Imagine having an opportunity to experience a career before actually deciding on it.

In many high schools today, that opportunity turns into reality. In St. Tammany Parish, seniors have the choice of getting class credit in an internship or mentoring program in the School to Work program.

At Mandeville High, the coordinator of the program is Marguerite Dietrich. Her goal with the program is to give students an opportunity to obtain practical knowledge for decisions involving choices for a life long career.

Nick Croy, Adelaide Hebert and Jonathan Lambert have been interning this year at EBS, LLC in Mandeville as part of their coursework at Mandeville High School. Mentorships and interns are part of a diverse and unique opportunity for businesses and students to learn in a hands-on environment. (Photo by Erika Brady)

As program coordinator, she receives many different “dream jobs” from students and then Dietrich attempts to place them with the right mentor. This is one way for businesses and schools to work together to provide students with real world experience in a field of their choice.

Three of the current interns from Mandeville High School are stationed at EBS, the Environmental Business Specialists, LLC, located in Mandeville. The interns are getting a lot of hands-on experience and each plans to use it to the fullest. One student, Adelaide Herbert, gets paid for her work testing microscopic samples after internship hours and will continue her career experience as a paid employee this coming summer.

The interns agreed that the work matters. They said they don’t sweep the floors but are learning how to assess positive and negative results of the testing they do. Their experience at EBS has included field trips to a chemical plant in Denham Springs and a paper mill in Bogalusa.

Part of the experience has been a growing awareness of the importance science has on the world, not only now but in the future. Fewer people are entering the fields of science at college, even though scientists are the ones creating new medicines and improving our environment. Through this mentorship program, science careers are explored and encouraged.

Mike Foster of EBS founded the Harvey L. Foster Foundation for Science Education in honor of his father. The foundation’s mission is to create fascination with science through a variety of different means, including two scholarship programs. The Harvey L. Foster Foundation Scholarship awards one or more scholarships for an academic year of up to $1,000 per semester. The scholarship lasts a maximum of four years, awarding up to $8,000 to deserving and continually qualifying students. Qualifying students are those graduating from a local high school in St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Livingston or Washington Parishes who plan to pursue a degree in the field of science.

Students may pursue their degree at any university but preference will be given to those applicants who commit to attend a university within Louisiana.

The second scholarship is the EBS Pearl River Study Scholarship. EBS donates $4,000 per year to the Foundation based on studies performed on the Pearl River on behalf of their two paper mill clients, Temple-Inland in Bogalusa and Georgia Pacific in Monticello, Miss. These studies are performed with the assistance of Dr. Kyle Piller of Southeastern Louisiana University. One or more scholarships are awarded for an academic year of up to $1,000 per semester. The scholarship lasts a maximum of four years, awarding up to $8,000 to deserving and continually qualifying students. Qualifying students are those graduating from a local high school in St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Livingston, or Washington Parishes who plan to pursue a degree in the field of science at Southeastern Louisiana University.

The Harvey L. Foster Foundation understands that school budgets are tight yet the cost for science equipment rises each year.

Consequently, another way the foundation contributes to schools in the four parish area is to support them with scientific equipment they may need for classroom teaching. The foundation has a variety of laboratory equipment that has been donated by manufacturing plants or by EBS. The foundation also utilizes donated funds to purchase lab equipment, including inventory from basic glassware to specialized lab testing equipment.

People who are interested in learning more about the scholarships or donating to the foundation can view the Web site, www.theharveylfosterfoundation.com.