Hong Kong student internships: invaluable work experience or slave labour?

Of the approximately 10 employees in the To Kwa Wan office of Boom Magazine, more than half of them are students – unpaid interns who receive only a daily lunch allowance. For two months this summer, journalism major Susan (not her real name) was one of them. She describes her time at the bilingual monthly lifestyle and fashion magazine as “frustrating”.

“There was a gap between my expectations and the actual experience. I had little coaching from my superiors,” she says. “I rarely got a chance to do interviews. Most of the time I just had unappealing tasks dumped on me, like translation and writing web posts. I usually just posted the web posts directly without any editing by senior staff. Also, they didn’t give me any feedback.”

Susan says she understands Boom is a small company, but is adamant unpaid workers should at least get some kind of compensation, especially in terms of instruction and coaching to improve their journalism skills. She even had to cover her daily travel expenses, she says.

“Luckily, I come from a middle-class family and the lack of pay is not a big issue. But for many others, coming from a lower-class background, it can be a problem. I have a friend who is a film student. He is applying for internships just to raise money for his school film project.”

Boom did not respond to an email from the Post asking it to explain the company’s policy regarding interns.