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INN332 Internship Abroad

Credits (ECTS):25

Course responsible:Stephen Sirris

Campus / Online:Taught campus Ås

Teaching language:Engelsk

Course frequency:Anually

Nominal workload:

750 hours.

400 hours in company/institution (12 weeks, 5 days per week), 150 hours host seminars and workshops, 200 hours work on logs and the reflection report (including required readings).

Teaching and exam period:The course is given in the Spring parallel.

About this course

International experience represents a unique and crucial learning context for students. An international internship in entrepreneurship and innovation offers you as a student a unique opportunity to gain cross-cultural work experience in a study-relevant company in another country. You can try out theories and methods in practice in a new cultural context and at the same time contribute with extra resources, research-based knowledge and outsider perspectives directly from your studies. This way, your internship will represent a mutually useful work relationship full of learning opportunities for both parties. This course takes cross-cultural action learning as its point of departure within the area of entrepreneurship and innovation. The aim is to gain relevant practical experience and apply academic knowledge in practice . Collaborations between universities and industry have given life to many new innovations over the years. Endeavours to find solutions to complex social, environmental and economic challenges have increasingly required collaboration between universities and industry, locally and cross-culturally. Thus industry and university incubation collaboration is a the core of this internship. For the time being the collaborating institutions are Stellenbosch University in South Africa and Rice University in USA.

Learning outcome

Knowledge:

  • You will develop knowledge about entrepreneurship and innovation work in order to gain a deeper understanding of the current challenges that actors face in practice in a new cultural context
  • You will learn to relate own practical experiences in the internship to theory and methods in the study program to gain deeper insight into the application of these to create new knowledge and understanding that challenges established thinking and doing.

Skills:

  • You will learn to collaborate to identify new opportunities, which can contribute to novel and creative ideas, change and growth in your internship company
  • You will develop skills to analyse, formulate, communicate and use solutions in the company as well as to make well-founded choices by reflecting upon theory and practice in a new cultural context
  • You will develop skills that enables you to describe, reflect upon and share practice-based experiences

General competence:

  • You will be trained in cross-cultural to a professional development within your subject area
  • You will be able to work independently, participate in the company as a team-member and contribute as a partner and with an outsider perspective to the innovation challenges that the company deals with
  • You will gain competence to absorb and reflect over practice-based cross-cultural learning

Highlights of expected outcomes:

  • Explore the progressive and collaborative approaches to cross-cultural partnerships around entrepreneurship
  • Develop sustainable industry linkages between both countries
  • Explore new fields of joint capacity development activities and cooperation, and how to transfer knowledge and skills across cultural contexts

  • The learning context is the start-up companies in and around the university, the university environment and the regional ecosystem.

    Students will participate in various network and course activities: Introductory seminars, courses in innovation and entrepreneurship at the university, attendance at seminars and workshops organized in collaboration with our partners at the university, as well as visits to local business actors and entrepreneurs. Initiatives are also expected to participate in local networking events during the practice period.

    Academic delivery - reflection report. You will write a reflection report of maximum 10 pages where you are supposed to link theory, methods and practice and reflect upon the internship as well as your practice-based learning in a different cultural context. The reflection report shall show ability to reflect based on learning in practice in close relationship with required and self-chosen literature. Further information about the report format and content will be provided at the course outset.

  • Students will be assigned a supervisor in the host community who will oversee all activities. The person in question will act as internship coordinator and have close supervision of the students' activities.
  • Reflection report written in English. Reflection report counts 100% of the grading. You will document your practice-based cross-cultural learning through reflection logs throughout the internship period. The final academic delivery is a reflection report, which is to be written individually. The reflection report is graded pass/fail.

    Reflection report Grading: Passed / Not Passed
  • Ekstern examiner controls the quality of the syllabus and the principles for the final assessment.

  • Mandatory activity:

    • Compulsory internship in the startup/firm. Full working days (40 h) in 12 weeks.
    • Compulsory participation in all the prescribed entrepreneurship activities in host country including Industry Immersion and visits, attendance in seminars, and other required assignments to be specified in host country.
    • Logs from reflection upon practice
    • Reflection report about own entrepreneurial learning and cross-cultural learning

  • This is an internship and exchange offer for master students. There will be a seperate application process in the autumn semester. You can find more information here: www.internabroad.no/

    There is a tuition fee for Internship Abroad. The student commits according to given deadlines. If the student withdraws from the internship agreement after the deadline has expired, tuition fee payment must be expected.