[extra88]

Many internships are not like what you did. Many require a lot of supervision but even if an intern is mostly shadowing a staff member, they'll be a net negative as the staff member will either work more slowly or take the time to explain what they're doing or what they did.

Some internships are basically a form of charity, the mild negative effect on everyday work is at least partially balanced by the longer term potential of an intern becoming a good candidate for a staff position or by the positive effect on reputation of taking such interns.

In my specific area, the interns are a net-negative for the time they're with us but when they work with another group, I think they're (minimally) a net positive.

[wushupork]

This. As someone who hires interns, it takes a lot of time and effort to train them to be effective. It takes away our resources, and we're essentially PAYING them to train them. (I have not done unpaid internships). To have a bunch of know-it-alls think they will come in and make business decisions rather that focusing on learning and becoming effective speaks volumes of those people and they need to be removed. It's not about teaching a lesson. There's just no room for that if you want to be a well-oiled ship.