Cape Town based design education institution Friends of Design Academy of the Digital Arts, says it has noticed a new trend the local market when it comes to creative internships.<\/p>\n
Search through the job listings for creative careers in South Africa, and you\u2019ll start to notice a curious trend emerging. While middle- and heavy-weights are in relatively high demand, entry-level junior positions – as in, open to graduates with no on-the-job experience – appear to have become an endangered species.<\/p>\n
Instead, low- or no-pay \u201ccreative internships\u201d are proliferating at an astonishing rate \u2013 something that has industry veterans, educators and savvy graduates seriously questioning the ethics behind this trend.<\/p>\n
“There\u2019s absolutely nothing wrong with legitimate internship programmes,” said Kate Hilson, head of graphic design at Friends of Design Academy of the Digital Arts.<\/p>\n
“Having the opportunity to learn the inner workings of a studio or agency under the mentorship of a seasoned professional can be really valuable when you\u2019re just starting out. The problem is, some companies seem to be redefining what an internship is, and that new definition sounds an awful lot like an underpaid junior-level job.”<\/p>\n
According to Kerry Hugill, head of Web at Friends of Design, the requirements lists for these internships are often a dead giveaway that they\u2019re not the supportive learning experiences they\u2019re supposed to be.<\/p>\n
“We\u2019ve seen job specs for year-long \u2018internships\u2019 that involve a huge amount of responsibility, with virtually zero supervision and full accountability,” she said.<\/p>\n
“A lot of them would be a handful for a junior, let alone an intern, but instead of a junior\u2019s salary they pay anything from R2k to R5k a month. That\u2019s so far from fair compensation that it would laughable if it wasn\u2019t so shocking.”<\/p>\n
According to Hilson, an often used excuse for low wages is that recent graduates don\u2019t contribute meaningfully to the workforce straight out of college.<\/p>\n
“That might be a valid argument if we were talking about an internship where the graduate is doing odd-jobs and absorbing the agency experience for a couple of months,” said Hilson, “but that\u2019s not what\u2019s actually happening in the majority of cases. These supposed interns are being tossed straight into the deep end, are expected to produce professional-quality, income-generating work, and are then paid less than R100 a day for the privilege.”<\/p>\n
“If a person\u2019s work is good enough to use, it\u2019s good enough to pay for,” said Hugill. “Rebranding a junior role as an internship doesn\u2019t give you licence to pay a pittance for someone\u2019s skill. You may as well be asking these kids to work for exposure \u2013 that\u2019s not a growth opportunity, it\u2019s exploitation.”<\/p>\n
And using internships to weed out underperforming juniors, a year seems excessive in comparison to other industries\u2019 typical 3-month probation period, the institution said.<\/p>\n
“It\u2019s not as if employers are hiring graduates, blind,” said Hilson. “They vet portfolios, check references, and have face-to-face interviews. If, after that whole process, you still think it\u2019s going to take a year to bring a candidate up to speed, you might want to hire a different person or source your graduates from a better-quality college.”<\/p>\n