American student. Now, they say ‘We want to have someone with an engineering background, in mechanical engineering or construction or IT or whatever it is.”
For the American students, working for smaller firms has at times proven more rewarding. While interns cover their transportation and the German hosts pay a small stipend for the full-time work to comply with German law, some go above and beyond.
“(Interns) thought the bigger the company, the better the internship, and it has turned out that that is really in most cases not true,” Mr. Meis said. “At family-owned companies that have been around for 100 years or something, they are one of maybe one or two interns. They get the VIP treatment — sometimes housing or even a car.”
For now, the program has decided against virtual exchanges, which Mr. Meis said work in theory but may not be feasible for an experience that is three months long and is built around hands-on interaction. He does hope to work with universities, funders and other partners to accommodate those students who want to spend a longer period in Germany, as some companies have asked for six-month placements.
The program also wants to find new avenues for scholarships and assistance for those without the means to afford the exchange. One option could endure from this year’s adaptation: sending them to work for German companies in the region rather than all the way across the Atlantic.
“I think it’s still of value,” Mr. Meis said, despite the fact that most will want to return to the travel experience. “We want to be accommodating to both students who might have certain restrictions and also the companies that we have here.”
Learn more about the program’s eligibility requirements, costs and how to apply here.
More information on the 2021 program is below:
4830-4680-6493 v.1 GAE - Company Information Package 2021
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