Events

CDU Professional Practice students impress with internship presentations

An internship is a quintessential component of a higher education degree that helps students gain a real-world insight into their chosen professions. For some fortunate students, an internship can be the stepping stone to their first professional job.

Charles Darwin University (CDU) Melbourne students studying the core Professional Practice unit presented their personal internship experiences to a panel of ATMC judges over two days this week. The judging panel included Director of Welfare, Academic Services & Careers Assistance (WACA) Ashwin Koneru, Academic Language and Learning Lecturer Tania Honey and CDU Melbourne Manager Megan Nevett. Supervisors from each student’s internship placement were also invited to attend the presentations.

The students, who were either completing a Master of Business Administration or Master of Professional Accounting, had recently completed a professional internship with an established company in their respective fields as part of the unit.

Students’ internship placements were very diverse. Some students interned with not-for-profit companies such as JERA International and Save the Children, whereas others worked in varied positions at businesses such as Pizza Hut, Novatel Telecommunications and St Vincent’s hospital.

The judges had the hard task of selecting the two best presenters from each day, along with first and second runner-ups. Students were marked not only on their public speaking skills but also on the in-depth content they included, how they analysed that information and what methods they used to present their experience.

Students were expected to include an overview of the company, the tasks they completed, what skills they acquired in the internship, as well as highlights from the experience and their personal reflection.

Some of the top students impressed the panel by using interesting and interactive multi-media such as photos, videos and testimonials. For other students it was their personal confidence and explanation of how they had grown throughout the experience that caught the judge’s eyes.

CDU Melbourne Lecturer Chandana Unnithan who teaches the Professional Practice unit said she was impressed with the level of professionalism some students implemented for their presentations.

“The first thing that I picked up on was the students who have professionally grown as a person, they have learned to go through the hurdles and they have had negative and positive experiences and have learned from both and gone forward in their approach. This shows in their presentation too, naturally it comes out,” Chandana said.

“We’ve had some people who are really good. Some people have been working already and have a lot of experience working in the industry in their home countries as well.”

After two long days of countless presentations with very varied experiences and placements, the judges decided on which students were the best of the best. The top presentation for the first day was awarded to Preethi Bath who completed her internship at The Care Institute and the best presentation for the second day was given to Shraddha Rana who interned at Save the Children.

However, the winners were not the only students who were celebrating. At the end of the Professional Practice unit, nine students were still working at the companies where they interned. Some students had sourced their own jobs, while three hard-working students, Shipra Madan, Krinthika Shreshtha and Ranajit Sinha, were offered full-time professional positions after completing their placements.

 

Full list of Presentation winners:

Day 1 Presentations:

BEST – Preeti Bath

1st runner up – Shikha Shetty

2nd runner up – Sharminder Kaur

 

Day 2 Presentations:

BEST – Shraddha Rana

1st runner up – Khalid Khan Marwat

2nd runner up – Abhinav Shukla