Internships are one of the best ways for high school students to develop professionally, explore career options and learn from industry experts. Students had internship opportunities this past summer, employed at workplaces ranging from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.
Senior Carolyn Fu worked at NIST as part of the Summer High School Internship Program (SHIP). She worked in the Engineering Laboratory and looked into the transfer of heat from wildfires onto urban materials. “I assisted my mentor with data collection on wildfires and got to apply my computer science knowledge and chemistry background to perform data analysis,” Fu said.
Fu won second place in the annual NIST SHIP poster presentation contest, in which the interns presented their summer research. In fact, the school accounted for the first, second and third-place winners: senior Shreyas Bachu, Fu and senior Millie Vyas. “There were a lot of great presentations so I didn’t expect to win. I was surprised but really happy,” Bachu said.
There were even students who traveled to different states for work. Senior Ayesha Gulati spent six weeks in California to intern at a research lab. “I shadowed trial participant visits to learn the basics of clinical trials, including how to pre-screen hundreds of patients, how to process and ship out lab work, and obtain patient consent with confidential paperwork,” Gulati said.
The Montgomery County Summer Rise program is another way for students to get involved in the workforce. This program allows rising juniors and seniors to work with a host (businesses, nonprofits, etc) for a minimum of 50 hours over a five-week period in their field of interest, and possibly earn a stipend. “I supervised and taught fifth grade art students to gain experience as an educator in the arts through Summer Rise. I was surprised to learn there is a decline in art and music teachers especially. It was really fun interacting with kids and seeing the cool projects they came up with,” senior Jezzel Renderos said.
Senior Dhruv Das spent nine weeks of his summer at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) developing a new 5G cellular network. “I worked with a team in designing an app that monitored the signal strength of this newly developed 5G cellular network at the APL campus. I learned a new programming language and how to apply computer science into a work environment,” Das said.
Senior Samantha Rafiqul taught students how to code at Code Ninjas, a company that strives to foster the development of coding skills through an engaging curriculum. “The biggest thing I learned was adapting. Each kid had a different learning style, so I would adapt to each kid’s suitable learning pace so that they were able to learn how to code but also have fun with it,” Rafiqul said.
Similarly, senior Heidi Lin works with kids, but in group therapy at Expressive Therapy Center. “I support a therapist in group therapy with kids ages seven to nine. I interact with the kids and help them stay on track. I experience the environment of being a therapist, and learn strategies to deal with certain scenarios should any problems arise,” Lin said.
While workplaces often only take in junior and senior interns, underclassmen should begin to think about options for the upcoming years. Applications for summer internships usually open in winter, and results come in early spring.
