American River College’s Associated Student Body heard from a student who is petitioning for ARC to shift back online and congratulated her for using her voice and taking action during its March 11 meeting.

The board also heard from Vivian Dillion, work experience faculty coordinator, and Catherine Pohlman, internship developer, who hosted a presentation for the ASB board about ARC’s Work Experience and Internship Program.

The work experience and internship program is an instructional program at ARC that helps students develop workplace skills or knowledge. According to Dillon, the information that students learn in this program is very valuable when students enter the workforce. 

“The program really tries to make sure that the students’ experience is beneficial, contributes to their growth and their journey and that they have support there,” Pohlman said. 

The program is hosting online events for students to learn about different internships through March 24. For more information, visit the internship information month events here.

ASB member Brianna Huynh says that she learned about SMUD’s internship opportunities at an event hosted by the program during her first semester at ARC.

“I ended up submitting an application for their scholarship program and I won it this past summer which has led to an internship this coming summer,” Huynh said.

ARC student Ashlee Green created a petition to continue classes online for the remainder of the spring semester. Green says that ARC reopened the campus prematurely.

“For the past two years, we have not been able to successfully reopen without having to shut back down in a short amount of time after reopening,” Green said. “I believe that this time will be no different unfortunately and that’s particularly due to the stealth variant.”

According to Green, she felt like it was necessary to share her petition which has 256 signatures with ASB. Green added that she will have future discussions with ARC President Melanie Dixon and with some members of the Board of Trustees.

“I understand completely where a lot of people are coming from with not wanting to continue the rest of the spring semester online,” Green said. “That being said, a lot of people do want to continue with the spring semester online.” 

For more information about ASB and future meetings, visit the ASB student government website.