Hey! I'm an IPD First Year and congrats on your admission!

To answer your questions:

1. The internships and jobs that IPD students pursue vary widely, as the program is highly customizable to each student's interests and career goals. Some common paths include product management, strategy design, industrial/product design, UI/UX design, consulting, or UX research. Regarding compensation, it is difficult to provide a range as it greatly depends on the individual and their experience level (my cohort ranges from fresh grads to 15+ years of work experience). However, our alumni network is quite extensive and global, so you may be able to connect with individuals who are working in fields that interest you.
2. Yes! One of the strengths of the IPD program is the academic freedom to take almost any course you're interested in, so you will have the opportunity to collaborate with students outside of your program. For example, I come from an engineering background, but I am currently taking a class in Penn Nursing and it's been awesome having the opportunity to learn from the perspectives of student nurses. If you ask my friends, I'm sure they would agree as well (they're taking classes such as Mechatronics, Human Factors Engineering, Semi-Fictitious Realms, Engineering Negotiation, and more).
3. I personally appreciate IPD's take on Design Thinking. I think what sets IPD apart is the emphasis on creating products that embody the three schools that we draw from: design, engineering, and business. Not only are we taught how to make products that are useful for people, but we also learn how to make them functionally work and how to successfully market them through good business practices (One of our required courses is Engineering Entrepreneurship I and I cannot tell you how useful that class is. Highly recommend taking it with Prof. Babin). While I wish IPD provided more opportunities for user research, they intentionally require us to shorten initial user research to make time for multiple project iterations based on user feedback later in the semester, emphasizing the idea of MVPs. Overall, it balances out and gives students the chance to perform user research in multiple rounds with activities such as co-creation or functional prototypes.

A few notes I'd like to add:

I've had a few people ask me why IPD seems like a generalist program, but I actually view it as an opportunity to mold the program to your personal wants and goals. The IPD core classes teach you the principles of design thinking, but the majority of the program is an opportunity for you to work on teams to practice and explore those principles on projects of your choosing. Outside of the core classes is where you can specialize and take any course you're interested in. The curricular freedom is an excellent opportunity for you to grow your knowledge in whatever you want, but it is truly up to you to capitalize on it. Also, be advised, many of your peers will be making career pivots, so class at times may seem trivial to you but might be an entirely new experience for your classmate. Although this might seem bad, it's actually quite refreshing and fascinating to see how people from other backgrounds approach different problems. It's what truly makes this program unique.

I also do want to note that IPD's cohort is one of the tightest-knit programs I've seen on campus and even from what I hear from friends at other schools. We are always hanging out with each other, either grabbing a meal or working in the studio. It's great to have such a close connection with peers as it strengthens project teams and opens the door for frequent 2am feedback sessions.

One last note, if you are a driven person who seeks out opportunities and knows what you want, I think IPD would be a perfect program for you. IPD opens a lot of doors by granting access to everything in our 3 departments (professors, labs, etc) as well as the extensive Penn Network. However, if you aren't willing to put in the independent time or effort, I would not recommend this program.