Unpaid internships historically have been a common practice among for-profit companies and a valuable means for students to gain work experience and earn high school or college credit. In 2010, however, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued guidelines limiting for-profit companies’ ability to offer unpaid internship opportunities. The focus of these guidelines is the requirement that the internship serve as educational training and a benefit for the intern, not the benefit of the employer.
In Davenport v. Elite Model Management Corp., No. 1:13-cv-01061-AJN (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 9, 2014) (Davenport v Elite-1) (Davenport v Elite-2), the court granted preliminary approval to a $450,000 settlement between Elite Model Management (“Elite”) and a group of unpaid interns who claimed the company intentionally misclassified employees as interns to avoid paying them wages and overtime. Dajia Davenport, who worked for…
Employers and attorneys alike are carefully monitoring the rising tide of class action litigation related to unpaid internships. Recently, former unpaid interns have filed suit against Fox Searchlight Pictures, producers of “The Charlie Rose Show,” [1] and Hearst Corporation, [2] which publishes the chic woman’s fashion magazine Harper’s Bazaar. The details of the cases very, but each Plaintiff purports to…
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