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U of I intern program helps fight state’s ‘brain drain’

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.bodytext {float: left; } .floatimg-left-hort { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right: 10px; width:300px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-caption-hort { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:300px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-vert { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right:15px; width:200px;} .floatimg-left-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; font-size: 10px; width:200px;} .floatimg-right-hort { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px;} .floatimg-right-caption-hort { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimg-right-vert { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px;} .floatimg-right-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; border-top-style: double; border-top-color: black; border-bottom-style: double; border-bottom-color: black;} .floatimgright-sidebar p { line-height: 115%; text-indent: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar h4 { font-variant:small-caps; } .pullquote { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 150px; background: url(http://www.dmbusinessdaily.com/DAILY/editorial/extras/closequote.gif) no-repeat bottom right !important ; line-height: 150%; font-size: 125%; border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} .floatvidleft { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatvidright { float:right; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} The University of Iowa has joined the fight against Iowa’s fleeing younger generation with a growing internship program.

“(The internship program) helps to keep our best and brightest here, or at least expose them to what is here so they will remember down the road and possibly come back,” said Jan Danielson Kaiser, marketing manager for the Des Moines Public Library.

The internships help connect students to Greater Des Moines and make it a realistic option for their future.

“There is much more to Des Moines than at first glance,” said Tom Sullivan, a marketing intern for the Des Moines library and a journalism student. “This has been largely beneficial. I had no experience in a large-city setting.”

The Pomerantz Career Center, the University of Iowa’s career service office, launched its Des Moines Center Internship Program with 15 students and local organizations on board in January 2007. After a successful spring semester, the fall 2007 program grew to 20 students employed by new and returning companies.

Local organizations have benefited from the establishment of the internship program. For smaller and nonprofit organizations, the extra help is welcome.

“Just to have an extra pair of hands, it is invaluable to me to have that extra help,” said Danielson Kaiser, whom Sullivan helps with writing, annual reports, events and a range of marketing efforts for the library.

Larger companies, such as Principal Financial Group Inc., appreciate additional organizations working toward retention and recruitment in Central Iowa. The University of Iowa is one of the top four schools that Principal recruits from, said Nu Huynh, lead campus relations consultant for Principal. With many U of I students coming from Chicago and other outside areas and looking to return to their hometowns after graduation, Huynh said new efforts promoting jobs in Des Moines are exciting and supported.

“For us (getting involved) was a no-brainer; it made perfect sense,” Huynh said.

Students appreciate the connection to the job market and the opportunity to get established in Des Moines

“You get an idea of how things really work in the world,” said Michael Mittelstadt, an Iowa student studying finance, who completed an internship with Principal last spring. “You get the hands-on experience and an idea for your future career.”

After receiving his degree in the spring, Mittelstadt said he has been offered a job at Principal, and will return to work with the same investment performance team he interned with. Mittelstadt said that the quality of the company and the position will allow him to stay in Iowa, close to home.

Besides giving job experience to students and recent graduates, the program provides life experience; they experience what Central Iowa has to offer.

“Iowa is not just a cornfield,” said Ericka Meanor, an intern at the Iowa governor’s office, who majors in international studies and German at Iowa. “We have so much going for us. As a student at a university I did not see all the opportunities.”

Three goals define the Des Moines Center program.

First, the program is designed to encourage the retention of young professionals in Iowa, said Gerald Wickham, director of experiential education at the Pomerantz Career Center. By providing interns with 12 academic credit hours, professional networking opportunities, service learning requirements and a course on the “Images of Iowa,” students are offered alternatives for getting connected and receive better exposure to opportunities within Iowa.

With 20 students studying different subjects and interning within a variety of fields, the U of I designed the “Images” course to provide some common content for the students.

“The class is ostensibly to combat ‘brain drain,'” said Ralph Siddall, who teaches the course. “Students get a sense of the qualities of Iowa so they are not on the first plane to New York or Chicago.”

This semester, Siddall said, he is taking advantage of the political campaigns by studying political rhetoric and how the campaigns and literature depict Iowa.

“A lot of the students are Iowa natives,” Siddall said. “They think they have to get out because the rest of the world says Iowa is small; after a while you start to believe it.”

The students can see Iowa from an analytical perspective, Wickham said. They can consider what Iowa holds for their future and how they can contribute to the state’s future.

The Des Moines Center internship program also provides a channel to make connections within Central Iowa. Adam Steen, a growth capitalist with Transition Capital Management in West Des Moines, organizes networking activities between established professionals and Iowa interns.

“It starts with networking and connecting, but ends with learning and getting involved,” Steen said.

Speed networking activity nights are scheduled during the semester, and lunch and casual meetings continue throughout the term to help relationships grow. With life and business experience, professionals help bridge the gaps and establish connections in Greater Des Moines, Steen said.

Providing job options for students is another goal for the Des Moines Center internship program. Through the new program, students are provided with a channel to local organizations and housing so that they have a chance to compete with students from local schools, such as Drake University, Wickham said.

With students from Iowa and all over the world, and existing internships available in places such as Washington, D.C., “(the Pomerantz Career Center) wanted to increase the range, here, to the capital,” Wickham said. “Students had summer opportunities, but nothing during the school year.”

The program’s final goal is to increase the number of University of Iowa students in the state capital, the largest employment market in the state, Wickham said.

Huynh said that future and potential leaders are being created with the program as students are “engaged and active in the community.”

“Now we are preparing for next spring,” Wickham said. “Employers are looking for interns.”