Marin nonprofit helps build student leaders

High school juniors and seniors who have a leadership bent and who want to help their peers go to college may apply now for a paid summer internship with the San Rafael-based nonprofit 10,000 Degrees.

Firas Khan of Novato High School, one of two interns in this year’s program, said it showed him how to fine-tune his nonprofit management abilities.

“I know this internship will definitely build up my leadership and self-advocacy skills, since we come up with and carry out most of our projects on our own,” Khan said.

Khan is a former director at the Islamic Center of North Marin, where he helped create a support group for students. He was also a student educator at Marin Makerspace and an intern photographer at the Marin County Civic Center.

“It’s really about developing the next generation of teens who are going to run the world one day,” said Janet Haney of Bank of America, which sponsors the program. “For me, it means we’re leveling the playing field of teens who need to work over the summer.”

Bank of America finances the eight-week internships at $17 per hour to benefit both the nonprofit and the students, Haney said.

The key takeaway for student leaders during the internship was to “see how their own career trajectories could be transformed,” said Megan Topping, spokesperson for 10,000 Degrees. “They get to work in a professional capacity under the lens of educational equity.”

According to Topping, Khan and intern Zoe Rosales helped 10,000 Degrees with a program to get college students a free account and professional profile on the social media platform LinkedIn. The interns set up an online testing station for students who were unable to attend the live demonstration.

The interns also updated the nonprofit’s database of 2,200 alumni of 10,000 Degrees who have received scholarships and other financial aid in order to track their status and college success.

“They got to see people in the community, and how they empowered their lives,” Topping said of the two interns.

Rosales said the experience was life-changing in terms of understanding how a culture of college success can be shaped for underserved populations.

“I’m a first-generation college student,” said Rosales, 18, a freshman at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. “Where I came from, college was not necessarily treated as important — it was more like a luxury.”

Rosales, a Petaluma resident who went to high school in Marysville, said she and Khan were able to support the work of 10,000 Degrees staffers who are helping Marin high schoolers access college success pathways.

“It taught me how valuable nonprofits can be,” Rosales said. “Now I want to devote my life to nonprofit work.”

Applications for the 2022 program opened Nov. 1 and are due by Jan. 28. Datils are available at bit.ly/3lrpF5e.