Expand, Enlighten and Engage
TLH’s main goals:
- Expand internship opportunities for interested businesses and students
- Enlighten current college students and recent graduates living in the Tallahassee area about the Capital City community
- Engage young talent in all that Tallahassee and the surrounding areas have to offer personally and professionally
TLH’s strategic plans:
Expand – TLH has found a link between students who interned in Tallahassee during their college careers and recent graduates who now reside in Tallahassee. Therefore, TLH plans to improve the quality of internship experiences in the community by working with the higher education institutes and interested businesses to develop an internship tool kit. This will include specifically targeting the public sector organizations. This toolkit will contain a comprehensive guide for businesses regarding attracting, interviewing, hiring, and managing interns. The toolkit has the potential to be industry specific and tie in the ability to foster relationships between businesses and colleges that have mastered the internship process with those starting or struggling with their current program. TLH is working with the Greater Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce to host the toolkit on the Chamber site as a resource for interested parties. TLH’s hope is that through expanded opportunities for internships, students can make the connections and gain the experience necessary to see potential in Tallahassee’s business community – enough to make plans to stay and call Tallahassee home.
Enlighten – TLH has found a link between students who connect with groups that are actively engaged in Tallahassee happenings and those recent graduates who decided to make the Capital City their home. TLH plans to promote Tallahassee and the surrounding areas, as well as groups that young talent can become involved with that cultivate these connections. TLH plans to nominate citizens that will formally and informally speak to groups as ambassadors of Tallahassee. TLH plans to implement a campaign surrounding Tallahassee’s offerings fueled by those community members that “LOVE Tallahassee” as the ambassadors.
Engage – TLH has found a link between those college students engaged outside of the college campus and immediate surroundings during their careers and those who chose to call Tallahassee home because they experienced what the community has to offer. Through this model TLH plans to work with the young professional groups in Tallahassee that have a large base of membership and already established actions and events attracting and retaining young professionals to Tallahassee. Some of these are professionally focused, while others focus on personal development. Both are necessary for the happiness of many in the young generation and play a large part in stopping the brain drain of the community. TLH plans to connect current college students to these groups, as well as help these young professional groups promote and organize events for students and recent graduates to attend.
How you can help: We need you! If you or someone you know would be interested in volunteering with us and offering up ideas on any of the goals to expand, enlighten and engage, email William Smith at Smith.William@ccbg.com.
Happy New Year!
Research, research, research is the name of the game for TLH since chose to focus on college internships and engagement in the Tallahassee community.
Members of our team have been talking with many people in the community and are working to partner with key stakeholders like TCC, FAMU and FSU that will provide the talented students for our local businesses.
We have gained valuable information and perspective from higher education staff about internship requirements and availability. Students need quality internships to help fulfill class credit and to gain valuable working knowledge in their fields. Our opportunity for a successful project lies within the business, government and non-profit community.
We need to communicate the importance of quality internship experiences for students and then help create tools to make offering these positions an easy choice for Tallahassee area organizations.
As we talk with more and more members of the community, we are finding overwhelming support for our project, which has already been a topic for a few other community groups. We’re hoping we can be the glue that brings everyone together to make this happen.
Talent Lives Here Needs Your Input!
The Talent Lives Here initiative is gathering information on internships in the area and has developed a survey so that local organizations and businesses can provide some baseline data upon which the initiative can base its efforts. Whether you currently have an internship program or you’ve had one in the past, or you’ve never had an internship program, the Talent Lives Here Initiative would like to invite you to take the survey here.
In addition, if you are willing to share what makes your internship program successful or you know of other area businesses, non-profits or other organizations that the initiative should contact about their internship program, please contact jlovelace@talchamber.com.