Plano Mayor Harry LaRosiliere joined community and corporate leaders on Feb. 26 to kick off the Plano Mayor’s Summer Internship Program at Hilti corporate headquarters in Plano.
The summer internship program offers Plano ISD students the opportunity to complete a paid 8-week internship at one of many local corporate or nonprofit organization offices over the summer. Students learn skills that ready them for college and career, while earning at least $10 per hour, working between 20-40 hours a week.
At the kickoff event, Mayor LaRosiliere said he feels this program continues to build on what he calls the Plano Promise to local youth: “Our community will protect you, our schools will educate you and our community will nurture you.”
Capital One was the founding sponsor of the program in 2014 and continues to support the program in its sixth year as presenting sponsor. JPMorgan Chase is the job fair sponsor (and will be underwriting 20 interns in technology and healthcare industries), The Boeing Company is the internship enrichment and training sponsor and NTT Data is the sponsor of the community service day at North Texas Food Bank. Other sponsors include AT&T, Bank of America, City of Plano, Kroger, Liberty Mutual, Oncor, Plano ISD and Trammell Crow Company.
The mayor’s goal is to recruit businesses of all sizes to provide a total of at least 120 internships to students. Businesses may sign up by April 1 at planomayorsinterns.org
Plano West High School senior Shawin “SK” Kiero interned last summer at the Plano Chamber of Commerce. He said, “The Plano Mayor’s Summer Internship Program was honestly one of my greatest experiences. During my time with the program I gained real work experience in marketing, in addition to learning about resilience, communication and determination. Without this program I feel that my future wouldn’t be as bright as it is today.”
Another exciting program the mayor acknowledged was the teacher externship in partnership with Plano ISD and Capital One. This program places Plano educators into corporate environments over the summer where they shadow executives to gain insight into a business or industry. This ultimately helps the educators keep sharp on the workplace that their students will ultimately enter, thus helping them better prepare the students. Teachers in the program are paid $25 per hour.
Applications for students who want to participate in the summer internship program are open through March 6. The student must be a sophomore or junior at a Plano ISD high school or living in Plano, have a minimum 3.0 GPA, be 16 years old by June 10 and be eligible to work in the U.S.
