As a student or fresh college graduate, one’s immediate concern is getting real-world work experience, turning the knowledge they’ve accumulated into practice and gaining the much-needed confidence to pursue the career they’ve been preparing for. And while they’re exposed to many opportunities, there’s a slight reluctance when it comes to actually applying for a position. This may be because students feel either unqualified for a certain job, lacking both the discipline and the professional interactions on a day-to-day basis, or they are uncertain about what company or field they should focus their attention on.
At one point or another and to some extent, we have all been through this, we can relate to this feeling of uncertainty and we want to help students develop their interpersonal skills, technical and professional ones. To put it bluntly, we want to empower those at the beginning of their career to take the plunge and prove they can tackle any challenge that comes their way! Actually, we have been doing it since 2012 and we will continue to do so as part of our training policy and “never stop learning” approach!
Students embarking on the Pentastagiu adventure
On February 28th we are launching our 6th Pentastagiu in Iasi! Pentastagiu 2017 promises to be the biggest, the most interactive and diversified one yet, with over 300 students from 4 cities in Romania (Iasi, Suceava, Bacau, Galati) who have registered for the 7 available tracks and have been selected for the training program. The inauguration is taking place at Unirea Hotel, Cuza Conference Room, where in addition to presenting the next steps of the internship program, we have invited some of Pentalog’s professionals to share with us their views on the current job market and useful tips on how to advance one’s career as a fresh graduate. Iulia Argintaru, HR Specialist, is going to give us some insight into the latest trends on the IT job market and Cataline Vrabie will talk about IT technologies and latest methodologies, like Agile and Scrum.
At the moment, 160 interns out of 400 candidates have been selected for the Pentastagiu in Iasi, an internship program powered by Pentalog that over the course of 5 years has become the most popular and in demand students program in the region of Moldova. The program has been implemented in two universities from Iasi and Suceava so far: the Faculty of Computer Science in Iasi and the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in Suceava. We aim to partner with more universities as we believe that gaining practice through an internship is an utterly important factor in a student’s academic training!
Pentastagiu – a 4-module internship program
Students were able to choose from 7 different technologies (Front-End, Java, .NET, PHP, Testing, Mobile, Python), addressing the need for future well-trained professionals on the IT job market. There are up to 25 candidates for each track and 20 Pentalog trainers to guide, train and assist them. In addition, on the course of the program, more specialists are expected to join the mentors, so the formation will be one-to-one and the students can even get guidance in choosing and developing the topic for their graduate degree exam.
The internship program consists of 4 modules, each matching a specific step in the students’ formation, starting from February and ending in July. During the first 3 modules, the students will benefit from specialized workshops and knowledge sharings and will interact with their mentors during the weekend at Pentalog’s office in Iasi. The goal is to build up their expertise, starting from basic to more advanced concepts, so that they can get a full grasp of the technology they want to specialize in. And to that end, we will focus on practice rather than theory, teaching them how to work in an Agile team, having access to the latest methodologies, frameworks and tools.
In the last module, interns will have the chance to get a sense of what working in Pentalog means, as the training sessions will turn into an 8-hour work day in our Pentalog office, where they can observe, get all the answers they need, work on real projects alongside our professionals, participate in multiple tasks, get hands-on experience and feedback.
Ask for a quote2018 resolutions
Staying in touch with our former interns has helped us evaluate how the internship program is performing and whether it has brought added value in their professional endeavors. More than 85 per cent of them have succeeded in finding an IT job and are employed at the moment. This success rate along with the enthusiasm displayed by students in the faculties we have partnered with have motivated us to set the bar higher. So our goal for next year is to extend our coverage area and add more universities to our portfolio!
We cannot believe what an incredible journey this has been and we are extremely happy to see so many students interested in our internship program! Each year we strive to offer the best opportunities to students, and their feedback really encourages us to keep going and develop this program even more in the years to come. But until then, Pentastagiu 2017 is officially starting, so on your mark, get set, go!