Training Tomorrow’s Changemakers: Roots & Samuel Merritt University Launch a New Healthcare Internship Program

Roots Community Health and Samuel Merritt University teamed up with local partners this summer to launch a hands-on healthcare internship for Oakland youth, building skills, confidence, and the next generation of health equity leaders.

This summer, Roots Community Health welcomed a new cohort of interns through a powerful partnership with Samuel Merritt University (SMU), East Oakland Youth Development Center (EOYDC), and Umoja Health. The internship, coordinated by SMU’s Center for Community Engagement (CCE), placed local high school and early-college students directly in the heart of community health efforts, working side-by-side with trusted care teams at Roots.

This partnership marks a meaningful addition to Roots’ workforce development portfolio. While Roots has long employed and supported community health workers, the internship program is a testament to its commitment to cultivating the next generation of health equity leaders from within the community. Through mentorship, exposure, and hands-on experiences, this initiative is preparing young people to become not only healthcare professionals, but also advocates for justice and wellness in their neighborhoods.

We caught up with Emily Prieto-Tseregounis, Ph.D., Vice President of External Affairs and Chief of Staff to the President at SMU, to hear more about the vision behind the program and what made this summer so impactful:

Why is this internship program important to you and to SMU?
This program sits right at the intersection of SMU’s mission and my values: growing a diverse, community-rooted health workforce and giving students real responsibilities that improve care today, not just after they graduate. Led by SMU’s Center for Community Engagement, this program opens doors for local young people, builds confidence and skills, and shows our students, many of whom are first-gen, that they belong in healthcare and that their lived experience is an asset, not a barrier.

What stood out about partnering with Roots, EOYDC, and Umoja Health?
It’s the trust. Roots has deep, sustained relationships with Oakland families; EOYDC and Umoja bring youth development, mentoring, and culturally grounded outreach. Together, they created a learning environment where interns weren’t just “shadowing,” they were contributing as part of a trusted care team. That authenticity is hard to replicate, and it’s exactly why the learning sticks.

What kind of impact do you see this program having—for students and the broader community?
Early signs are encouraging: interns built frontline skills (communication, reliability, teamwork), learned how a clinic actually runs, and saw their work reduce friction for patients. For the community, it expands capacity where it’s needed most and strengthens a local talent pipeline that’s more culturally responsive and more likely to stay and serve in Oakland. Longer-term, this is how you change representation in the workforce and, ultimately, outcomes.

How does this internship align with SMU’s broader work to improve access to culturally competent care?
SMU is investing in culturally responsive care, affordable pathways into health professions, and community-engaged learning. This internship is a practical extension of that strategy: it pairs students with community health workers and clinicians in settings where cultural humility, language access, and trust are non-negotiables, and it does so in partnership with organizations that reflect the communities we serve.

What do you hope these young people take away from the experience?
Three things:
1.) A sense of belonging in healthcare – “people like me do this work”
2.) Tangible skills – professional communication, confidentiality, reliability, and basic patient-navigation know-how
3.) A north star – seeing that health equity isn’t abstract; its daily systems work powered by small, consistent acts of care

One intern summed it up beautifully:

“In this internship with Roots and Umoja, I learned a lot about community health and developed important hard and soft skills that I will be able to carry with me in my future career. Through the various activities, like practicing CPR, taking blood pressure, and suturing, I realized the importance of the work that goes on in helping the community. It takes a village to form a healthy society and there is a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes that isn’t usually talked about. This internship helped me realize what I want to do, which is something I was looking for when I applied.”

What’s next? How do you hope this model grows?
We’d like to make this a standing, year-round pathway with stackable experiences, from early exposure to deeper clinical internships, so students can keep building skills and credentials. We’re eager to scale with more Roots departments and additional community partners, while keeping the core Oakland-rooted model intact. Success looks like: more interns, clearer academic credit where appropriate, stronger data on retention and career placement, and graduates who choose to practice in the very neighborhoods where they trained.

Final Thoughts from Emily:
Partnering with Roots and our fellow community organizations has been a profound reminder of what’s possible when we center youth, equity, and local leadership in our work. This internship program is more than a career pipeline, it’s a pathway to healing, representation, and real community change.