Abstract:

Internships is integral part of professional programs in higher education. This is recognized as an essential component of professional education, since this is seen as valuable learning experience for students.

The paper reports about perceptions of undergraduate and specialist students as well as their mentors regarding the internship experience in different IT businesses. The purpose of this study was to investigate the difference between students’ and mentors’ perceptions regarding the internship they participated.

The study used two questionnaires to collect data, one for each group of participants. Both questionnaires included two sets of statements. First part includes six statements for assessing learning outcomes in accordance with Dublins' descriptors were included. Second part includes nine statements for assessing soft and communicational skills of students what were included. In addition, questionnaire for student included demographic questions regarding gender, status, and level of educational program.

The data were gathered during the period of June to September 2015. Finally, 31 valid questionnaires were gathered in sample of mentors, and 89 completed questionnaires were collected in sample of students. Descriptive statistics and independent samples t-test was applied to analyze the data.

The findings show significant difference between students' perceptions and mentors' perceptions in five variables. Specifically, mentors’ perception was statistically higher in four variables, namely students’ knowledge, their ability to analyze, ability to synthesis, and ergonomic work sensitivity. On the other hand, students perceived statistically higher their responsibility regarding the awarded assignments.

Keywords:

Internship, higher education, learning outcomes, taxonomy, skills.