Bank of America is celebrating 20 years of its paid summer internship program, Student Leaders — an internship that often is students’ first paychecks, the company said.
The program connects high school juniors and seniors to eight-week paid summer internships with local nonprofits, allowing them to build skills and early work experience.
Paid summer internships are no longer supremely rare, at least in the for-profit sector. Various reports put the share of students whose internships were paid at 56% (a widely cited National Association of Colleges and Employers study from 2016) to 61% (a Zippia survey from 2023).
A solid internship program can serve as an important vehicle for talent scouting and employer branding. That’s especially true if it has good pay and offers valuable experience and the foundations for a potential full-time job, according to Glassdoor’s best internships of 2024 list — and those are all aspects of why BofA began its program in 2004.
“The Student Leaders program started because we recognized the need to equip youth around the country with skills and work experience needed to provide better job opportunities in the future,” Stephanie Lomibao, senior vice president and Philanthropic Giving Program executive at Bank of America, told HR Dive in an email. “Stressing the value of internships beginning in high school would bolster these student’s resumes early on and inspire them to build on this valuable experience with new internships as they continued their education.”
BofA also recognized that a summer internship is often the first time their students are being paid a wage, so the company also provides financial education, Lomibao said.
“What we’ve learned is that our workforce needs have only grown over 20 years, so by equipping more than 4,500 students, we’ve played a role in meeting these needs and setting an example for other companies,” she continued.
Internship programs more broadly can be important reputation builders. But employers must be careful to implement them in ways that are compliant with various laws and keep interns engaged from the first moment, an attorney previously wrote for HR Dive.