Woodrow Wilson High School senior Esmerelda Miguel interviews another intern as part of her duties at Independent Insurance Agents of Dallas in the Mayor’s Intern Fellowship Program.
While lifeguarding, being a camp counselor, and serving plates of chicken nuggets to bathing suit-clad children at the country club are all fine summer jobs for the average high school student, a few local students have gone above and beyond this summer through the Mayor’s Intern Fellowship Program.
According to its website, the fellowship program started in 2007 when Education is Freedom, a group whose goal is to promote an educated workforce, partnered with Mayor Tom Leppert and the City of Dallas to put 84 interns into summer jobs at 46 companies and four schools. Today, the fellowship employs 350 interns out of 1,790 applicants from 40 schools, and places them in 218 companies and nonprofits in Dallas. It is an eight-week paid internship, funded by gifts and the companies themselves, and is modeled after the prestigious White House Fellows Program.
Julianna Sweeney, who will be a senior cheerleader at Woodrow Wilson High School and is working in the UT Southwestern Human Resources department, feels like she has received a great deal of experience in the real world of employment. “I have been able to see how the hospital hire and fire people and learn more about the employment process.”
Woodrow senior football player Rance Albert, in his second year as a mayor’s intern, has been upgrading software systems while working with Information Technology Services at Dallas ISD. “The internship gives me a step ahead on everyone else, and I am able to have more responsibility and independence and not have someone looking over my shoulder.”
Emerelda Miguel, Woodrow senior soccer player and Sweetheart, has been working at Independent Insurance Agents of Dallas this summer. “I have learned the importance of meeting others and networking in the profession and learning more about the insurance business, so that I might one day have a job in this business.”
Miguel has been put on a special project for the communications department where she interviews other interns on camera, edits the clips, and creates a video meant to recruit other interns and young employees to her summer employer. “I was kind of nervous at first, I had never interviewed anyone, but I have become more professional and experienced in my time here,” she says.
Tammy Land, executive director of Independent Insurance Agents of Dallas, says, “We want to know what the interns feel about the insurance industry, how well they are being prepared for the working world, what they view as important.” Speaking of Miguel specifically, “She has a fresh perspective and ideas on new ways to approach tasks. We will benefit from her research on ‘Project Intern’, in that she is helping us better understand her generation, their needs, goals, and how we can work cohesively together.”
Even though it has been hard work, the students recognize how much the program will benefit them in the future. Woodrow senior Variations (show choir) member Morgan Niezgoda has been working at J.P. Morgan Chase. “I want to do something with math, though I haven’t figured out the specifics. Working here has allowed me to explore the banking track and network for my future, and I never knew you could do so much with Excel!”
A study done by Millennial Branding, a Generation Y research and consulting firm, shows that 90 percent of companies believe that high school internships will improve college prospects, and 83 percent believe these internships will land better paying jobs.
The applicants had to navigate a rigorous application process and an interview day with 500 other students where they did multiple interviews a day. This process helps prepare the students for real world interviews. “It was scary, but in a good way,” Sweeney says.
“The interview day was crazy,” Miguel says. “Even though there was a map, the layout was confusing, and I had to ask for directions to the different interviews.”
Niezgoda has met with British clients panicking over Brexit, Albert was able to meet with the CPO of Dallas ISD, and Sweeney has seen nurses fired for stealing medication and a rabbi who wouldn’t leave the hospital. “I thought stuff like that only happened in the movies, but when you see it in real life, it is different,” Sweeney said.
“The interns learn what it means to be part of a team, working together in an office toward common goals,” Land says. “They receive hands-on experience in a field they are interested in, enabling them to decide if they would like to pursue it further as a career. They develop contacts that can benefit them in their future. Most of all, the intern gains confidence that will carry them through life as engaged adults.”
