So I have long lists of design companies that I would like to work for in my years placement, now I have no idea if any of these companies will actually take on a student for a year. So what should I do?
Should I ring them up, find out if they do, or interested in doing so?
all of the above.
if your school has no formal system for this, you should try asking any upper-classmen or recent grads you can find if they know their firm needs help or not. otherwise pick 30-40 firms and pester the designers over the phone + email, be sure to select a wide spectrum of locations/industries sometimes the work is in big cities that are just swamped, and sometimes its out in the country doing something very un-glamorous.
you will need to be relentless and patient.
call 1st just to find out who to talk to, the busiest people (who need help the most) will be difficult to track down.
then call 8am-ish local time, before they get too involved in their day. follow up with email recapping the conversation w/resume + work sample.
Mail only those who sounded like they have interest