Pomona College students are gaining experience for future careers and helping their community close to home as interns spring semester for the City of Claremont.
Support for their experience comes from the Pomona College Internship Program (PCIP), which provides stipends for unpaid, student-sourced internships that meet eligibility requirements. PCIP provides a curriculum during the semester that includes activities such as informational interviews, check-ins on interaction with employers and internship reflection papers. This curriculum supports the students’ development as they intern at a variety of organizations, including the City of Claremont, says Elizabeth Contreras, assistant director for experiential learning and career advising in the Career Development Office. She adds that “everything is aimed at connecting their experiences to broader career aspirations.”
Tracking Water Usage to Prevent Overconsumption
Julia Aceron ’28, a mathematics major minoring in data science, is using software to organize a device tracking water use in city facilities. By visualizing the results, she hopes to help the City of Claremont prevent overconsumption. “I communicated with the water company to help with the syncing of the spreadsheets for the water payments. This allows for more automatic data entry, which improves efficiency,” she adds.
Aceron’s career goal is to be a government data analyst, “to serve my community and improve the environment,” she says. Data science “integrates computer science, math and statistics to improve the world,” Aceron notes. “So seeing how it can be used in the context of local government sparked my intrigue.”
The internship has helped Aceron understand how important feedback is in organizing data. Her advisor shares Aceron’s work with others in city government and tells her what works and what doesn’t—“which helps me improve my skills,” she’s found.
Promoting Claremont’s Urban Forest
Kei Bromley ’27 and Emma Grace Howlett ’25 are working together on a web and social media campaign to educate the residents of Claremont about the city’s urban forest that has earned it an Arbor Day Foundation Tree City designation. More than 25,000 trees are owned by the city because they grow in an easement area extending 10 feet from the curb. Cooperation between the city and its residents in caring for the trees is essential to maintenance of the arbored streets that are a source of civic pride.
Bromley and Howlett view the internship as a way to make a positive contribution to the community and to learn how classroom insights could be applied in local government. Howlett, a history major, says the internship “provides a window into the intersections between two of my passions—community service and education.” For Bromley, who is majoring in environmental analysis, “developing a deep understanding of the importance of community outreach and involvement” will help advance her possible career in sustainable infrastructure.
Trees, Howlett has learned, benefit communities not only by absorbing pollutants, creating shade and providing habitat for wildlife; they also contribute to mental well-being. Bromley says the interns are “helping to bridge the gap between residents and tree policy in the city.” Their work includes making website documents easier to understand and creating social media posts to encourage residents to be stewards of the environment.
Helping to Standardize Community Project Decision Making
Jun Kwon ’28 aspires to work in either law or government. A philosophy, politics and economics major, he applied for the Claremont internship to gain a broader understanding of municipal government. Too often, he believes, people only pay attention to the state and national levels and overlook the good they can do through local politics.
On the job, Kwon has learned that scores of organizations propose community projects each year, and the City of Claremont approves or rejects them on a case-by-case basis. “The city wanted some form of standardized framework to base their decisions on,” he says.
Kwon is researching best practices in other locales and helping create a framework to aid decision making. One important takeaway thus far: “Policy developments don’t have to happen overnight.”
Developing a Curriculum for Leadership and Employee Development
Psychological science major Annie Xu ’28 says that she “feels deeply passionate about working with people and for people.” Her internship involves researching an employee development curriculum and outlining a mentorship program to benefit the City of Claremont’s 300 employees. She is also working on a survey of employee career satisfaction.
From the start, Xu knew she would be pushing beyond her current level of experience. “This excited me,” she says, “as I am always pursuing opportunities to push myself a bit further than what is comfortable.”
A previous internship with a consulting firm helped Xu become familiar with organizational structures, something she is finding helpful in her current role. “This internship has been so insightful,” she says. “I never realized how much policy and effort is put into ensuring that we citizens have a safe, inclusive and lively community to live in, and I feel so honored to be contributing to it.”