TECH international internship

The application period for scholarships on international internships is ongoing throughout the year. Scholarship is applied via online application at least two weeks before the beginning of the internship period. Scholarships are available according to budget, and they are allocated based on the order of incoming applications.

Note! Scholarships are not admitted retrospectively for internships that have already begun before the online application has been submitted. Please note to reserve about 2 weeks for preparing all the required attachments.

After you submitted the application with required attachments it will take approx. 2-3 weeks to process your application and make the decision on the scholarship. Applications are processed approx. twice per month. Note that holiday seasons may cause delay in processing the applications. 

Decision on the scholarship will be notified via email. If the grant is admitted to you, it will be paid in one instalment about a month after the decision has been made. In case the internship period is about the start only later during the year, the scholarship will also be paid near to the starting date. Detailed instructions on applying and a link to the online application can be found below.

Note! If the student does not fulfill the requirements of the scholarship or e.g. the required documents are not returned after the internship, the scholarship can be partly or entirely reclaimed.

All rights reserved.

Please note that Aalto University does not provide students with health insurance, accident or liability insurance during their internship period. If the employer doesn’t provide you with these insurances, you are yourself responsible for taking out sufficient insurance coverage.

About Aalto University's statutory accident insurance for students:  students are insured against accidents sustained during practical training associated with studies. The policy only covers accidents related to teaching at an institution and practical training while in a work placement without pay provided the placement is external to the educational establishment. Read more from the Internship Checklist. 

According to the travel notifications by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, travelling to Russian Federation, Belarus and Ukraine should be avoided. Aalto University does not grant new scholarships for internships taking place in these countries. This guideline is in force until further notice.

In addition, please note Aalto University Guidelines for international internships during the academic year 2022-23 (due to Covid-19)

• If you are planning for international internship period during the academic year 2021-22, please first read the guidelines (in Finnish, Swedish and English). Attachment can be found in the bottom of this page. 

• Erasmus+ Grant  is intended for internships in an Erasmus+ country in Europe, except for working on your Master's thesis. Nevertheless if your internship is recognised back at Aalto as elective studies towards your degree, the Erasmus+ Grant can be applied for.

  Erasmus+ programme offers a limited amount of scholarships to the partner countries (in Europe and outside of Europe) - get in touch with your School’s internship coordinator well in advance before you apply for the scholarship. Erasmus+ scholarships to the partner countries are granted according to the existing Erasmus+ financing.
   

• TECH International Internship and Travel Grant is intended for internships in a country outside of Europe or performing thesis work abroad (either in or outside of Europe).
  The travel grant is allocated only for internships outside of Europe.
   

These instructions concern internships that are organized independently. Internship programmes have their own rules and policies.

The terms apply to all internships grants: Erasmus+ Grant, TECH International Internship and Travel grant for outside of Europe.

In order to be eligible for international internship grants, all the following conditions must be met:

• You are a TECH student (CHEM, ELEC, ENG or SCI) at Aalto University and have enrolled for the ongoing semester.
• You will earn ECTS credits for your traineeship and the credits will be included in your degree. Check this from your study programme, especially if you are studying in a double degree programme.
• You have completed at least 20 ECTS credits/semester. The credits appear in your Transcript of Study Records (Please note that we count this in the following manner: the total number of credits apparent in your Transcript of Records divided by the number of semesters (attending) starting from the beginning of your studies (current semester excluded). This should be no less than 20 credits. If you have not enrolled as attending for a certain semester, a proof is required, e.g. a screenshot of the Sisu page that shows your attending and non-attending semesters.)
• The duration of your traineeship is at least 3 months or 90 days (Erasmus+ internship min. 2 months). With the exceptions of Erasmus+ short-term blended internships (5-30 days).   
• Your traineeship is fulltime work and is performed mainly within your employers premises.
• You haven't been granted an Aalto internship grant before (incl. grants for internship in Finland and international internships).
• Your salary (including the grant) is max. 2 000 euros/month
• You are going to a country other than your home country or country of origin
• Grants are not admitted retrospectively for internships that have already begun before the papers have been submitted.

We do not encourage our students to accept unpaid internships. However, unpaid internships abroad may be supported if there are reasonable justifications for this. In any unclear situations, please contact the Learning Services of your school.

The safety situation of the target country is evaluated based on the instructions by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland and Aalto University travel policy.

If your internship will take place in a country outside of Europe, you can apply for the TECH International Internship grant and the Travel grant. In addition, this grant can be applied for working on your Master's Thesis in or outside of Europe.

The amount of the internship grant is 1 500 €/internship.

The additional Travel grant is meant to cover travel expenses when travelling between your traineeship destination and Finland. If you are in a foreign country (due to, for example a foreign exchange programme) before your internship, you are not eligible for a travel grant. You can not receive the grant if the employer pays for the travel costs or if you receive financial support for your travel expenses from other sources.

The amount of the grant must not exceed the actual travel costs. You do not need to attach receipts. Nevertheless be ready for providing the cost proof upon request.

The amount of the travel grant depends on your destination country:

400 €      Middle-East and North Africa
450 €      North America
600 €      Asia ja Africa
800 €      South America and Oceania

Note! There is no Travel grant for destinations in Europe!

The online application form and all required attachments must be filled out and submitted at least two weeks before the beginning of your internship.

Please reserve about 2-4 weeks for all the necessary paper work with the institution abroad before you submit the official online application.

