How to Write an Internship Report
Writing an internship report can seem complicated at first, as it is a document that requires some specific details about the activities that you developed during the internship period.
We know how the last year of an undergraduate student is always very busy with several subjects to finish, preparation of final year project, internship and the report that needs to be delivered to the educational institution.
Although the internship report is not a research paper, the document needs to follow a basic structure with a well-defined theme, objectives and problems. Therefore, it is necessary to write down all the relevant information that you received during the period of your internship.
To help you understand how to make an internship report, we have prepared this article with several tips on formatting, structure and style. Let’s check it out below:
How to do an internship report?
The internship report is a simple document that aims to record everything the student has learned and developed in the internship experience, in addition to describing all the lessons you learned from that experience.
1. Talk about the importance of the internship
In the internship report, you need to talk about the importance of this experience in your academic life. Do this by expressing in general and objective all information. Therefore, the content needs to highlight how the experience has contributed to you to understand how the profession works.
Write two to three paragraphs about all the knowledge acquired, always making a counterpoint to the profession you have chosen. But write in your own words, without having to quote any author.
2. Inform when and where the internship took place
In a paragraph, you must inform when the internship took place and where you had this experience. Therefore, put the full name of the company and the period in which you did the entire internship.
3. Define a problem
Every academic work needs to have a problem to be solved. When you are going to do an internship, you need to have a problem that needs to be solved through research.
The internship report has the mission of showing the resolution of this problem to the reader. Therefore, choose a more specific issue that is easy to be solved and understood by the reader.
When writing the report, inform the problem, providing context. Be sure to include the consequences and always use a transitional phrase before starting to state the problem.
4. Write out the objectives of the internship
The first objective that must be written is the central objective of the work, the one that you dedicated yourself to during the internship period. Then you need to add all the specific objectives. But always do this using the infinitive verbs like describe, analyze, research, among others.
5. Introduce the company
In the company presentation, you need to write about the organization in which you did the internship, and what was the subject of your study. Take the opportunity to write about the company’s history, how the organization charts is made and talk about the challenges that the company faced.
6. Write a descriptive report
At the stage of the descriptive report, you need to develop all the specific objectives. To do this, use several arguments to reinforce each item, but use theoretical references to take as a basis.
7. Make the conclusion
In preparing the conclusion of the internship report, some questions need to be answered. So, answer questions like “what were the results obtained?” and “what did you learn from the internship?” to reinforce the importance of the experience that will be important for your professional growth.
8. Keep an updated journal
Set aside a diary to write down all the information about your internship. Update the information daily with the main activities developed and everything you learned from the experience. So, use a calendar to do this, or if you prefer, you can make a scanned document.
What should be the format and structure of the internship report?
Like all academic work, the internship report must follow some formatting and structure rules for it to be accepted by the institution where the student is studying.
Structure
The internship report must follow the basic structure below. Check out how it looks:
- Cover
- Cover sheet
- Approval sheet
- summary
- Introduction
- Organization description
- Developed activities
- Conclusion
- References
- Attachment
Other pre-textual elements can also be used within an internship report. Therefore, you can place a dedication page, list of graphics, acknowledgement page, list of abbreviations and acronyms, epigraph, list of images, list of tables, among other options.
The introduction field serves to contextualize the internship and objectives. In the area of the description of the organization, the objective is to tell the history, values, mission, numbers and essential facts of the company in which you did an internship.
In the topic description of activities, you will use your notepad. In the notepad, you need to have all the information about the tasks and lessons that you had during the internship that support the objectives set.
This journal information needs to be placed in the activity description. Do this in detail so that the reader understands that everything you have developed and learned was related to your course.
In the conclusion part, you need to make a summary showing all the results obtained and what were your final considerations of that particular stage for your career.
To support and emphasize some parts of the report, it is necessary to use some references. Therefore, whenever possible, use this feature to make your report more professional.
The attached field is used to add the organization’s declaration that must be signed by the person responsible for the internship, in addition to other documents that were relevant during your internship.
Write in the report everything relevant to you, but do it in a way that everyone can understand to show how much you have absorbed from your internship and fulfilled the proposed objectives. However, avoid going too far in the descriptions and leaving important information hidden.
Formatting
When preparing the internship report, you need to follow the format recommended by the institution where you study. In any case, most follow the standard format below.
Text
- Font Type: Arial or Times New Roman;
- Font size: 12;
- Spacing between lines: 1.5 (without extra spacing before and after);
- Text alignment: Justified;
- Indentation of the beginning of the Paragraph: 1.25 cm;
- Font size in special texts: 10 (long direct quotes, footnotes, references in the numerical system, nature of the work, titles of illustrations, sources of illustrations and content of illustrations such as graphs and tables).
Page margins
- Top margin: 3 cm
- Left margin: 3 cm
- Right margin: 2 cm
- Bottom margin: 2 cm
Page size
- A4 format
Style
The same norms and rules for academic research must be applied in the internship report. Therefore, do everything very clearly and objectively, always using the established rules of your institution. However, be sure to add your style to the content by exposing your own words.
In the internship report, you can use both the first person singular and the third person singular. Therefore, you do not need to use the impersonal way to write the report text or use the expression “the author” to refer to you.
Therefore, maintain a structure that everyone can understand, having a beginning, middle and end. Analyze each piece of information that you will put in the report so as not to stick to irrelevant details.
Conclusion
The internship report is a mandatory document for many undergraduate courses. So, follow our guidelines in this post to start doing yours the right way to get a good result in your course.
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