So I'm a sophomore looking to apply for computer science internships for Summer 2016. I've been fortunate enough to have a paid internship the past summer, however there were a few issues.
It was my first job in this field and it was remote, all communication was done via slack, email, and skype. My communication skills needed work though, and so the internship ended at the end of the year with "tight budget" being cited as the reason (it was a small startup). My main issues were not "joining in the conversations" going on in slack, and not asking as many questions as I should have. I tend to be rather stubborn when it comes to problem solving and I try to solve it as independently as possible, however this can be to my detriment.
My question is, should I put them as a reference? At the end they did say they would be open for letting me use them as a reference or for letters of recommendation, but I worry that if they mention my communication skills not being up to snuff, it'll kill any internships opportunities before I even get to the interview stage.
I have worked on my skills since, working on a few open source and group projects, but I feel that excluding them as a reference would be suspicious, but including them would kill my chances. Thoughts?