The starter pistol has sounded for college internship applications—for the summer of 2025.
Companies in finance and accounting are now recruiting for interns nearly 18 months before college students would be expected to start. The investment bank Guggenheim Securities and the Royal Bank of Canada, in addition to accounting stalwarts Grant Thornton and PricewaterhouseCoopers, among others, started advertising for 2025 summer internships this fall. Many summer 2024 internship slots are already filled, several companies say.
The advanced timeline means that college students who may have taken just one business class are trying to prove their mettle in competitive application processes that can launch careers after graduation. To prepare students, colleges are hosting recruiting events and prepping their students earlier. Many applicants for 2025 are sophomores striving for a coveted internship after their junior year. The stints often lead to a full-time job offer before their senior year, career coaches say.
“To find out I had to apply so early was really, really crazy for me,” said Brayden Dam, a sophomore studying accounting at the University of Florida. Dam, 19 years old, learned of the early timeline from a college adviser when he was a freshman.
This fall, Dam applied to a few 2025 internships with accounting firms in Tampa, Fla. He was told that those offices were full and that he should try Orlando or Miami.
“I thought I was getting in early,” he said. “But apparently, I was even later than some people who had already filled up the slots.”
Talent advantage
PwC and other companies say that the early deadlines help them scoop up talent that could go to competitors. PwC posted its summer 2025 internships for areas including tax and consulting in September, the earliest the firm has ever advertised internship positions, said Rod Adams, who leads hiring for the U.S. and Mexico. One key reason: PwC is trying to compete for top talent amid a dwindling number of accounting majors.
In some cases, the companies hoarding intern talent more than a year in advance have cut full-time jobs or have made job offers to students, only to defer start dates for those new graduates. Major consulting firms don’t have enough work for their existing staff and are facing slowing revenue growth, and Ernst & Young last week began laying off partners. This year, PwC delayed the start dates of about 600 full-time consulting hires from August 2023 to January 2024.
It’s hard to plan for workforce needs so far in advance, Adams said.
“Would it be easier if we did real-time hiring? It would be easier to manage the manpower planning, but to get the top talent, we’ve got to be out in the market early,” he said.
Financial firms are the most likely to recruit sophomores early, according to college career offices and people familiar with corporate recruiting. At the University of Michigan and the University of Southern California, employers will host events and start to recruit undergraduate students in the first months of 2024 for summer 2025 internships, according to those schools.