Brooklyn Collaborative Studies students thank mentors, serve as mentees to peers
The applause, whoops and hollers were immediate as the 43 juniors walked into Brooklyn Collaborative Studies’ (BCS) auditorium at 610 Henry Street in Red Hook/Carroll Gardens. The students were the honorees at the January 17 ceremony celebrating their successful completion of semester-long internships at 23 businesses, government and non-profit organizations throughout Brooklyn and Manhattan.
Completion of the internship program, begun in 2007, is a requirement for graduation and has seen 545 students participate, being mentored by over 95 professionals in law, medical research, education, animal care, law enforcement, photography, art, journalism, public policy and more.
“Work makes you smarter. You’re smarter today than you were yesterday,” said Alyce Barr, founding principal of BCS. “Internships enable [you] to replace the blurry imagined image of adult work with one that is rich with detail derived from [your] own experience. . . Your generation will have lots of jobs, many of which you can’t even imagine today.”