Purpose

Higher education internships have been studied in different aspects, mainly from the student or university perspective. To contribute to the understanding of the third actor in this type of university-industry cooperation, the paper examines employers' perspectives on higher education internships.

Design/methodology/approach

Through a literature review and based on Narayanan et al. (2010) conceptual model, an a priori model was developed, which was then validated by a multiple-case study in a Portuguese undergraduate course.

Findings

The findings reveal rich and meaningful insights into an under-researched area, including validation of seven antecedents, two processes and six outcomes of internships from the employer's perspective. This research showed that employers give great importance to outcomes of internships, either in terms of productivity, possible future recruitment, inflow of ideas, behaviours and competences or the intern's satisfaction.

Practical implications

The findings suggest the need for universities to undertake more collaboration with industry, as the employers made weak references to the creation and maintenance of ties with the educational institution, denoting low motivation. On the other hand, most of the outcomes for employers found in the literature are confirmed, except for the continued inflow of ideas construct. This may evidence some lack of strategic thinking related to the internship programs on part of the employers.

Originality/value

This paper validates and extends the dispersed findings of existing research by providing a useful, unifying conceptual model of the employer's perspective on higher education internships, which can be tested at other levels of education or in other countries.

中文翻译：

---

实习计划的前因、过程和结果：雇主的观点

目的

高等教育实习已经从不同方面进行了研究，主要是从学生或大学的角度。为了有助于理解此类大学与产业合作中的第三者，本文考察了雇主对高等教育实习的看法。

设计/方法/方法

通过文献综述并基于 Narayanan等人。（2010）概念模型，一个先验模型被开发出来，然后通过葡萄牙本科课程的多案例研究得到验证。

发现

调查结果揭示了对一个研究不足的领域的丰富而有意义的见解，包括从雇主的角度验证实习的七个​​前因、两个过程和六个结果。这项研究表明，雇主非常重视实习的结果，无论是在生产力、未来可能的招聘、思想、行为和能力的流入还是实习生的满意度方面。

实际影响

调查结果表明，大学需要与行业进行更多的合作，因为雇主对与教育机构建立和维持联系的提及不足，表明动机不足。另一方面，文献中发现的大多数雇主的结果都得到了证实，除了思想结构的持续流入。这可能表明部分雇主缺乏与实习计划相关的战略思维。

原创性/价值

本文通过提供一个有用的、统一的概念模型来说明雇主对高等教育实习的看法，从而验证和扩展现有研究的分散结果，该模型可以在其他教育水平或其他国家进行测试。