Employee Story

When Alieu was offered an internship with Seattle Goodwill, he knew it was a professional development opportunity that he couldn’t pass up.

Alieu, a 2020 graduate from Everett’s Mariner High School, already had familiarity with Seattle Goodwill as a student in its Youth Aerospace Program, but he’d never worked in a professional setting. He knew an internship could provide him invaluable career experience. And if he got half as much from the internship as he got from the aerospace program, he knew it’d be well worth his time.

“So far I’ve never had one of those (entry) part-time jobs where you might work fast food or in a retail store, so pretty much this was my first work experience,” Alieu said. “I learned a lot of things. I learned when you come into the work place, you have to come dressed professionally. I learned how to multi-task, definitely, and I learned how to do time management. I learned what you are going to do when it comes to an office space job.”

Alieu’s three-month internship turned into five months, and he split his time between Goodwill’s Snohomish Job Training & Education Center (JTEC) and the King County JTEC. He worked as an instructor’s assistant in Goodwill’s computer classes and English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes, helping students while also developing his digital skills.

“I felt pretty honored that even with (the COVID environment) I was able to come in and be able to make a difference, help out and build my skillset,” Alieu said. “Because of this internship, I had a more productive summer. I turned it into a, ‘Let’s go to work and see what I can accomplish, regardless of the circumstances.’”

Alieu is confident his internship will benefit him once he begins his career as an electrical engineer. That’s what Alieu plans to study at the University of Washington-Bothell, where he started taking classes last fall.