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I think you are placing too much emphasis on internships. The purpose of college is not to work but to learn.
I don't agree with this. The purpose of the internship is to provide a learning experience for a student in their selective field that also provides some kind of training and professional experience. In this era of economic hard times, the students who have degrees + several internships fare better than the ones who do not.
Imagine when a new graduate is job-hunting. the prospective employer has hundreds of applicants. how will a student stand out among the hundreds. Employers want someone with some kind of experience that can contribute to their company/organization, not just someone who can cashier, stock, and sweep.
However, I do believe that thinking creatively helps. There are opportunities within a university itself (mentioned above), town/city municpals that have offices with services, companies, libraries, stores, and small businesses. There are internships with large companies and international organizations. Some of them even offer stipends or scholarships to off-set the costs of the intern. Sometimes students can get accepted into an internship program by writing an essay. There is a federal govt program called the STEP (Student Employemnet Program or something like that), where a student is placed in a federal office and is a paid intern. And a student can always create their own internship -- find a business or organization where they want to intern at, approach the appropriate personnel, and see if they can 'create' and internship position.
The other thing a student should keep in mind is that internships can provide valuable professional experience. However, having other skills sets (technology, other training, being a team player, organizational skills, etc.) are also desireable.
Your nephews college experience should not and will not mirror your own. There are other ways to do things. And not all college students participate in internships. Or need to. All those people who go to small town schools do just fine and he will too, because it's where he wants to be.
I went to the small town liberal arts college in the middle of nowhere, and a huge percentage of the student body ended up on internship programs in New York City, DC, Philadelphia, Chicago, etc. for part of junior year or during a summer surrounding it.
Yep.
You can still do internships in population centers, even if your school isn't in one. My sister went to a small town liberal arts college in Iowa, and she did her internships in Chicago. I attend one in small-town Minnesota, and the bulk of our internships were in Minneapolis and Chicago (the only "internship" I did was student teaching, and it didn't require a population center, all it required was living somewhere that had schools). It's not really a necessity that internships take place in your college town. Most don't.
Getting a job in college has more to do with the size of the student body in relation to the town population.
For example.....50,000 students in a smaller city like Gainesville, FL really overwhelms the job market and many UF students have difficulty getting any form of part time employment.
However.....a small 2,000 or so student liberal arts college in a small town probably won't overwhelm the job market as much.
This was a pretty big factor in my college decision, actually. I decided to go to school in a city because it would be much easier in terms of recruiting, networking with employers, and having more internship experience. Instead of just doing 1 internship over a summer, I was able to do 4 by interning part time during the school year.
Would choose best college to which one gains admission; choose a job skills-relevant major like computer science or finance; and a college near major employment centers where profs seem to consult and interact with major local employers (ideally where many alums are top execs who control hiring)...and will suggest smartest students for jobs, internships, etc
Similar logic to a software engineer choosing to live in SiliconValley; or a bond or stock trader in Manhattan or an oil&gas engineer or exec in Houston....may change employers several times during career and may eventually start own company...but have tremendous local networking opportunities and advantages when one lives in a global epicenter for one's industry, as opposed to some backwater...even in the era of Net/Blackberry, even in the tech industry
I went to school in a city and loved it, but agree with the others that I would not be afraid to attend a school in a small town due to fear of lost opportunties. The prime internship experiences typically happen in the summer, and, like others have said, there's no need to do those anywhere near the school. Most probably don't.
As far as networking goes, a good liberal arts school in a small town still typically has great connections in the broader world; alumni are everywhere, for example.
There are pros and cons to every college situation, but schools in a small town setting can offer enough other benefits (easier to feel part of an academic community, perhaps) to offset limited internship opportunities. I wouldn't make that a factor in the final decision.
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