Internships for Long Beach students have been increased by 50 percent in the past year, an announcement that will proudly be addressed at Mayor Robert Garcia’s second State of the City on Wednesday, January 13. The city is now ahead of schedule for meeting the mayor’s goal of doubling internships in his first term, a commitment that came with the city’s partnership in the Long Beach College Promise, the Office of Mayor Robert Garcia announced Thursday.
“Education is the most important investment we can make to boost economic development, and I’m extremely proud that we’ve been able to extend so many new internship opportunities to our young people so quickly,” stated Mayor Garcia. “We could not have done it without our great partners at LBUSD, LBCC, and CSULB as well as the Pacific Gateway Workforce Investment Network, Long Beach CALL, and our partners in the business community, including Molina Healthcare. I’m very thankful for all of their hard work and leadership.”
When Garcia took office, internship opportunities numbered about 1,500, according to the release. Since then, more than 750 new internships have been created for high school and community college students. The mayor will discuss the 800 additional preschool seats throughout Long Beach, made in the last year by LBUSD. He will also address new targets to be set by partnering with LBUSD alongside private providers.
Wednesday’s address will be the first Long Beach State of the City translated into other languages, according to the release. Speakers of Tagalog, Khmer and Spanish who attend the event will have the option to use free headsets to hear a real-time translation of the mayor’s speech. An American Sign Language interpreter will also be in attendance to translate for members of the audience who are hearing impaired.
Funding for these translation services comes out of the Language Access Program that was included in the Mayor’s budget. The State of the City speech begins at 6:00PM on Wednesday at the Terrace Theatre, with a pre-event including music and food trucks starting at 5:00PM.