Your experience really depends on lucky you are

I took this program during the peak summer seasons with a lot of other people. Even so, people's experiences seemed to fall into 2 firm camps. Some people found their internships fantastic; they loved their companies, had worthwhile work to do and they made fantastic connections. Others had a terrible experience that was a waste of time for everyone involved. Examples of the horror stories I heard: Whole days spent sitting emptily at a desk, bosses seemingly devoid of a heart and who couldn't care less about you, telemarketing for 2 months in English to a population that virtually only speak Chinese.

But I still think this program is worth it because of two things. If you have never been to China, spending 2 months in either Beijing or Shanghai will deepen your understanding of this country and really, really widen your global perspective. Two, if you don't like your internship placement, request a change, immediately! The CRCC support staff are wonderful and personable, and they work really hard to accommodate requests and listen to what exactly it is what you want. Without them my summer could have gone a whole lot worse, and many of the folks who started out with awful internships also took this step and found their second placement much, much better.