Asian American Youth Internship Program: Angela’s Story

This summer, Angela, Class of 2029, a Biochemistry major, participated in Apex for Youth‘s paid internship program. She worked as a Research & Teaching Intern at BioBus in partnership with Life Science Cares. 

Apex for Youth’s J.T. Tai Internship Program aims to close the opportunity gap for first-generation Asian American youth across NYC by placing them in paid internships with organizations such as BioBus. High school students intern for six weeks, and college students for eight weeks, each working 30 hours a week in a professional environment. Youth can explore career fields, build professional skills, and expand their networks with the support of mentors.

BioBus’s mission resonated with Angela from the start. They work to make science accessible to people who are often excluded from it because of race, gender, economic status, or physical access, and to help them build the confidence to explore it. For Angela, that mission felt closely aligned with Apex for Youth’s own work empowering Asian American youth to unlock potential they might never have thought possible.

Digging Into Rain Gardens

Angela and her fellow interns were given a choice of three research topics: air quality, food scarcity, and rain gardens and flooding. With a particular interest in mycology and fungi, Angela was drawn to rain gardens: the small, sidewalk-level gardens designed to manage stormwater. She was paired with fellow intern Shelly to combine the two interests into a single research project.

Together, they designed an experiment testing how fungi might support rain gardens under environmental stress. They set up four planting conditions: soil alone, plants and soil, plants and mushrooms. Plants, soil, and mushrooms were exposed to varying concentrations of a mock pollutant, copper (II) sulfate. Watering the pots every two to four days, they tracked changes in soil pH and copper content over time, looking for signs that fungi could help buffer plants against pollution.

Mentoring the Next Generation

Alongside her research, Angela and Shelly served as scientific communicators and mentors to three high school students: Janet, Tristen, and Victoria. They guided them through their first research projects and offered insight into the college application process. Angela focused on Biochemistry, and Shelly on entomology, giving their mentees a window into two very different scientific fields.

Angela and her fellow interns also brought science directly to younger students. The team designed a hands-on, 10-minute activity to teach elementary and middle schoolers about pH, setting up stations where kids could dip pH strips into different liquids and observe the results themselves.

Learning Through Exploration

Beyond the lab, Angela pointed to the Apex for Youth’s professional development sessions as one of the summer’s highlights. She enjoyed visiting Lincoln Center and having a lunch-and-learn.

“Hearing professionals speak candidly about switching careers and not always knowing their path forward made me feel more relieved to know it’s okay to not know what you want to do at the moment; rather, it’s good to go out there and explore, which these PD sessions help me do,” Angela said. Those sessions also pushed her to build her professional network, a goal she’d set for herself at the start of the summer.

A Summer of Growth

Angela’s summer reflects exactly what the J.T. Tai Internship Program is designed to do. The program matches Asian American high school and college students with paid internships that let them explore career fields, work in professional environments, and build the skills and networks that carry into their school, careers, and lives.

In fact, 96% of youth completing Apex’s Summer Internship Program said the experience helped them gain new professional skills.

Her story is one of many made possible by donors like J.T. Tai & Co. Foundation, and community partners such as BioBus and Life Science Cares, who open their doors each summer to give youth like Angela a real foothold in the scientific community.

“We love when our internship program can partner with Community Organizations to create meaningful learning opportunities for our youth that positively impact the New York City Community. With BioBus, three of our interns were able to support science and research programming for high school students and conduct research of their own.” – Marina Karnofsky, Career Exploration Program Manager

Is your company interested in hosting a J.T. Tai intern next summer? Apex for Youth handles the screening, matching, hiring, and ongoing support; you provide the mentorship and real-world experience. Email internships@apexforyouth.org or visit apexforyouth.org to learn more.