ezefllying

Several of you have asked for details regarding the internship. As a number of posters noted, United operates a formal MBA program, and, while I don't know many details regarding it other than what others have posted, I know that the other intern at my hub was a airport-management graduate from, I think, the University of North Dakota.

I was not enrolled in the MBA program. My employment with United was, admittedly, the product of a fortunate referral from a friendly frontline employee and a far-more persuasive recommendation from a UA corporate manager with whom my father was colleagues elsewhere in the '90s. My hiring was initially conducted through the small office in which I worked and was only handed over to H.R. after the office decided I was a fit for the job.

So, to answer several questions, it was very much ad hoc, and while I'm hoping a friend of mine can get something like it next year (non-rev benefits, even as a companion, can be the best elite status in the sky), I believe my particular office won't be hiring another intern next year. Still, I'm happy to answer any employment questions more specifically, especially if you PM me. I'm sorry I can't offer more help, but, since the hiring was conducted by someone generally uninvolved in recruitment, and since the office doesn't seem to be hiring again, I'm uncomfortable providing my supervisor's specific contact information.

I'm working on a post about my first days with the company and my job at the office. Because of the nature of the office work, with most of my time spent handling and conveying privileged and merger-related information, I can't give a very full account, but there were notable moments nonetheless, with all of the attendant absurdity one might expect. The post, as normal, will be mildly stupid, in a college-student-tries-to-make-the-office-amusing sort of way.

As an aside, if anyone's in ATL (or possibly JFK or DTW) today and has availability in the Sky Club, please, if willing, let me know. I was supposed to fly DCA-BOS in time for class this morning, but I was subject to an infinite ground hold and so decided that, missing the class anyway, I might as well collect miles at route myself via ATL onto the largest wide-body I could find. I'm somewhere over Raleigh now.