This week, spring officially arrived at Students for Justice -- we started planting the seeds for the summer 2022 session by interviewing applicants. They are an inspiring group and we are really looking forward to getting to know them better as interns!!! At the same time, we are hearing about the exciting plans that our former interns have for their summers. One of those interns, Andre Williams, is heading to Oregon for a great job.
Andre is a sophomore mechanical engineering major at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. He was paired for the fall 2021 session with volunteer mentor Elaine Mathews, who has worked as a research scientist at NASA's Goddard Institute and Ames Research Center. Elaine's professional background enabled her to mentor Andre as a scientist as well as in his role as an intern. Andre told us, “This upcoming summer, I'm going to work with HP in Corvallis in 3D printing. I'm really excited. I definitely feel like SFJ helped me going into that interview. Before I had my first interview with them, my mentor Elaine helped me prep. She helped me prep for most of my interviews."
Andre wasn’t actively involved in politics before joining Students for Justice last fall, but through the internship, his relationship to politics was transformed: "I definitely pay more attention to politics now. I look at it as something that can be fixed and something that can be changed. You can have a personal impact on it." This is music to our ears! Our goal at Students for Justice is for our interns to become informed citizens and stay engaged politically after the internship's end. Some, perhaps including Andre, will also become leaders in the fight for voting rights.
Within Students for Justice, Andre has been promoted. He is going to return to SFJ in the fall semester as a team manager, leading a group of interns through the program. As a team manager, he will benefit from participation in a leadership skills workshop and one-on-one mentoring as he also gains management skills through practice. This training will help him wherever his career takes him. We know he is going to do a great job in this new role!
