Internships have long been regarded as a rite of passage for college students aiming to land a job immediately after graduating. But new data is suggesting intern pools may get even younger.
2024 survey data from CSR at American Student Assistance shows that employers are very interested in hiring high school students for internships – and offers a reasonable argument for why.
“I think the pandemic has really shifted a lot of thinking about why we go through our education systems and how it’s connected to real-world experiences,” said Julie Lammers, SVP of Advocacy and CSR at American Student Assistance (ASA), a national student career-readiness nonprofit. “The last few years have led young people to start evaluating the relevance of what they’re learning in high school and what is going to immediately translate into the workforce. Some employers have recognized this and they’re interested in filling that gap.”
To Lammers’ point, more employers are doing away with college degree requirements for job titles that previously called at least a bachelors, and at least 16 states no longer require a four-year degree for most state jobs.
What’s more, data has shown that teens are feeling unchallenged by their coursework, and wholly unprepared for the real world, even if they have aspirations to attend college.
The remedy? High school internships.
The value of high school internships
Lammers points out that early work programs can be an effective way to help young explore their career interests, but most importantly, to help them land a job when they’re they’re ready for it as adults.
“These types of internships give them a glimpse of what it’s like to leverage relationships to move up in their career,” Lammers tells ESSENCE. “We know that 50% of jobs still come through someone you know.” She has a point, but 2019 research shows that 80% of US jobs come through personal connections.
Data also suggests that up to 70% of all jobs are not published on public job forums, and most are fulfilled through networking.
“That social capital building is so critically important,” Lammers say. “One of the most important outcomes of a work-based learning experience is building that social network. We have to be really deliberate in making sure that all young people have access to these experiences, not just someone who knows someone. Really trying to be very tactical and deliberate in expanding these types of opportunities to all students.”
Fitting into a skills-based work economy
The pandemic forced many Gen Z college students to shelter-in-piece, thus missing the important social touch points previous generations cultivated in the office. As a result, some soft skills (interpersonal skills often demonstrated in professional settings) were lost. As more workplaces continue to push more remote and hybrid workers to make a return to the office, early careerists may have a harder time assimilating into job culture.
Lammers says that ASA’s survey data suggests high school internships can bridge that gap.
“Through no fault of their own, many young people have not been able to learn those durable skills needed in most workplaces,” she tells ESSENCE. That important communication piece, the ability to work on a team, all of those things that we know are built with a workplace experience.”
Who gets to experience these high school internships?
Although ASA’s recent survey data suggests employers are increasingly attracted to implementing high school internship programs, the opportunities may not be widely available to every student that wants them.
“Employers need to see themselves as a critical piece of solving this challenge of providing opportunity to young people,” Lammers says. “This can’t just be left to education systems and community-based organizations to do. This is the future workforce, and employers need to be willing to step up and provide these types of opportunities. It really starts with asking the important questions: How are we making sure you’re supporting a 16-year-old is different from how you support a young 22-year-old worker? How are we really thinking about those cultural competencies as youth are entering your workforce to make sure they’re feeling supported, they are not threatened by being in a new environment or a new way of doing things. It’s up to all of us to set younger generations up for success.”