National Intern Day (July 29, 2021) is fast approaching! How will you celebrate your interns this year? We’ve put together some examples of how other organizations have shown appreciation for their interns to help you plan your celebrations.
1. Stryker’s Professional Development Workshops
Part of Stryker’s National Intern Day celebrations include offering professional development workshops, such as resume reviews. In a survey of interns, our partners at RippleMatch found that part of what made their experiences more valuable were the professional development opportunities, so what better way to say thank you than to host some workshops.
2. Genentech’s Intern Appreciation Video
In 2020, Genentech’s University Talent Acquisition and Strategy Team put together an Intern Appreciation Video in which they thanked all their interns in several different languages. This is a great way to celebrate your talents’ various backgrounds and promote inclusivity.
3. Google’s Twitter Thread
Google shared a thread of tweets from its Google Students account, which has nearly half a million followers, and featured various interns, highlighting the projects they’re working on. A Twitter shoutout showcases the impact interns have on your organization and serves as a public testimonial of their skills and talents.
4. Rocket: Asking What Their Interns Want
Normally, Rocket’s Intern Experience team puts together “fire-drill” celebrations, such as surprising their interns with parties, smoothies, and more. Last summer, the team asked their interns what they wanted out of their virtual internship experiences. The interns expressed a desire to get to know each other better, more networking opportunities with senior staff, and swag, so the team put together intern bingo, a goodie bag, and more.
5. Five Top Tips from the Kansas City Area Development Council
The Kansas City Area Development Council has a program that matches interns to its employer partners in the KC region. In one of their blog posts, they shared five ideas that employers can incorporate in their intern celebrations, including:
- Volunteer Day
- Game Day
- Swag Bags
- Lunchable
- Field Trip
While most of these ideas are traditionally in person, if your program is remote, there are different ways you can execute on each of them. For example, a remote lunchable could be ordering your interns a snack box or even a meal prep box like Blue Apron and face masks so you and your interns can enjoy a “spa” and food day.
6. College to Congress’s National Intern Day Summit
College to Congress hosted a half-day virtual summit in 2020, which featured panels geared for not only students but also recent graduates as well as employers to celebrate interns, who are crucial to the success of Congress. Speakers included members of Congress, lobbyists, documentary stars, and more.
7. Blog Posts Featuring Interns
In the same lane as Google’s tweet thread, Visit Concord, SAS, and LucidChart all put together blog posts featuring their interns and their experiences. This is also another great way to showcase the invaluable work your interns are doing and put them front and center of customers, prospects, employees, and more.
8. A Letter to Current Interns from a Former One
Austin Geidt, Uber’s first ever intern, wrote an email to the 2019 cohort of interns. In it, he shared his experiences, learnings, and career trajectory from intern to full-time hire. An email from a former intern is a great way to inspire current interns and show them what’s possible.
9. Aerospace’s Bi-Coastal Celebrations
If your program is in-person or you’re able to gather your remote or hybrid interns in-person, consider hosting an event. Aerospace has multiple offices and celebrated National Intern Day 2018 with each location doing something special for its interns. The El Segundo campus, home to Aerospace’s largest intern population, hosted a carnival-themed event complete with picnic lunch, snowcones, and a dunk tank, for their 232 interns.
10. How Symba is Celebrating Our Interns
Here at Symba, our interns are core to our team. This National Intern Day, we’ll be posting a blog that highlights our two current interns, Nasim and Laukik. Nasim has been our Design Intern for a while now and will share her experiences at Symba so far. Laukik is our new Business Development Intern, who will share what he hopes to gain from his internship.
We’re also hosting a virtual team social! Our interns will get a stipend to either pick up or get their favorite meals delivered. We’ll meet on Zoom and give them space to express their career aspirations and desired learnings so we can better support their career journeys.
We hope these examples spark some ideas for how you can celebrate your interns this year. Happy National Intern Day from all of us at Symba!
