UWS to offer paid internships thank to Great Lakes | Explore Superior

Grant Enables Paid Internships at UWS

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UW-Superior Receives $317,454 Grant

By Daniel Fanning

UWS to offer paid internships thank to Great Lakes | Explore Superior

UWS to offer paid internships thank to Great Lakes

The University of Wisconsin-Superior recently received a Career Ready Internship grant in the amount of $317,454 from  Great Lakes Higher Education Guaranty Corporation.  This grant will benefit students by offering opportunities to gain invaluable, real-world experience through paid internships in their fields of study.

This Great Lakes Career Ready Internship grant covers October 2015 through May 2018. An anticipated 240 new paid internships for juniors and seniors who don’t receive enough financial aid to cover college expenses will be created during this three-year period at UW-Superior. The program goals include cultivating new paid internship opportunities with business as well as government and public agencies.

“It’s a win-win for all,” stated Cortney Alexander, Director of Academic Advising and Career Services at UW-Superior.  “The student’s win by getting paid for an internship that would otherwise be cost prohibitive for them and the organizations win by getting the opportunity to work with energetic, dedicated, and financially secure undergraduate students who will eventually be leaders in their fields.”

Great Lakes learned the positive impact of paid internships from its past one-year grants. The Career Ready Internship program began as a $2.5 million pilot at 19 Wisconsin colleges during 2013-2014, and led to $5.2 million in grants for 40 colleges across four states in 2014-2015. Thousands of students have participated in paid internships in their fields of study, and 98 percent of these students either graduated or continued in their academic programs the following semester.

UW-Superior has earned Career Ready Internship grants since the Great Lakes program began. The UW-Superior ‘Jacket Internship Financial Assistance program was new on campus in 2013 and the social work program was the first group of students who benefited immediately.  Through this program, students were paid for their valuable contributions to state agencies and nonprofit organizations.

A student who was recently supported with a paid internship said, “The program made me work that much harder while I was interning and that reflected on my performance.  My internship has even offered me a job in the future.”

The three-year grant to UW-Superior is part of a record $12 million that has been awarded to 33 colleges and universities in Iowa, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Grant recipients have already begun collaborating with businesses and nonprofits to develop new paid internships, and are planning to make them sustainable beyond 2018, when the Great Lakes grant period ends.

“We were thrilled to see so many colleges recognize that our funding could bolster the reach of their existing internship programs and sponsor new partnerships with area employers,” said Amy Kerwin, Vice President – Community Investments at Great Lakes. “The 33 Career Ready Internship Grant recipients have embraced our desire to provide the greatest number of current and future students with an educational opportunity they might not otherwise have.”

“Paid internships benefit students, colleges and employers,” said Richard D. George, Great Lakes President and Chief Executive Officer. “Students gain meaningful workplace skills and are more likely to earn degrees and use their internship experiences to help secure good jobs upon graduation. Colleges will see increased graduation and job placement rates, and employers gain a pipeline to fresh talent.”

The new three-year grants require colleges to make an escalating cash match, which will encourage institutional sustainability. Great Lakes believes partnerships between colleges and employers will strengthen as the shared benefit becomes a shared commitment to cover an increasing percentage of funding for internships by the end of the grant period.

Colleges will spend the first three months on administrative planning, additional employer outreach, and student recruitment. Paid internship placements for eligible juniors and seniors will begin in January 2016. An anticipated 7,000 new internships will be created during this three-year period.

This UW-Superior opportunity was the result of hard work by several people and departments on campus and led by Career Services staff; Lynn Amerman Goerdt, Assistant Professor Social Work and Social Work Field Coordinator; Donna Dahlvang, Director of Financial Aid; Angie Soderberg, Career Services Internship Coordinator and Kaelene Arvidson-Hicks, Grants and Research Administrator.

About Great Lakes: Dedicated to making college education a reality since 1967.

Knowing that education has the power to change lives for the better, Great Lakes Higher Education Corporation & Affiliates was established as a nonprofit group focused on a single objective: helping students nationwide prepare for and succeed in postsecondary education and student loan repayment. As a leading student loan guarantor and servicer, Great Lakes has been selected by the U.S. Department of Education to provide assistance and repayment planning to more than 8 million borrowers—as well as assistance to colleges and lenders nationwide. The group’s earnings support one of the largest and most respected education philanthropy programs in the country. Since 2006, Great Lakes has committed nearly $154 million in grant funding to promote higher education access and completion for students of color, low-income students, and first-generation students. For additional information, visit home.mygreatlakes.org.

The University of Wisconsin-Superior is a nationally recognized public liberal arts institution of over 2,600 students in the Duluth-Superior, MN-WI metro area. UW-Superior now has more than 60 program offerings, select graduate programs, and competitive Division III athletics programs, as well as research and scholarship that support the community and region.




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