MTC Seeks High School Students for Paid Internships
OAKLAND, CA — High school students from throughout the Bay Area are invited to apply for summer jobs to receive paid work experience in the field of transportation through the Metropolitan Transportation Commission’s High School Internship Program. MTC has set April 22nd as the deadline for submission of applications from high school students who are at least 16 years old by the start of the program this June.
“The program’s purpose is to introduce students to potential careers in transportation,” noted MTC Executive Director Steve Heminger. One of MTC’s citizen advisory panels, the Minority Citizens Advisory Committee, provided guidance in the design of the program, which began in 2000, and assists with recruitment of high school students.
Dominique Bocanegra, a high school student who interned in 2008 with the City of Brisbane Public Works Department between her junior and senior years, said she worked on a variety of projects. They included logging parking permit survey comments, setting up a digital permit-tracking database and installing traffic counters that calculate speed and traffic volume. Bocanegra especially enjoyed the three days she spent with Brisbane’s police department, where she learned to use a radar gun as part of a speed survey and rode with a K-9 police unit. She called her summer job “the best experience of my life.”
Students will be employed, either full-time or part-time, for up to eight weeks between June and August with cities and public agencies in a department related to transportation planning or engineering, public works or public transit. Hourly pay in 2008 was $9.50. Currently, 25 paid internships are available throughout the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. Students can view all of the positions and select the internship(s) they are most interested in being considered for by going to the MTC Web site at www.mtc.ca.gov/jobs/high_school/. Students must be at least 16 years old and have completed at least the tenth grade by the start of the program, and must have a minimum grade point average of 2.8. Applications from students with grade point averages below 2.8 will be considered if accompanied by two letters of recommendation.
“This is an opportunity for students throughout the entire region,” commented Ann Macaulay, program manager. “Along with the more urbanized parts of the Bay Area — Alameda, Contra Costa, San Jose, San Mateo and San Francisco — we especially need student applications for positions in Marin, Napa, Solano and Sonoma counties.”
Application packets are available online from the MTC Web site (www.mtc.ca.gov/jobs/high_school/) or by request via e-mail to highschool@bayareametro.gov. In addition, MTC’s High School Internship Coordinator can be contacted at (510) 817-5807 for further information. Applications will be accepted via fax to (510) 817-5848 or may be mailed or delivered in person to MTC at 101 8th Street, Oakland, California, 94607 (no e-mailed applications will be accepted).
The deadline for submitting completed applications — including a one-page cover letter and a letter of recommendation — is Wednesday, April 22, although some counties will have jobs open until filled.
MTC is the regional transportation planning, financing and coordinating agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area.
Contacts:
Kordnie Lee: (510) 817-5807
Ann Macaulay: (510) 817-5741