The internship debate

I am curious what our students make of the arguments in this piece:

Unpaid Interns, Complicit Colleges – NYTimes.com

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Snip:

The uncritical internship fever on college campuses — not to mention the exploitation of graduate student instructors, adjunct faculty members and support staff — is symptomatic of a broader malaise. Far from being the liberal, pro-labor bastions of popular image, universities are often blind to the realities of work in contemporary America.

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Here in the SJMC, we’ve worked with employers many times, trying to fashion internships with compensation or where it was not possible, a robust experience that paid off later. Our alumni have helped with this effort, as well, through such things as funding the Sharon Stark Investigative Internship at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

But I’d like to hear from students. What do you make of the arguments? What have been the strengths and weaknesses of your paid and unpaid internships?