Please make sure that you have all the required attachments (in pdf-form) before starting to fill in the online application form. It is not possible to modify the application form after submission, neither to send the missing attachments by e-mail.

Haka identification is required for the internship grant application. Remember to inform the contact person at your Aalto school (see contact information below) after you have submitted the online internship grant application.

The required attachments are:

1. Your Transcript of Records. We accept the electronic transcript from Sisu.
2. Internship contract or other document sent by your employer stating your internship tasks, monthly salary, internship dates and the employer's contact information.
3. If you are applying for these grants to work on your Master's thesis abroad, please attach an acceptance of the topic from your thesis supervisor (professor in charge) at Aalto.
4. An agreement from your degree programme verifying that you will be earning credits for your traineeship. You can attach, for example, a copy of an e-mail in which you agree on your credits with the coordinator of your study programme. This confirmation is not necessary if you are going to work on your Master's thesis abroad.
5. If you are applying for the Erasmus+ Grant: you have to submit, in addition with the above mentioned, documents required by the Erasmus+ programme. You can check them from the Erasmus+ scholarship website. The Erasmus+ Learning Agreement needs to be signed by your degree programme/major planning officer.

See also

Waiver - Aalto University's Release of Liability & Responsibilities of Students going abroad.

• Please note, that the Waiver applies to all students who have been selected for an outgoing mobility, including internships. Waiver is accepted as part of the grant application form and you can find it from the Internship checklist website

Technical instructions for filling in the form: 

• Open the electronic application form (link above). Do not use Internet Explorer.
• Sign in with your Aalto credentials.The application consists of several pages. The headlines of the pages can be seen on the left.
• Please fill in the application page by page.Tick the box on "Mark page as complete" when you have answered all the questions on that page. You can save the application form and continue filling it later. Note! Please do not copy text to the application form (e.g. from Word) - this can lock the application and prevent the pdf document to be uploaded.
• On the page "Attachments" please add the scanned, relevant application documents (listed above) in PDF format. The maximum size of one file is 2 MB.
• Send the complete application by clicking "Submit".
• Do not close the browser, but wait until the programme produces a pdf copy of your application. Please save the pdf copy as a receipt of the submitted application. In case the pdf is not generated and/or you cannot save it, contact your School’s internship coordinator (see their contacts below). Please do not fill in another application!
• Sign out from the system.
• After submitting the application you cannot make changes in it anymore. If you have questions on your application please contact your School’s internship coordinator (see their contacts below).
• Note! You will be notified about the internship grant decision by email sent directly from the online system. It is possible that emails will be directed to your junk folder. Please check it regularly!

Read more about Erasmus+ internship scholarships.

If you have received an internship grant from Aalto University you must return the following within 30 days after your internship period has ended: 

1. Internship report (please follow the instructions below). The internship reports will be published online.
2. Scanned copy of your work certficate 

You will receive further instructions by email on how to submit your documents to the online portal (after internship -form).

In case the duration of the internship changes from your original scholarship application form, or if you do not return the required documents, a part of the scholarship or the full sum might have to be paid back.  

How to write an internship report 

The internship reports will be published in the Publisher database where they can be read by other students interested in going on an internship abroad. Please note that the contents of the report are public. Thus, do not add your personal information on the report unless you specifically would like to let the future applicants contact you (for instance by email) in case they have questions. Please remove “author” from the report before you save the document unless you want it to be seen by everyone reading your report. Also please make sure not to mention other people by name in the text but do tell the name of the company or organization who employed you. 

Aalto University Learning Services reserves the right to edit the reports before publishing them or can choose not to publish them. 

The internship reports are very useful information for your peers who are planning on going abroad. Therefore, please make sure that you give a lot of information which could be helpful. 

What to write in the travel report

The report should be 2-4 pages long. You can write the report in either Finnish, Swedish or English. Please use headlines to structure the report. 

1. Basic information about the placement: The company, city and country where you worked in, time and duration of the internship (e.g. June - August, 2022). 
2. How did you find the placement? What channels did you use in the job hunting? Explain if you found the internship yourself or did you apply through an internship programme? If you found the position yourself, describe how you found it and through which channels. In case you got the job through a programme, write about the application process. 
3. Your tasks: Describe your tasks in detail. Explain also how your internship was supervised and were you happy with the supervision. You can also add details which you found interesting, such as how the working culture differed from the working culture in Finland or your home country. Also compare the working culture differences in the employees' relations with each other and how your co-workers were performing their tasks.       
4. What did you learn? Describe what you learned and how your tasks were related to your studies. What skills were you able to develop further? Did you learn anything about intercultural communication? What about language skills - were you able to develop them?
5. Salary, taxation and grants: In addition to the salary and taxation, please give more information about other possible grants you received. 
6. Practicalities: How did you find your flat, how much was the rent and other costs. Also write about other arrangements, in case you for instance needed to get a visa and especially if you did your internship outside Europe.  
7. Life outside work: How did you spend your free time? Did you meet other trainees? 
8. Local customs: Talk about the local habits, customs and culture. 
9. Accreditation of the internship: Mention how many credits you will be awarded for the traineeship (if you already know).
10. What kind of an impact has the internship had on your future studies or career plans? Explain in more detail. 
11. Additional information: Write down everything you think could be useful for your fellow students wanting to do their internship abroad. Try to remember what kind of information you yourself would have found useful before you moved abroad.