Richmond marks decades of civic learning
STUDENT EXPERIENCE
As the Bonner Center commemorates its 20th anniversary, their Civic Fellows program has also reached a significant milestone, with more than 200 students engaging through internships worldwide.
“As a Honduran immigrant, I know firsthand how vital resources and support are for immigrant families,” said Johavy Mendoza Meza, a senior majoring in Latin American, Latino, and Iberian studies. So she found a way to give back through an internship with the Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce as a Bonner Civic Fellow.
“This internship allowed me to contribute to an organization that empowers Virginia's Latino community through business development, educational programs, and promoting the culture,” she said.
Mendoza Meza helped the Chamber develop bilingual promotional materials, worked on social media campaigns, and organized festivals and other community events. She also conducted outreach to Hispanic-owned businesses, inviting them to participate in events, business development programs, and networking opportunities.
“I gained a deeper understanding of how networking and professional relationships contribute to project success.”
The Bonner Center for Civic Engagement (CCE) created the Civic Fellows Program in 2005 to provide students an opportunity for paid summer internships at nonprofit or governmental organizations that they could intentionally tie back to their academic course of study. Since then, more than 235 Civic Fellows have secured internships in organizations that focus on the arts, education, environmental issues, human rights, community development, political advocacy, public health, criminal justice, and international diplomacy.
The academic component is an integral part of the fellowship.
“The student and faculty mentor regularly meet to reflect on both what the student is seeing on the ground in their internship and what they are observing in their academic readings,” said Derek Miller, an assistant director with CCE. “The goal is for the student to connect the everyday experiences with the academic work they are reading.”
Students have journeyed to more than 29 countries to complete the work, though most complete their internships in Richmond.
Junior Timur Garifullin spent his internship in Richmond at IT4Causes, a nonprofit IT organization that prides itself on providing affordable technological assistance to nonprofit clients. His tasks ranged from coding a website to migrating an entire server with all the company’s data.
“I experienced what it’s like to be a software engineer, IT implementation specialist, network specialist, educator, human resources employee, and much more,” said Garifullin, a computer science and economics double major.
Realizing that he can use his computer skills to make people’s lives less stressful, Garifullin hopes to work as a software engineer/data analyst for a company with a big social impact in the future, and maybe one day run his own nonprofit.
“IT4Causes is a company that was started with the idea that IT is a necessity in the modern world and should not be limited only to big companies,” he said. “Using technology for good is an idea that deeply resonates with me.”