As summer comes to an end, so do all of those summer internships everyone encourages us to do in college. I'll be honest, At first, I was not a fan of leaving my old job to get an internship. I liked my old job a lot; it was easy, I was able to goof off, and it required next to no responsibility. It was a typical high school job that I had held onto through college, and the thought of trading it in for something more serious was a little scary, especially considering it had the potential to ruin the holiest time of student-hood—summer.

It was actually so much better than I could have ever expected, and as far as I know, most people only have great things to say about their internship experiences. But one of the major pros to having an internship applies to those who didn't care for their positions—internships are temporary. If you didn't like your duties, your hours, your coworkers, your boss, your whatever, you had the satisfaction of knowing that it wasn't forever. If your first couple of weeks didn't go so well, you were able to count down the weeks until it was over. Even for those who loved their internships, a whole summer of work can get tedious, so it was obviously nice to know that there was a designated stopping time. That's something no job will ever offer ever again.

For the most part, internships are tough not to love. It's all the perks of having a professional job without any of the major accountability or stakes that you have when you're settling into a full-time career. Think about it—as much as it's nice to succeed, nobody expects too much out of the intern. It's mostly a learning experience where mistakes are not only accepted, but even encouraged at some times. Again, that's something that will never happen with any other job in the real world.

Another great part of an internship is the fact that it gives you some great exposure to the inner workings of any industry or company you want—all without permanently locking you into it. It's really cool to be exposed to the deep workings of a company without being fully committed to it. You feel like an audience member to a super exclusive behind-the-scenes show. And then after a couple of months, you can choose to do the same thing all over again at another company you're curious to explore.

The best part of an internship has to be the experience you can gain from it. They allow you to decide what you like and, more importantly, what you don't like. My internship, for example, had me clocking in at 6 a,m. most mornings, and while I didn't initially think it would be a problem, it ended up killing me—now I know to heavily consider hours before taking a full-time position. The little things you learn about yourself when first experiencing a full-time professional job are invaluable and can't be learned in class—they have to be experienced firsthand.

When your counselors are bugging you about bulking up your resume, or you're reading a bunch of articles about the increasingly competitive job market, just know that internships aren't the worst way to go about your summers in college. There are a lot of perks that I think are overlooked because of how stressful the prospect of getting one can be. The fact is, they can be a lot of fun, and are irreplaceable experiences that you should take advantage of while you can.