Internship a win-win for Gallagher and Wintec IT student
Wintec IT student Adric Lloyd gained a lot from his internship at Gallagher including a permanent job.
Third year Wintec IT student, Adric Lloyd, is a perfect example of how internships can benefit both the student and business.
Since completing his internship at Gallagher this year, Lloyd has been offered and accepted a permanent job with the innovative New Zealand company as a junior software engineer in its mobile team.
Thirty-year-old Lloyd recently completed Wintec’s Bachelor of Applied Information Technology, specialising in Software Engineering, and says he’s stoked about getting a job at Gallagher.
“It’s a great place to work! My favourite aspect of the internship was the technical discussions I had with engineers. I learned a lot through these conversations and whiteboard sessions,” says Lloyd.
“The internship required me to draw on a range of things I had learned in different papers during my time at Wintec. Not just the programming, but the writing skills, maths, networking and group work as well. During the internship I did Android, iOS and .NET development, creating proof of concept apps for an anonymised telemetry service and later integrating these into some of the Gallagher production apps, though not for release during my internship,” he adds.
Gallagher software team leader Orion Edwards (right) says internships are beneficial for the long-term health of industry.
Orion Edwards, software team leader at Gallagher, was Adric's team leader during his internship.
“Adric fits in really well with our team. He had a mature and professional attitude, communicated well and worked diligently. While we did give him mentoring and direction, there was a lot of technical stuff that he had to figure out on his own, which he did well,” says Orion.
“I would encourage other organisations get on-board and consider taking on an intern. Primarily, internships help someone new enter the workforce and gain skills but are also beneficial for the long-term health of our industry.”
Wintec’s Centre for Information Technology director Aaron Steele says solving an IT problem or exploring different IT solutions can be costly and time consuming. That’s where Wintec’s information technology students come in.
“Industry internships and projects give students a real-world customer and work experience that they must manage and deliver. The role needs to be IT-based but can be within any business or organisation.”
Wintec’s talented degree-level and postgraduate IT students can work on a range of IT related projects or tasks including: software engineering, database development, multimedia and web development, mobile app and game development, business and systems analysis, network engineering, security, systems administration, business intelligence, AR/VR and extended reality, and much more.
Steele adds: “There is no cost to the business but all internships must accumulate 300 hours over 16 weeks which is approximately two days per week (undertaken on or offsite).
“Many businesses utilise the partnership by tasking students with exploring innovative IT solutions that could help improve business efficiency, processes, or systems.
“IT internships and projects can help businesses while also providing Wintec students with valuable work experience. It’s a win-win situation.”
Wintec’s Centre for Information Technology is currently looking for businesses and organisations who are interested in taking on an intern or project student to start in February 2019.
Find out more about Wintec’s Centre for IT’s industry placements here or contact Alison Marshall on 07 834 8800 ext 3444 or alison.marshall@wintec.ac.nzRead more:
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