Jay Tighe, a senior economics and international business major, worked and studied in London as a freshman in the program. He is interested in nongovernmental organizations and did his internship in London with AfricaRecruit, a nonprofit group where his responsibilities included calling African Embassies around the world in a campaign to encourage professionals to return to the continent to help rebuild after political upheaval.

Getting London “under my belt,” he says, gave him confidence. “The logical progression was to do it again.” Which he did, in the fall of his junior year in Argentina, where he worked at a community center teaching English. He has applied for a Fulbright to teach English in Thailand after he graduates this spring.

FOR the most part, international internships are not paid. But students do pay. Tuition and housing is usually equivalent to on-campus charges, but extras can add up. For London, Villanova estimates $7,700 in fees (meals, airfare, local transportation, books, passport, visa costs, health insurance and about $2,500 in spending money), in addition to $21,000 covering housing and tuition for 18 credits. Pittsburgh charges about $9,000, including housing, for its six-credit summer program but gives the first 70 enrolled students a $1,600 scholarship. It estimates $3,500 more in expenses.

Baruch College, part of the City University of New York, provides every international intern with a scholarship that covers airfare. “Baruch is a city school and the young men and women here are not wealthy,” says Terrence Martell, the director of the Weissmann Center for International Business, which sends about 30 students abroad each summer. Baruch’s students, he says, come from immigrant communities and have the language skills and cultural understanding that appeal to international employers. It’s important, he says, to help them “leverage” that background. But Baruch does not offer credit, or supplemental academics. It works with about a dozen companies that design and administer internships, vetting workplaces and matching students with potential employers.

These types of companies are widely used by students whose campuses do not have their own program or the kind of program a student is looking for — or, increasingly, by unemployed recent graduates who want to build their résumés. One such company, Intrax, out of San Francisco, can help students identify placements, apply for their internships and oversee them once abroad. For a package that includes housing, local excursions and fees like visa processing and insurance (but not meals or airfare), Intrax charges independent students between $5,950, for a semester’s internship in Chile or China, and $8,150 for a post in London.

Dr. Martell cautions independent students to research companies carefully, not only for cost but also for program oversight and solid track records in placing students with reputable companies in meaningful jobs. Internship-only programs do not confer credit, but companies may be able to help students work with schools to arrange it.