Internship program seeks students, employers

A new program will offer paid internships to Texas Southmost College students and UTRGV students on the Brownsville campus.

Administered by United Way of Southern Cameron County, the All-In Internship Program will collaborate with Brownsville employers to provide 45 paid internships for each campus that will have “productive and meaningful work assignments with a learning component related to their major,” according to an information brochure.

Blanca Davila, post-secondary success coordinator for United Way of Cameron County, said the All-In program was created with the hope of placing students in a workplace before they graduate so they get experience. As soon as they graduate, they can market themselves because they have experience on their résumé.

“This program is going to help out outreach to other businesses in order for students to be experienced because, nowadays, many jobs require you to have two to three years’ experience once you graduate,” said Vicente Martinez, a senior majoring in accounting and marketing.

Andrea Torres, All-In Internship coordinator for the UTRGV Career Center, said to participate in the program, students must be enrolled at UTRGV or Texas Southmost College, meet satisfactory academic progress, be a junior or senior at UTRGV with a declared major (or in their last semester of their declared certificate or last year of their declared education program at TSC), meet employer qualifications for the internship and be eligible to work in the United States, according to the All-In Internship Program employer and student handbook.

Students who qualify and are interested in the program should visit the Career Center, located in Cortez Hall 129, and ensure that their profile is active and résumé is uploaded on Career Connection, Torres said.

“For some people that already have their profile, just make sure your information is all correct. … Once your résumé is done and turned in on Career Connection, you email me,” Torres said. Torres’ email address is andrea.torres01@utrgv.edu.

The email should include the student’s name, major and classification. From there, the student’s applicant type will change to internship and he or she will be able to see and apply to available internships.

“After the employer posts the job, it’s up to them … to determine if you are the one that’s going to get hired,” Torres said. “You also need to make sure you meet the qualifications of your employer and those qualifications are going to be showcased in your résumé.”

The internship or placement the students obtain should be aligned to their degree, Davila said.

“Students can themselves, right now … go scout for an employer, a company, within Brownsville,” Torres said.

The program requires the employer to pay the intern a minimum of $10 an hour plus applicable employment taxes. The employer will be reimbursed $5 for every hour the student works for up to 300 hours in a 15-week internship period.

“If the employer wants that specific student, then we just go to through the formal process really fast and they just hire the student,” Torres said.

Once the students start their internship, they will be paid by the employer, not UTRGV, Torres said.

“[This] is another reason it’s all up to the employer to do the interview, to hire them … and to pay them,” she said.

After students are hired, they are required to complete a 16-hour non-paid soft skills training workshop conducted by Workforce Solutions Cameron. Ten students at TSC have already undergone the training, Torres said.

“We have two hours of résumé checks … two hours of mock interviews and 12 hours of actual soft skills training in a classroom setting,” Torres said, adding that the workshop will train students on how to be a successful employee.

The training will be conducted by Frieda Linton, a facilitator for Workforce Solutions Cameron, Torres said.

For more information about the All-In internship program, visit allininternships.com/wp/ or email Davila at blanca@unitedwayrgv.org and Torres at andrea.torres01@utrgv.edu.

“The All In Partnership was established in Brownsville in 2011 through a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,” according to a UTRGV news release. “The partnership includes leaders from 13 businesses and organizations united to create a shared agenda and strategic plan to strengthen and build partnerships, engage the local community to raise awareness about postsecondary completion rates, and remove barriers preventing students from enrolling, continuing and completing college, and gaining living wage employment.”