The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) is excited to announce its Pathway to Government College Mentorship Program for the summer of 2023 (formerly known as the College Internship program). The MTC Pathway to Government College Mentorship Program provides students/mentees with the opportunity to gain professional work experience in transportation planning, technology, budget and financial planning and analysis, legislation and public affairs, design and project delivery, and local government services.

MTC is the transportation planning, financing and coordinating agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. It is the federally designated Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) and the state designated Regional Transportation Planning Agency (RTPA) for the nine-county San Francisco Bay Area. MTC provides services to the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG). For more information about MTC, visit www.mtc.ca.gov.

For the summer of 2023, students/mentees will have the opportunity to work remotely as well as in the office full-time for eight weeks from Monday, June 12, 2023 through Friday, August 4, 2023. Mentees will have job assignments and a dedicated mentor who will help develop and guide them in their overall career interests and provide real-life work experience of what it is like to work for a regional government agency.

For the summer of 2023, we have opportunities in the following areas:

Technology Services Section (TSS/Innovation & Development) - The mentee will support the Innovation & Development team in their mission to further transform MTC with cutting-edge technologies and processes. Some of the exciting projects the mentee will work on include:
Evaluating hardware and software solutions to create equitable and user-friendly experiences for a hybrid workforce
Investigating AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML-powered (Machine Learning) technologies available on the market that might enhance MTC’s performance and impact
Reimagining the process of routing committee packets across the agency for review which is a critical task for MTC’s operations
Designing simple, low-code apps and automated processes to power small but significant backend and user-facing workflows

Technology Services Section (TSS/Innovation & Development) - The mentee will help launch an equity-based digital experience for households to better utilize the Bay Area’s tolled roads or bridges. This program is scheduled to launch during the mentorship, so it will also include post-launch analysis and iterating on improvements to better the user experience. The mentee will also help hone our strategic goals of being a provider of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) for the region. This topic will include long- and medium-range planning around discovering who our users are, what their needs are and how we can build a roadmap that adds value to their traveling lives. The types of tasks and work assignments will include: project planning, stakeholder engagement, contract management, quantitative data analysis (data retrieval and cleaning, metrics setting and interpretation), qualitative research (design and methodology), roadmap planning, strategic goal setting, and product prioritization.

Technology Services Section (TSS/511.org System) - The mentee will assist the transit data coordinator to conduct a thorough examination of all agencies’ GTFS (General Transit Feed Specification) and GTFS+ data. The mentee will assist the data team to perform case studies and feasibility studies of incorporating transit ridership data into the 511 system. The mentee will design and develop a transit data review tool using 511 SF Bay APIs. The tool will be a custom website that will help MTC staff and transit operators to review the transit data flowing through 511 transit data system. The mentee would be required to have prior knowledge of website development and should be able to develop it independently with general supervision. MTC staff will provide guidance with design of the website and data APIs.

Legislation and Public Affairs (Public Engagement Team) - The mentee will support the LPA engagement team in implementing inclusive public engagement programs by helping to engage interested Bay Area residents, partners and organizations in a variety of key planning efforts at MTC and ABAG while learning about best practices for public participation and engagement. Key public engagement efforts happening in summer 2023 include the first phase of Plan Bay Area 2050+ and Transit 2050+, and the second phase of engagement for the Next Generation Bay Area Freeways Study. The mentee will work with staff to help organize in-person community events as well as virtual workshops and webinars; support content development; and staff community meetings, as needed. The mentee will also support reviewing, analyzing and synthesizing comments and feedback from the public to identify community and partner priorities for the various planning efforts. The mentor would prefer to have the mentee come into the office once a week on Tuesdays.

Legislation and Public Affairs (Public Engagement/Legislative Affairs) - The mentee will support the LPA engagement team in implementing inclusive public engagement programs by helping to engage interested Bay Area residents in key legislative efforts at MTC and ABAG while learning about best practices for public participation and engagement. The mentee will focus on supporting the public and community engagement efforts related to a potential transportation revenue measure. The mentee will work with staff to help organize events, which may include in-person or virtual workshops, small group discussions and/or webinars; support content development; and staff engagement activities, as needed. The mentee will also support reviewing, analyzing and synthesizing comments and feedback from the public to help identify community priorities and key takeaways. The mentor would prefer to have the intern come into the office once a week on Tuesdays.

