Entrepreneurial Internship Program

For Employers

The Entrepreneurial Internship Program is an opportunity for early stage startups, small businesses and nonprofits to engage Tufts student talent through our summer internship grant program. 

You will have the opportunity to work with passionate and talented student interns while helping them learn about entrepreneurship in the field. Derby Entrepreneurship Center will be supporting students with a limited number of $4,500 internship grants for a 10-week internship.

Step 1: Check eligibility for the $4,500 program

Following are the employer eligibility requirements for the summer internship grant program.

  • The company must be less than 10 years old.
  • The company must not have raised more than $5 Million cumulatively since inception.
  • The company must have between 1-30 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) employees.
  • The company must commit to providing 1×1 mentorship to the student on a weekly basis.
  • The company agrees that the internship will serve as a learning opportunity for the student. Please consult the “Paid and Unpaid Internships” section of Tufts’ Employer Policies page to ensure you are in compliance with the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).

Step 2: Post a student job

  • Create a job listing, preferably on Tufts’s Handshake platform, which gets the best circulation with Tufts students and is the official job listing platform supported by the Tufts Career Office.
  • Follow these instructions to post a job on Handshake. Handshake is Tufts’ job listing platform for students. Handshake partners with SIFT and Persona on their employer validation process which may take a few days to complete.
  • Contact Sue Atkins, Associate Director of Employer Relations at Tufts to expedite the process. (You can also use a link to a job listing on a platform of your choice, but Handshake has far better circulation within Tufts so it is worth the investment.)
  • With a Handshake link and/or your own job listing link, you can now submit the internship job listings on our curated job list below. Please do so by February 28, 2024.
READ HANDSHAKE INSTRUCTIONS
EXAMPLE 2023 JOB POSTING
POST A JOB

Step 3: Interview and hire intern

  • Arrange an interview with the Tufts student candidate according to your company’s normal hiring process.
  • Extend an offer to selected student interns by March 13, 2024.

Step 4: Confirm acceptance and start date

  • Communicate with students by early April on grant funding.
  • Confirm start date with student intern by mid-April 2024.