For Lower-Income Students, Big Tech Internships Can Be Hard to Get

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/05/business/tech-internship-application-grind.html

by lapcat • 3 years ago

7 8 3 years ago

The article tries to make everything about race and class, but fails. It features photos of a black man and white woman who failed to get jobs in tech. But it fails to show that white men did any better.

The only student referenced who did get a tech job has a Vietnamese name. And he goes to a school they refer to as higher-ranked. And he applied to far more companies than the other students.

Are we to conclude that this is evidence of racial and class privilege? Vietnamese Americans are not known for their generational wealth or family connections. And the article doesn't indicate that the successful student had any of either.

Only in the last sentence does the article admit that the black student still had an internship offer from the financial services firm that he interned at last summer. That sounds like a pretty good fallback option, and not indicative of a prejudiced hiring system.

lapcat3• 3 years ago

The article tries to make everything about race and class, but fails.

No, that was you. The article doesn't mention race except in these context:

"To try to broaden opportunities, Oracle, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Amazon and other large tech companies have over the years set up a variety of introductory internship or mentorship programs for first- and second-year college students. These programs are intended to provide students from groups that are underrepresented in tech — including female, Black, Latino and lower-income students — with hands-on experience working on engineering projects."

"In a recent interview, Vaishali Sabhahit, global head of university talent at Adobe, said the company typically received applications from more than 100,000 candidates for its summer internship program in the United States and hired about 600 interns. This year, the company started a separate internship program in cybersecurity with Bowie State University, a historically Black university in Maryland."

It features photos of a black man and white woman who failed to get jobs in tech.

Not jobs, internships. And how does the photo of a white woman show it's about race?

But it fails to show that white men did any better.

Again, the article wasn't about race. The title was literally about "Lower-Income Students".

Your comment goes on and on about race in a way that the article does not.

crackercrews4• 3 years ago

You've missed several references. Here's one, from the beginning of the article.

“College itself is a huge workload, especially for minorities and people of lower socioeconomic status,” Mr. Ross said.

Also, if you think that putting "lower income" in the title and having a header photo of a black student isn't making this about race, I don't know what to say. There are also mentions of race and minorities throughout.

eficek• 3 years ago

Internships are jobs, and they pay like it

Your comment is very observant though. I think someone may have seen the phrase "lower-income" and a big image of a black man, then thought his culture was getting erased... lol

For Lower-Income Students, Big Tech Internships Can Be Hard to Get

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