Student Opportunities

Internships and other opportunities Heading link

  • Argonne National Laboratory internships: Visit the lab’s Graduate Programs or Undergraduate Programs pages for further information. There are multiple internship programs in different fields, and application requirements and dates may vary for each.

Scholarships Heading link

Chris Jackson Computer Science Education Scholarship: This $5,000 scholarship is awarded to a new recipient every six months. Applicants will be required to discuss their interest in pursuing a computer science degree, their career aspirations, and why they think they should receive the award. Learn more, find out the next available application deadline, and submit your application here.

Illinois Student Assistance Commission: The iGROW Tech Scholarship program will be available starting the 2024-2025 academic year. It was developed to help recruit and train individuals to work in high-demand technology jobs. The iGROW Tech Scholarship is currently in the program development stage, so you can learn more and sign up to receive updates as they become available on the application process.

Why do hackathons? Heading link

participants in Google Tech Challenge

We strongly encourage UIC CS students to sign up for hackathon competitions. Here are some reasons why:

  • Meeting new people. Not just potential employers—who might watch a hackathon for potential new hires—but also fellow students.
  • Developing your résumé. Hackathons let you showcase the skills you’ve developed in class and build some new ones.
  • Enhancing your job interviews. Hackathons make you a more interesting interviewee. You can talk about how you approached a problem, the solutions you considered, and which skills you brought to the table.
  • Winning! (Of course.)
  • Participate in UIC’s Institute for Equitable Health Data Science Research’s EPIC Cosmos Hackathon on Wednesday, October 9th, 2024. This hackathon uses the EPIC database, which is designed to improve patient care. Participants will  use HIPAA-limited data to ask insightful questions and compete for best insight into the world wide data. Register now for this in-person event is open to all faculty, students, and staff, but is limited to 50 participants.
  • Help design user interface solutions for space with  NASA’s Spaceship User Interface Technologies for Students, or SUITs  program. Join an info session 9/12, 9/24, or 10/27 to learn more, and submit your proposal by October 31, 2024. Finalists will participate in Test Week with the agency in May, 2025.

 

UIC students have placed highly in these hackathon events:

Research Experiences for Undergraduates Heading link

student attending an REU at another university

Research experiences for undergraduates—called REUs for short—offer undergraduate students the opportunity to complete career-building research projects over the summer. REUs are competitive (with students chosen for the research positions by application) and often are held at universities other than your home institution. Most REUs are sponsored with funding from the National Science Foundation and typically come with a stipend that you can use to cover living expenses and other costs. Other REUs are offered by various government agencies and non-profits.

REUs make excellent résumé entries and offer valuable hands-on experience that you can talk about in job interviews. If you have your eye on a master’s degree or PhD after graduation, REUs provide a head start on building your research experience and could give you insight on what you might like to pursue in graduate school.

Think of REUs as a great way to get research experience while trying out living in a different place.

Check back for upcoming opportunities to be posted here