PSE 211 Internship Reports

By Guest Blogger Joe McDonald

A Paper Science Engineering rite of passage for almost 60 years, the Industry Internship Report, is typically regarded with both excitement and trepidation by rising juniors. The 20-100+ page report challenges students to summarize their work experiences in a professional manner.  The different sections of the report highlight important areas of our discipline.

1962 Internship Report

 It all starts with a mill history. Paper mills are each very unique facilities with pasts as varied as they are colorful. The history of the mill’s establishment and construction, its continued upgrades, as well as its relationship with the local community are all examined. The most exciting part of this section is seeing how engineering has progressed as a discipline, from manual operations and calculations to today’s automation and real time process monitoring.

After finishing the historical background, the report progresses to a mill process flow section. This section helps us students grasp paper making from woodchip to finished roll. Though our internships are often only in one area of the mill, typically our awesome industry supporters allow us to see all sides of the facility, so that we can gain an understanding of the whole process.

The final and most important section of the report is the job duties and projects sections. This segment gives us the opportunity to discuss our work. We examine our project’s importance to the company, as well as its connection to what we are studying in class. This is also where we get to brag about how our work as interns is saving companies $100,000s per year!

Steam Balance

Though a lot of work, when finished, the reports are a thing to be proud of! A culmination of a summer’s worth of interning and a semester’s worth of writing. These reports would not be possible without the help of awesome professors who equip us to be engineers, and an incredibly supportive industry that gives our students the opportunity (and pays!) to intern as engineers.

2014 Internship Reports – FINISHED!!!