Four Reasons Your Company Should Hire NAF Interns

Hiring interns is a big decision—but hiring the right interns can mean big returns for your business.

NAF interns are not your average interns. Thanks to industry-specific courses and professional development activities they experience throughout high school, these interns will add value to your team from day one.

Hiring an intern isn’t just beneficial for the intern—it’s smart business. Here’s why your company should hire NAF high school interns:

NAF interns will exceed your expectations

Long gone are the days when interns just grabbed coffee or made copies in the backroom. NAF interns want to solve your company’s biggest challenges, improve your strategies, and share their fresh perspective with your team.

When Capital One hired NAF interns in their Home Equity Department, the team gained new ideas to work with. “I think high school students offer a different perspective,” Jamila Thompson, Learning Associate says. “The ideas that they came up with were like ah-ha moments for us.”

While there are plenty of misconceptions about hiring high school interns, NAF interns come equipped with industry skills. These high school students may not have years of experience, but their NAF academies have prepared them for the workplace.

“I’ve found them to be generally more productive, professional and conscientious about doing a great job than I expected—without any prior corporate work experience,” says Senior Manager of Virtualization Planning at Verizon, Greg Hutton who, along with his team, has mentored countless of NAF interns throughout the years. 

Tyler Woei-A-Sack, one of Hutton’s teammates and Network Engineer at Verizon, is constantly amazed at what these high school interns bring to the table.

“We face complex challenges every day at work and their input and thought process to resolve those challenges is amazing to see,” says Woei-A-Sack.

You’ll be building your talent pipeline

Hiring NAF interns is not just a corporate social responsibility venture for your company—it’s an investment in the future. Developing future talent is one of the smartest decisions a business can make. Career path decisions are made early, so when you hire high school students now, you create a pathway back to your business for future employees.

“When businesses have the opportunity to connect with high school students, they’re creating a pathway for these students to become the future leaders of their companies,” says NAF President, Lisa Dughi.

That’s right. NAF interns aren’t the only ones gaining valuable experience from their internships.

“Companies like Verizon can also build a continuous recruiting relationship with the interns for college internship positions then, hopefully, full-time superstar employees. This is great opportunity because those future full-time employees would have valuable experiences from their previous internships,” explains Woei-A-Sack.

Don’t believe us? NAF alumna, Brenda Urias, who started her career with AAA as a NAF intern recently celebrated 20 years with the company.

“Had it not been for NAF, I probably wouldn’t have been so far in my career and my employer is definitely reaping the benefits of hiring me as an intern 20 years ago,” says Urias who is now the Manager of Travel Marketing Programs at AAA.

The global competitiveness of the American workforce depends on it

America’s future innovators and leaders are sitting in today’s classrooms, but too many young adults are entering the workforce without the skills they need—and your company needs—to be successful.

Our nation’s economic success depends on your commitment to education. A significant portion of America’s unemployment rate is due to the growing chasm between skills and open jobs. America cannot compete in a global marketplace with an uneducated population and underprepared workforce—this is where you come in.

By hiring NAF high school interns, you’ll be contributing to a more diverse, educated and better-prepared workforce. Eighty-eight percent of NAF students are females and/or ethnic minorities and 69% are low-income, so by hiring NAF interns, you’ll be creating a path for overlooked American youth to obtain more competitive wages, bettering the national economy and creating a diverse talent pool for workforce recruitment.

Other companies are doing it, so why aren’t you?

Verizon, Capital One, Lenovo, KPMG, World Wide Technology, Marriott, and SAP all hire NAF high school interns—just to name a few. NAF has been matching qualified, diverse interns with businesses in a variety of industries for more than 30 years. From STEM fields like information technology, engineering, and health sciences to the fast-paced worlds of finance and hospitality, high school interns can help your business succeed—now and in the future.

And the best part? It’s easy.

NAF internship providers have access to a host of logistical resources from accounting to HR solutions so you can focus on providing quality work-based learning experiences for our interns and building that talent pipeline for your business.

“Why should you hire NAF interns? Simple: value, social responsibility, and investment into the future,” says Hutton.

Ready to hire? Let’s talk.