Arnika Frazier-Jackson Particulars Disney UNCF Students Program
As HBCU Homecoming season continues, the United Negro School Fund (UNCF) is continuous to equip younger folks with the instruments, networks, and alternatives they should thrive. For HBCU college students, particularly, meaning packages designed to organize them for the aggressive world {of professional} growth, and Arnika Frazier-Jackson is telling BOSSIP all about it.
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The director of Pupil Skilled Improvement Applications at UNCF leads the Panda Cares Students Program, a dynamic suite of initiatives that provides college students hands-on expertise and career-ready abilities. Underneath her steerage, this system connects HBCU college students with company giants, serving to them transition confidently from classroom to boardroom.
“It’s about giving our college students a seat on the desk. They’re not simply shadowing. They’re producing, creating, and exhibiting the subsequent era how you can do it too,” the proud FAMU Rattler informed BOSSIP.
Now in its thirteenth yr, the partnership presents scholarships, mentorship, and internships to HBCU college students enthusiastic about careers in leisure, media, and content material creation. Jackson performed a key position in creating this system’s curriculum and serving to Disney and different companions perceive pupil wants and aspirations.
By way of these internships, college students achieve publicity to a variety of company roles, from HR and advertising to regulation and journalism, and even content material creation. Jackson emphasizes that interns are anticipated to provide, not simply observe, cultivating a mindset of duty and impression. This system has since expanded to incorporate initiatives with FX, Andscape, and Nationwide Geographic, offering alternatives in sports activities journalism, directing, producing, and factual storytelling.
“The Walt Disney Firm is such an important associate as a result of they perceive with the ability to give entry and alternative,” Jackson informed BOSSIP. “At first, this system was actually created to assist relieve monetary boundaries for college students attending HBCUs.”
As conversations with college students developed, so did this system.
“We began listening to that college students actually needed to have the ability to get their foot within the door or at the very least have some kind of engagement with leaders throughout the firm,” she stated. “So that they began an internship program. And now we’re in that cohort; and I slot in as a result of we truly labored to develop this system because it stands now. I used to be on that staff to domesticate the partnership, construct the curriculum, and assist the companions perceive what the scholars’ wants and aspirations are.”
What started as business-focused internships in departments like HR, PR, advertising, expertise acquisition, and regulation, quickly expanded to incorporate content material creation and journalism.
And as soon as HBCU college students received by means of the door, Jackson says, they made it rely.
“Our college students received in there and confirmed up and confirmed out,” she stated. “They weren’t simply shadowing an govt or a staff, they have been engaged on initiatives and popping out with some phenomenal issues.”
That excellence led to much more alternatives. “Due to the work college students have been doing, we have been in a position to open up partnerships like ESPN’s Rhoden Fellows Program,” stated Jackson. “That’s for college students enthusiastic about sports activities journalism and telling tales by means of the lens of the HBCU expertise.”
The collaboration with FX is one other spotlight, constructed on the legacy of the late John Singleton.
“That program was created to point out college students what it means to be a screenwriter, how you can develop as a producer, and what a director truly does,” she says. “College students get a mentor with FX, and now the scholars chosen will be capable of go to L.A. in 2026 to the FX sound stage and shadow somebody that works there. They’re even constructing this system primarily based on what the scholars’ pursuits are — which I believe is phenomenal.”
Nationwide Geographic has additionally joined in, giving college students the prospect to change into “factual storytellers”; creators who use real-world narratives to showcase their abilities.
“To have the ability to go from one internship throughout the enterprise unit to now increasing to an entire suite of packages actually speaks to the understanding of the associate,” Jackson informed BOSSIP, “and their dedication to offering entry and alternative to college students attending HBCUs.”
In line with Jackson, college students who need to apply ought to embrace their genuine selves and leverage their distinctive strengths. She believes that GPA isn’t the one measure of readiness, and that professionalism, initiative, and results-oriented considering usually matter extra in touchdown alternatives. By teaching college students on networking, constructing a powerful resume, and quantifying their achievements, she ensures they’re absolutely ready to excel within the aggressive workforce.
Her method mirrors the teachings she realized at FAMU.
“Whereas it’s sure, about with the ability to have the schooling, and I really feel such as you get the very best schooling at our HBCUs as a result of the expectations are so excessive, however it’s additionally with the ability to assist them with these tender abilities which can be wanted to exceed and excel throughout now within the workforce,” stated Jackson. “As a result of their competitors is not their friends. Their competitors is people which were in business for 20 or 30 years. And so we need to be sure that we at all times present them with one thing that will get them over and past the tip of the race.”
UNCF’s imaginative and prescient is evident: put together the subsequent era of HBCU leaders not only for jobs, however for significant careers, and with the Disney UCNF Students Program, fostering networks, offering mentorship, and providing real-world experiences, they’re opening doorways that lead from the very best of seven hills to the heights {of professional} success.
How To Apply
The Disney UNCF Students Program is open to underrepresented rising school juniors, ideally enrolled full-time at an HBCU, throughout broad fields of research comparable to movie, tv, hospitality administration, journalism, media manufacturing, and digital media. Functions are open till October 31, 2025, at 11:59 PM EST. college students can apply at uncf.org and discover extra data on Instagram at @uncfspdp and LinkedIn at UNCF Pupil Skilled Improvement Applications.