Public service group to develop new resources for federal interns

The Partnership for Public Service will launch a center to connect college students participating in federal internships and will recruit, hire and train a group of students to promote federal service on their campuses, the nonprofit group announced on Monday.

The initiatives will be funded by a $3 million grant, distributed over three years, from the Robertson Foundation. The foundation, established in 1996 by hedge-fund founder Julian Robertson, has supported the Partnership as a donor and funded the preparations for its State of the Public Service scorecard, scheduled to be published for the first time in 2008. Robertson funds scholarship and leadership training programs at Duke University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill that focus on domestic and international work in government.

"This is a huge programmatic investment," said Tim McManus, vice president for education and outreach at the Partnership. "It allows us to do things we wouldn't be able to do otherwise."

The funds will help the Partnership hire 10 students to promote public service on their campuses during the 2008-2009 school year. The Partnership posted a job listing for federal service student ambassadors on Monday. The ambassadors would be paid $2,200 for two semesters and a small remuneration to defray the cost of hosting events.

The other programs funded by the Robertson Foundation grant are less fleshed out, McManus said. The Partnership is trying to determine whether the internship center should have a physical location, though McManus said it would provide programming to help create a network for students doing federal internships in and outside of Washington. Partnership staff will be involved with the program in an interim and long-term capacity.

The goal is to give federal interns a sense that they are part of a larger community, in the hopes of providing them an experience like that of interns who work on Capitol Hill or on political campaigns. McManus said many schools do not track where their students are working, and agencies do not always help their interns connect those at other agencies. The center's programming, McManus said, will be aimed at helping college students understand the full range of possibilities for federal employment.

The center also will help federal agencies improve their internship programs.

"If we look at internships as a pipeline, that only works if the student has a really good experience," McManus said. "We want to make sure we're working with federal agencies as well to make sure they have really strong internships."

The Partnership will use the Robertson Foundation funding to launch training for schools in its Call to Serve network. Topics will range from how to run successful campaigns to stimulate student interest in public service to how to negotiate the applications and security clearance process. Training will begin in the fall, with the goal of reaching students who plan to apply for internships in the summer of 2009.

McManus said, ultimately, he hoped the Robertson Foundation grant would help the Partnership tie together some of its many programs.

"Wouldn't it be great to work with those Call to Serve schools to really identify their best students to work with federal networks, and to match them with federal agencies that are part of our efforts to improve employee satisfaction?" McManus said. "This will help create some of the connective tissue between our programs."