A Parent, An Advisory Board Member, An Internship Provider: How BAE Systems Embraced the Power of Internships

Local NAF advisory boards and their members provide an essential bridge between the classroom and the workplace. By working with academy leaders, advisory board members use their industry expertise to ensure that academy students have a robust and enriching learning experience that better prepares them for college and career success. The board in southern New Hampshire is no exception.

Sheila Lessard, Manager of Finance Training and Support for BAE Systems, Electronic Systems, has been directly involved with her local NAF advisory board for three years. It all started after her daughter, a NAF academy student at the time, completed her internship with BAE Systems. Sheila saw the positive experience her daughter had and realized that many companies tend to connect to upcoming talent too late – during their Junior or Senior year of college – and in order to build a stronger talent pipeline, they needed to start in high school. When an advisory board seat opened for the Academies of Finance in the southern New Hampshire area, she jumped at the chance to get involved.

BAE Systems has a long history of supporting NAF academies in New Hampshire through the advisory board. Since 2006, they have placed 14 interns into their Billings and Accounting groups. Internships like these give high school students hands-on experience in a real work environment and empower them to sharpen both their hard and soft skills. While NAF only requires a 120-hour internship, BAE Systems interns work 40 hours a week for the entire summer. This commitment can be challenging for a high school student, especially if it’s their first job, but Sheila has been impressed by many of the interns who take full advantage of the opportunity to learn and characterizes the vast majority of them as “high performers.” Three of the interns from 2006 – 2013 were offered full-time employment after they graduated college.

Sheila thinks these experiences are critical for students because “it’s important for the industry to put a face on tech. It’s not just ‘nerdy,’ it can be really cool too!” If students aren’t exposed early on to professionals in a variety of careers, they may be too afraid to explore a certain subject in college or completely unaware of an industry that might help them succeed. As an advisory board member, one thing Sheila makes sure the NAF academy students know is that “finance people really are part of the STEM equation and a lot of finance jobs have a technical hybrid component to them. Jobs in finance aren’t just balance sheet or accounting related. The finance world is much larger than students might think.”

Thanks to the commitment of Sheila and BAE Systems, local NAF students have an inside look into finance and technology careers and are better prepared for future success. To learn more about becoming an advisory board member, you can visit naf.org/get-involved/volunteer-locally.

Sheila is the manager of Finance Training and Support for BAE Systems, Electronic Systems. She is responsible for supporting financial tools including functional needs assessments, requirements definition, system implementation and coordination of training and support. To learn more about BAE Systems, you can visit baesystems.com.