In 1999, the company was a major sponsor of SHPE's Eastern Technical and Career Conference in Massachusetts. Corning is also part of the GEM Consortium and the National Physical Science Consortium, both of which support graduate study for minorities. Corning's summer internship program is available at all its locations. Better than eight out of ten of Corning's interns get offers for second internships or permanent jobs, Brewster says. Around 60 percent decide to join the company on a permanent basis.
Interns work on projects that relate to their course work and interests.
They get mentors who are matched for ethnicity as well as professional direction. Those groups also sponsor social events to help the interns get acquainted. After the interns return to school, the people they met at Corning stay in touch through the Internet, sending e-mail news about programs and scholarships as well as personal messages. New engineers at Corning go through a complex and highly informative orientation process. Informational sessions are spread over the first three months.