University internships in Spain: what is missing for its stakeholders?

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the performance of the current university internship programs, with a particular focus on the present needs of the main stakeholders: the students and businesses. The study draws on the interpretive perspective of organizational culture (Berger and Luckmann), which stresses the difficulty of integrating subworlds with different codes, practices and habits. The results of a case study on the program run by University of Cadiz are then presented through a qualitative analysis. Otherwise, the conclusions have been compared with those obtained in recent research conducted by Spanish universities (Granada, UNED, Politécnica de Valencia, Politécnica de Madrid, Carlos III and Lleida).