Pilot Program: High School Students Intern at Tech Companies

The times, they are a' changing.

Technology is literally transforming every study and career path. So there is no better time than now to start inspiring high school students by exposing them to the myriad of fields and industries they can work in when they have technology and digital media skills.

This week, more than 20 students from Ignatius Gymnasium in Amsterdam started internships with technology companies and organizations in Amsterdam and Hilversum which are using technology to develop and deliver products and services.

The internships are part of a pilot program developed by PreparationTech and NewTechKids, a tech education academy in Amsterdam which teaches computer science, coding and computational thinking to primary, middle and high school students.

The pilot's goals are to:

• make technology-related learning more experiential in order to highlight the benefits of technology education
• make high school students more aware of study, training and careers related to technology and digital media
• bring students into contact with role models who can teach them about different industries and fields and provide information about possible pathways
• encourage companies to showcase what they do and how they use technology in order to expand the tech talent pipeline

Students are interning at a wide variety of companies and organizations, including:

• one of the world's leading digital creative companies
• a principal trading firm and one of the world's largest liquidity providers
• a leading Dutch IT company focused on mission critical solutions
• a digital healthcare communications solutions firm
• a leading European Urban Artificial Intelligence Research & Development team
• a global digital productivity company founded in the Netherlands
• one of the Netherlands' largest digital media companies

More information will follow on some on the companies participating in this pilot program.

If your company or organization would like to help inspire high school students to pursue tech-related study and career paths by providing internships or other engagement activities, please reach out to Deborah Carter at dcarter[at]preparationtech.com

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If your high school is interested in developing a similar internship program, please reach out to Deborah Carter at dcarter[at]preparationtech.com

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(Photo by John Schnobrich on Unsplash)

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