Regional Planning Program (RPP/Major Plans Team) - The mentee will support a variety of tasks on Plan Bay Area 2050+, the upcoming update to the Bay Area’s long-range plan for transportation, housing, the economy and the environment. Key tasks will include: coordinating the 2023 Plan Bay Area 2050 Implementation Progress Update, supporting public engagement activities as part of the Plan Bay Area 2050+ kick-off in July 2023, and conducting research and analysis on the federal and state statutes, guidelines and regulations that guide the long-range planning process. The mentee should plan on being in the office every Tuesday, which is when the Major Plans Team has its weekly in-person team meeting and when the mentor would have a weekly in-person check-in with the mentee.

Budget and Financial Planning & Analysis - The mentee will learn the processes undertaken by the budget section to produce, monitor and support the agency’s and it’s entities budgets and actual transactions. This will be achieved through assisting the analysts in the preparation of reports, analysis of financial transactions, and monitoring of encumbrances. Some of the tasks will include:
Support the budget staff to format/update/complete canned and ad hoc budget or financial reports.
Assist in financial analysis of actual transactions for agency entities through searching in the financial system and coordinating with other staff.
Assist in the reconciliation of Bay Area Toll Authority (BATA) and Caltrans Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) and Report of Expenditure (ROE) for FY 2022-23.
Support the budget staff in upcoming FY 2022-23 budget amendment(s) and ongoing FY 2023-24 budget.
Support the budget staff in the coding and budget inputs of agency entities for the upcoming FY 2023-24 operating and capital budget.

Design & Project Delivery - The mentee will support the Bay Trail active transportation team in updating the Bay Trail Design Guidelines and Toolkit. (Download PDF reader) The mentee in this position will assist with best practices and cutting-edge precedent research and apply their topical and emerging design-related knowledge to help inform the regional trail design guidelines, and other complete streets/urban design/quick build initiatives. The mentee will be expected to work in a project manager role and apply their organizational skills and professionalism working with consultants to deftly review project deliverables. The mentee will also conduct analysis related to the Bay Trail using spatial data tools such as ArcGIS to help inform regional decision-making and planning.

Local Government Services - The mentee will participate in and support high-level discussions on a regional economic development strategy that takes advantage of recent federal and state commitments to an inclusive clean energy transition and rapid transportation electrification that simultaneously addresses climate change and socio-economic disparities. This strategy, which will be developed in collaboration with a broad range of stakeholder groups, will explore the potential for developing underutilized industrial sites in the east and north bay counties into manufacturing clusters that provide high-road jobs to a local workforce. The mentee will be a thought partner in this process and will gain both technical skills in data analysis and presentation and understand the policy development process.
SKILLS AND ABILITIES
Applicants should have the following knowledge, skills and abilities:


Organizational and analytical skills, detail-oriented;
Research and documentation skills;
Data analysis and/or financial analysis skills;
Project management skills;
Ability to gather, organize and interpret data; critical problem solving;
Ability to exercise sound judgment;
Able to work within time constraints and produce a finished product according to specifications;
Strong writing, communications, and presentation skills;
Able to work effectively with a variety of people;
Be self-motivated;
Sound knowledge in MS applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, MS Office/Office 365).
Preferred Skills for the following mentorships include:

TSS/Innovation & Development
Policy interpretation and/or analytical research
Strategic thinking and presentation skills
LPA/Public Engagement/Legislative Affairs
Experience with event planning, community organizing or related skills
Diligence, thoroughness and attention to detail
Fluency in a language such as Spanish, Cantonese or Mandarin strongly preferred
RPP/Major Plans Team
Policy Interpretation and/or Analytical Research
Data Modeling and Information Architecture
Survey Development and/or Methodology
Data Visualization, Infographics
Programming in languages such as Java, C++, jQuery, Python
Tableau (Data Visualization Software)
ArcGIS (Database Analytical Systems)
Budget & Financial Planning and Analysis
Financial and/or Data Analysis and Reconciliation
Strong Excel, Word and PowerPoint skills
Design & Project Delivery
Design research/best practices
Local Government Services
Data Visualization/Infographics
Policy interpretation and/or analytical research
MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS
To be considered for this mentorship program, you must be enrolled at least half-time in an accredited community college or university, four-year undergraduate or graduate program preferably within the nine county San Francisco Bay Area. Individuals who have already graduated (no earlier than December 2022) may be considered up to six (6) months post-graduation.

We are looking for students who are majoring in or planning to major in fields such as Business Administration, Public Administration, Transportation Planning, Transportation Engineering, City and Regional Planning, Urban Studies, Public Policy, Government Relations, Marketing, Natural Science, Finance/Accounting, and Information Systems/Computer Science. However, other fields of study and undeclared majors will also be considered.