Interns and agencies honor 2010 Community Champions

One former summer intern, Meghan Irwin, coordinated the Back-to-School Drive, an initiative dedicated to providing school supplies and school uniforms to more than 1,000 children in the care of Child Protective Services.

DALLAS, June 8, 2010 -- Seventy-five interns and nonprofit agencies today kicked off the 20th annual ExxonMobil Community Summer Jobs Program with a reception at the Dallas Arboretum. Dedicated to helping agencies and interns alike, the eight-week paid internship program offers nonprofits much-needed help during the busy summer months and provides interns with hands-on experience in a variety of organizations. This year, ExxonMobil will provide $270,000 to cover intern salaries and program administration expenses in Dallas.

“Internships are increasingly more important to securing a job after graduation,” said Robert Lanyon, manager of corporate citizenship and community investments for ExxonMobil. “The ExxonMobil Community Summer Jobs Program is a great way for students to develop skills that prepare them for a successful future while providing more services to the community.”

Along with welcoming the interns and agencies, the reception honored the 2010 Community Champions, alumni of the program who have gone on to pursue careers in the nonprofit sector. This year’s Community Champions are Jarie Bradley and Meghan Irwin.

Bradley served as a Community Summer Jobs Program intern in 2002 at the Bridge Breast Network, an organization dedicated to connecting low-income, uninsured individuals to diagnostic and treatment services for breast cancer. Through this opportunity, she received hands-on experience in communications, donor relations, fundraising and other operational aspects of a nonprofit. Bradley now uses the skills she honed during her internship in her role as human resources director for Central Dallas Ministries, an organization that addresses all aspects of poverty.

Irwin participated in the 2003 Community Summer Jobs Program through Community Partners of Dallas, an agency committed to ensuring safety and restoring dignity and hope to abused children. During this internship, she coordinated the Back-to-School Drive, an initiative dedicated to providing school supplies and school uniforms to more than 1,000 children in the care of Child Protective Services. Following her internship, Irwin went on to serve as a development associate at the Dallas Children’s Advocacy Center, an organization devoted to improving the lives of abused children in Dallas County and providing national leadership on child abuse issues. Irwin now serves as director of donor relations and manages the annual fund development plan, individual gift-giving initiatives and special events for the organization.

The Community Summer Jobs Program in Dallas is administered by the Volunteer Center of North Texas, which manages the internships and trains agencies to better recruit, interview and select candidates. Each nonprofit is responsible for interviewing and hiring its own interns, which helps ensure that the unique needs of each agency are best met.

“The summer months tend to be a particularly busy time for nonprofits, so once the interns start their jobs, they immediately become an integral part of the team,” said John Withers, board chair, Volunteer Center of North Texas. “This continued partnership between college students and nonprofits is vital in our mission to better our community.”

Since the program began in 1971 in New York City, ExxonMobil has provided more than $16.3 million to support 4,400 community summer job internships. Today it is active in 12 states, including Alabama, Alaska, California, Colorado, Kansas, Louisiana, Montana, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Texas, Virginia and Wyoming. For more information, visit www.exxonmobil.com/csjp.

About ExxonMobil Foundation

ExxonMobil Foundation is the primary philanthropic arm of the Exxon Mobil Corporation in the United States. The Foundation and the Corporation engage in a range of philanthropic activities that advance education, health and science in the communities where ExxonMobil has significant operations. In the United States, ExxonMobil supports initiatives to improve math and science education at the K-12 and higher education levels.

Globally, ExxonMobil provides funding to improve basic education, promote women as catalysts for economic development, and combat malaria and other infectious diseases in developing countries. In 2009, together with its employees and retirees, Exxon Mobil Corporation, its divisions and affiliates, and ExxonMobil Foundation provided $235 million in contributions worldwide, of which more than $98 million was dedicated to education. Additional information on ExxonMobil’s community partnerships and contributions programs is available at www.exxonmobil.com/community.

Source: ExxonMobil Foundation, Leah Marshall, 214-373-1601