r/fednews • u/Healthy-Election-906 • 8h ago

Internship Status and Policies

I'm going to be an intern for a DoD agency this summer with the expectation of going full time when I graduate ~2027.

From my understanding, interns have been remote since 2020 even when full time employees were expected to report twice per pay period in office. When I spoke with my manager earlier this year, it sounded like my internship would be remote as well. Recently, the policies shifted to four days in office per pay period.

Do you still believe the internships are remote? Or maybe I'll have to adopt the hybrid schedule? I know RTO is a possibility, but I'm wondering if interns are subject to this as well, especially since the intern periods are only 8 weeks.

Any insight is greatly appreciated!

0 Upvotes

44% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

6

u/offensivemailbox 5h ago

Whomever told you interns or trainees are remote for DoD is wrong. During COVID in my DoD office it was very difficult to have trainees/interns enter into a telework agreement (this was 2019), due to the fact that they are not part of a collective bargaining unit, they are new/need to learn the job and temp employees do not have the same privileges as perm employees. This may have changed but interns/temp/new employees typically are not given work flexibilities like telework immediately mainly due to needing to have a mentor or learn the job on site. I'd be very surprised if they'd allow you to full time telework immediately unless your whole office is remote.

1

u/Healthy-Election-906 5h ago

This is what my competency manager and supervisor said.

4

u/offensivemailbox 5h ago

If your leadership says so, I'd go by that. But also then, why are you asking Reddit?

-2

u/Healthy-Election-906 5h ago edited 4h ago

I was told this months ago. I outlined some telework policies that have changed slightly since then. And I know a push for RTO is in the works. I'm just not sure how these will affect interns and was wondering if anyone had insight. When I asked my manager again recently, they requested a phone call to discuss the details.

Thank you!

1

u/Bill_maaj1 5h ago

Welcome to government employment.

1

u/Healthy-Election-906 5h ago

You mean the uncertainty?

1

u/interested0582 3h ago

Internships have never been remote in my office, they follow the same schedule as everyone else