SOUTH RIVER — To give high school students an opportunity to help make their community better, the South River Borough Council appointed five interns as part of the newly launched Youth Leadership Program.
Oles Kormosh, Priya Jain, Nancy Rivers, Jenna Agnello and Miquel Ribau were approved to participate in the program by the council on July 17.
“This program offers opportunities for young leaders [who have] an interest in giving back to the community, government, environment concerns or improving the quality of life,” Borough Administrator Jack Layne Jr. said.
The program will be administered through Layne’s office and other departments about two days per week through September. Applicants who applied for the program had to be high school students who had experience in environmental assessment, local access television, complete street safety and innovative community, according to Layne.
“We have focused on planning … and working with our mapping software. We have two individuals working with TV-35 to try to bring new services and sophistication to that with a lot of their youthful knowledge that they come with. We have somebody working to try to improve street safety. We [also] have an individual who’s working on a general creative effort for the borough,” said Councilman Ryan Jones, who spearheaded the program this year.
“It’s just really exciting to see the youth get involved. This is something that I’ve been very passionate about. I’m trying to find new ways to leverage our bright young stars of the future and give them some training ground to take to the real world when they finally do. We welcome them and we are really excited to see what they have in store for us,” Jones said.
Each intern received $500 for their service, according to Layne.
“I am impressed with the interns selected. I interned in graduate school and learned much during my internship,” he said.
For more information about the program, visit www.southrivernj.org/administration/youthleaders.html.
Contact Vashti Harris at vharris@newspapermediagroup.com.
