Greetings Keith,
Thank you for your question. First and foremost, if you ultimately want to get hired as a trained forester, you need to attend a university that offers a forestry curriculum certified by the Society of American Foresters http://www.safnet.org/education/pforschools.cfm Nearly all forestry-related employers require a forestry degree from an SAF accredited institution (UIUC is SAF accredited).
Secondly, what “kind” of forestry are you interested in (urban forestry, silviculture, hydrology, genetics, engineering, mensuration, etc.)? Depending on what "type" of forestry you want to practice when you graduate ultimately should dictate which SAF accredited school you should look into. Some forestry programs are very proactive in management philosophy (forest management, silviculture, forest engineering, growth and yield, modeling, i.e., active management), whereas other forestry schools offer a more general ecology emphasis.
If you are interested in forestry internships, I would strongly recommend contacting the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences at the Urbana campus. If you are on the Urbana campus, feel free to swing by my office and I can help you with your endeavor.
Hope this helped!
