Internships for High School & College Students

Hi Berkeley and Bay Area Parents!

I have a 16 year old about to enter her Jr year and she has decided to complete an academic program where she gets to intern somewhere for 4 hrs a week. We aren’t well connected in the area, and so many opportunities arrive by ‘who you know’ so I am putting our requests out into the network to see if anyone can suggest somewhere/someone.  The program is pretty broad, but her interests lie in social justice and early childhood development, and she’s a great people person and writer.  Friday or Saturday would be her best working day, and she’s ok going outside of her immediate neighborhood. 
Happy to hear everyone’s thoughts! 

My son graduates HS in May and has been focused on pre med for a few years, has been selected for several internships around Oakland and beyond. He's been accepted to some great universities (still deciding which one) so he's a serious, accomplished, focused student. I'm a fairly low income mom and he needs to earn money this summer, so he can't do much volunteer work - though he could do a little. He's applying to standard summer camp jobs and so on. But he really wants to shadow ANY medical professionals, or do a very p/t volunteer role in medicine, as well as earn money. We don't really have any doctor friends. If he writes to local doctors, dentists, PTs and etc do you think they'd allow him to shadow? Does anyone have any creative ideas to get him shadowing this summer? He simply needs exposure to almost any aspect of medicine, both for his resume and to learn what he might be interested in, because we have no medical professionals in our family. BTW, 95% of internships either demand 1+ years of college, or that they be in HS. He's in an in-between spot as a graduate. Thank you.

Hi Parents,

Our daughter will be home in the Bay Area this summer after finishing her freshman year of college.  She is majoring Cell & Molecular Biology at UCSD.  She is hoping to find a volunteer position or a research job in any bio related lab.  She is willing to take on any task that needs to be done in the lab (i.e. wash glassware and other tedious jobs) to get exposure to research. I have told her to temper her expectations because 1) she will only be a rising Sophomore, and 2) COVID will likely still be an issue.

We would love to hear any suggestions that parents (or their college age kids) have regarding finding research opportunities at UC Berkeley, UCSF, Children's Hospital Oakland, or any where else in the Bay Area.

Thanks in advance for any advice or assistance.

Hi Parents,

My daughter is a freshman at UCSD this year and she is working on making plans for a summer job or volunteer position.  Although she is very early in the overall process, after undergrad she would like to attend medical school.  With that in mind, next summer (2021) she is hoping to come home to the Bay Area and work as a scribe at a hospital or other medical practice. Neither my husband nor I have any connection to medicine, so we don't have any advice to give her regarding how to find such a position. We would greatly appreciate any information or advice from parents or recent or current medical students regarding how to obtain a scribe position or other position that would provide patient care experience.

Thanks in advance for any info you can provide.

P.S.  Based on information I've previously obtained from BPN, I am encouraging our daughter to keep her options open in case she decides to reorient her career choice.

Hello Parents,

My junior college student is home this coming fall, taking online classes at SDSU and is looking for an internship opportunity. She is passionate about equality and has taken many classes on the matter. Would you know of organizations she could contact? We live in Walnut Creek but she is able to commute.  Thank you.

My 17-year-old niece, who lives in Barcelona, will be staying with us for 4-6 weeks in summer 2019 and is seeking an internship or job while she's here. She is fluent in four languages (Spanish, English, German, and Catalan), is very bright, has excellent people skills, and is a hard worker. She's open to all sorts of things--in private sector or public. She's most interested in social studies and psychology so I was thinking maybe something with the departments of psychology/sociology/anthropology at UC Berkeley, though I have no idea what options there might be. She's also wonderful with young children, and since she speaks both English and Spanish we thought perhaps something working with kids. Can anyone advise? 

I realize that it's a bit early, but thought I'd solicit some opinions / experiences / suggestions for a 17 year old boy who is interested in learning more about becoming a police officer. A little daunting for me to think about, but it's something he is interested in and I was curious about any summer programs where he could intern on that or possibly make a small amount of money doing a summer job in that area. I read about something called the Oakland Police Explorers, but there wasn't a lot of information about that. Any feedback would be appreciated.