High school is the perfect time for students to develop soft skills, build a resume and explore career options through real-life experience.
For the second year, Disneyland Resort partnered with Anaheim Union High School District to support Anaheim’s Innovative Mentoring Experience (AIME). Through the AIME internship program, high school students are paired with mentors to learn the ins and outs of an organization, prepare for the demands of college and career life, and make lasting personal and professional connections.
This year, six students were selected as mentees of Disneyland Resort professionals in the areas of experience integration, industrial engineering, finance, marketing, human resources and public affairs.
“Disney’s mentorship program helped give me great insight into the opportunities and jobs in the workplace,” said Hannah Jang, an incoming senior at Oxford Academy in Anaheim. “Besides the overviews Disney organized for us, my personal mentor helped arrange meet and greets for me with other professionals at Disney so that I was able to better narrow down what career I would like to explore in the next stage of my life journey in college.”
By the end of the six-week internship, the students accomplished creating an integrated business plan and presentation for a hypothetical theme park event. Meanwhile, their mentors felt a great sense of pride after witnessing how much the students had developed and learned during their time together.
“I know I speak for everyone around the resort who had time with these students when I say how impressed we were by them,” said Corporate Citizenship Manager Katie Marquez, who helped facilitate the internship experience. “Because this year’s format was virtual, we thought we might lose some of the magic we are known for, but these students and their mentors created a type of magic we never expected. This is an incredibly rewarding program for all of us at the Disneyland Resort and we hope the students found it equally as rewarding. We can’t wait to see where these students go next in their educations and careers.”
Supporting the AIME internship program is part of the resort’s workforce development initiative to provide mentorship and career readiness opportunities to Anaheim students and residents. Through these efforts, the resort also offers funding to help support nonprofit workforce programming in Anaheim and career development workshops to hundreds of local students and job seekers.