Internships are a way of life for millions of young Americans each year.

And lots of them suck. Like they suck a great deal. They can be soul crushing, demeaning and huge wastes of time and money.

Some people relocate for a semester long unpaid internship in a far-flung locale only to find out that they will be doing little more than getting coffee for the next 10 weeks.

Into this depressing mix enters Internpub, a website promising to give young people “knowledge about what they are getting themselves into when interning for a specific organization, company, or elected official.”

Founded by Ian Crueldad last year, the site boasts more than 2,500 personal reviews of popular internships around the country.

Raised by a single mom in San Jose, Crueldad graduated from George Washington University in 2015 and has been involved in politics for his entire adult life.

The self-described “political junkie” had never been involved in a startup before Internpub but felt that there was a real need for something like this.

“The idea of Internpub came from the experiences I had when I was interning in college,” Crueldad said in an interview with RISE NEWS. “I never had a bad internship myself. Nevertheless, I noticed through interacting with other interns that many of them were either unprepared for the internship, did not receive the internship experience they thought they were going to receive, or were not treated fairly Therefore I knew the idea for Internpub would provide the platform needed to help interns find the internship that best fits them.”

Crueldad said that he thinks that internships are necessary today in the US due to the fact that “more and more employers are demanding that a person have some sort of internship experience before even considering to hire them.”

Indeed, more than 1.5 million internships are filled each year in the US and the trend for more and more of this type of work is only increasing.

While young people may not need more places on the web to find internship listings, Crueldad is betting that they want to make smarter decisions about where to intern.

“I believe that in the future, Internpub could be the main website where interns can rate and review internships and be the platform that help interns start their careers,” Crueldad said.

And what about that whole entrepreneurial element? After-all, Crueldad is a pretty young guy to be running a startup that hopes to revolutionize an important part of the economy.

“I would say to a young person who wants to start their own startup is to overcome any self doubt and just get things started,” Crueldad said. “I started Internpub and received investments for it before graduating from college. I did not have a business background or a technical background when I first started Internpub. Yet I simply got things started, eventually received investments, and now the website is growing.”

For more information about Internpub, you can visit their website: www.internpub.com

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: IAEA Imagebank/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)