Student Opportunities
Internship opportunities
- Robotics Internship Program sponsored by U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy: This is a 10-week summer internship program for students majoring in a field related to robotics. The program provides opportunities for high school seniors, undergraduate and graduate students, and postgraduates to intern at federal national laboratories throughout the United States. The program includes a paid stipend of $600 to $750 per week (depending on academic level) and a housing allowance and/or travel reimbursement if needed. Apply here by February 8, 2021.
- High Performance Computing for Manufacturing (HPC4Mfg) Internship Program sponsored by U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy: This is a 10-week summer internship program for students majoring in a field related to high performance computing. The program includes a paid stipend of $600 to $750 per week (depending on academic level) and a housing allowance and/or travel reimbursement if needed. Apply here by February 1, 2021.
Hackathon listings
- The Postman API Hack (deadline: January 25)
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Tchibo Consumer Experience Hackathon (deadline: February 8)
- Hedera21 – Hello Tokenization Hackathon (deadline: February 12)
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Expert.ai Natural Language and Text Analytics API Hackathon (deadline: February 22)
Why do hackathons?

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.)
More on hackathons
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info here
UIC students have placed highly in these hackathon events:
- BuiltWorlds Hackathon 2019: Riccardo Pressiani, Matteo Foglio, Guido Muscioni, Francesco Sgherzi, Chiara Gambacorta, and Giulia Soresini, Grand Prize
- Google Tech Challenge 2019: 3rd place, 5th place
- MIT Energy Hack 2018: Chirag Soni, MS ’19
- BuiltWorlds Hackathon 2018: Giovanni Agugini Bassi, Iacopo Olivo, and Francesco Pinci, all MS ’19
- Mobility Hackathon Chicago: The Roiti (team of five MS ’19 students)
Research Experiences for Undergraduates

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. They 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.
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.
Selected summer 2021 REU offerings:
- Computational Sensing and Medical Robotics at Johns Hopkins University (application deadline: February 21, 2021)
- Computational Sensing for Human-centered Artificial Intelligence at the Rochester Institute of Technology (application deadline: February 1, 2021)
- Cybersecurity at Oakland University (application deadline: February 28, 2021)
- Educational Data Mining, held virtually at George Mason University (application deadline: February 15, 2021)
- Secure and Privacy-Preserving Cyber-Physical Systems: Software and Hardware Approaches at Tennessee Tech University (application deadline: March 1, 2021)
- Security of Smart Things at Florida International University (application deadline: February 26, 2021)