Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : College Starts Faculty Intern Program to Boost Diversity

Antelope Valley College for the first time is offering a faculty intern program to women and minorities.

Sallie Mitchell-Stryker, project director, said 10 internships are planned to help increase diversity at the college.

The teaching staff at the 9,800-student college is overwhelmingly white, she said. While 49% of the school’s full-time faculty is female, just nine of the 109 full-time teachers are ethnic minorities.

State legislation requires that the community college system have a teaching staff by 2020 that is reflective of California’s demographics with ethnic minorities making up 30% of faculty positions statewide.

The internships will allow the district to see if it can reach its diversity goals “through this kind of project,” Mitchell-Stryker said.

A $17,000 state grant is partially funding the program. “If it’s successful, the district will continue the internship program,” she said.

Internship candidates must have a master’s degree or be at least halfway through a master’s program. They also must never have been paid to work in the community college system.

Antelope Valley College will hire 10 interns for its spring semester, which begins Jan. 24. There are positions for three counselors, two vocational educations and five faculty-librarian interns.

The interns, who each will be assigned to a faculty mentor, will work about three hours each week and will be paid about $1,900 for the semester.

Mitchell-Stryker said that applications will be available Monday and selection will begin immediately.