DataGals Hosts a Year Up Event

Posted June 15, 2017 by Soniya Shah, Information Developer

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This blog post was authored by Soniya Shah.

This week, the DataGals hosted an event to raise awareness for Year Up. Year Up provides young adults, aged 18-24 with the skills and experience they need to succeed in the professional workplace. Here at Vertica, we are proud supporters of the Year Up program. We have hired Year Up interns, who have worked with our customer experience, project management, and sales teams. Our General Manager Colin Mahony, also serves on the Year Up board and is a mentor for Year Up students.


General Manager Colin Mahony speaks to the Vertica team about Year Up.

Year Up serves over 3600 students nationwide, with its roots here in Boston. Year Up uses a high support, high expectation model to motivate its students. They encourage students to develop technical skills that include everything from customer service to fund accounting and help them develop communication skills that can boost their writing skills, conflict and resolution management, and help them to network in the future.

The program is divided into two parts – the first six months are spent in the classroom learning skills employers look for, and the next six months are spent at an internship with a partner company. During the internship, students apply the skills they learned in the classroom. With a 100% internship placement rate and 85% success rate of graduates, the work Year Up does has a real impact on its students.

At Vertica, we care a lot about inclusion and representation. We’re proud to have worked with Year Up interns, who represent the diligence and determination the program values. We hope to continue to support this organization and the incredible work they do!

Interested in getting involved? Year Up builds a community for its students, and part of that community includes mentors. Mentors meet with students to assist them in building their professional networks and to encourage them to continue on their path. You can also help by spreading thie word, speaking to a class or proposing a different project to the Year Up program. You can read more about Year Up on their site.