Students Showcase Their Internship Work
AT&T gives laptops to students to ‘bridge the digital divide’
Incoming Lowell High School junior Devangi Baghat, 17, explains some of the work she did for online jewelry store Honor & Co. during her internship through Project LEARN's Summer Internship Program. Baghat was one of dozens of young students showcasing their work in MCC's Morse Federal Building Aug. 14, 2024. (Peter Currier/Lowell Sun)
Published in the Lowell Sun on August 16, 2024
LOWELL — Dozens of students who took part in the Project LEARN Summer Internship Program were given the opportunity to show off what they learned and the work they did during their internships with a variety of companies and organizations.
More than 70 students from Lowell High School and Middlesex Community College took part in the paid internships over this summer, many of whom talked about their work during Project LEARN’s first-ever Internship Showcase & Networking Event Wednesday morning at MCC’s Federal Building.
Among the crowd of young students was Devangi Baghat, 17, an rising junior at Lowell High School who interned with online jewelry store Honor & Co., where she helped with the company’s marketing efforts by taking photos and videos of pieces of jewelry and editing them before posting them online.
“It gave me the opportunity to learn business management,” said Baghat.
Next to her was recent LHS grad Henrietta Nyandemoh, 18, who plans to attend UMass Lowell this fall and interned with Harvard MEDScience. Through the internship, Nyandemoh said she went through the full gauntlet of introductory medicine, from CPR, to stitching, to broken bones and checking blood pressure.
She said the experience made her think about how she wanted to approach a potential career in medicine.
“I knew that medicine was up there for me, so I wanted to see how I liked it. My real takeaway is that I am not a hospital person. I would rather do private practice or research,” said Nyandemoh.
UMass Lowell Chancellor Julie Chen told the crowd of students after the showcase that doing internships like they did was an opportunity to “figure out what you get excited about.”
“All that homework, all those tests, all those exams, they become a lot easier when you understand what it is you want to do and why you are doing it,” said Chen.
LHS rising senior Surika Prak spoke to the crowd about her own Project LEARN internship experience at Lowell Public Schools’ IDEA Camp, which offers various summer STEM workshops for students in grades 5-12. Through it, Prak said she helped start up “LHS Food Reviews” to inform fellow students of good food options in Lowell, and she learned how to solder metal.
“Ultimately through Project LEARN, I was able to meet so many amazing people and I am so grateful that there are people out there who are willing to support our generation as we pursue our careers,” said Prak.
Lowell Superintendent of Schools Liam Skinner praised community partners like Project LEARN for their work in supplementing the education of Lowell students with opportunities for them to experience the workforce.
“There is no partnership more dynamic and meaningful than the one we have with Project LEARN,” said Skinner. “It takes a village, and Lowell Public Schools is a large institution, but we don’t have it all in there. We need these community partners to provide support.”
At the end of the showcase, each of the interns was gifted with a free laptop through a partnership with AT&T as part of an effort to “bridge the digital divide” by providing students with equipment that has become almost a necessity in modern education.
Michael Hartigan, AT&T director of public affairs for the Northeast, said the telecommunications company worked closely with Project LEARN as part of a wider effort to prepare students for the workforce by making sure they have the means to do so. AT&T has worked with Project LEARN for a couple of years now, but they have been providing digital devices to tens of thousands of students for much longer.
“We work with organizations like Project LEARN to address challenges students might face in overcoming the digital divide,” said Hartigan. “We are providing the resources and tools to start out strong.”
Dozens of students were given the opportunity Aug. 14, 2024 to show off the work they did this summer through Project LEARN's Summer Internship Program in a showcasing event at MCC's Morse Federal Building, where all of the students were also gifted with laptops by AT&T. (Peter Currier/Lowell Sun)
Incoming Lowell High School senior Surika Prak, 17, speaks to a crowd of fellow students at MCC's Morse Federal Building Aug. 14, 2024 during a showcasing event where the students showed off some of the work they did for Project LEARN's Summer Internship Program. (Peter Currier/Lowell Sun)