I Will Ride Student Outreach Program, California High-Speed Rail Authority

Target Audience: The target audience for the I Will Ride Student Outreach Program is students, young adults and other young professionals interested in public transit, sustainable development, economic development and transforming mobility options in California and beyond. In addition, we model the program to help other transit agencies meaningfully engage with students and young professionals.

Strategy Objective:The I Will Ride program connects students with information about high-speed rail and employment opportunities. Through I Will Ride, we have built a statewide and international education stakeholder network to share information and work collaboratively on outreach events. I Will Ride actively supports education-based clubs and programs including Women in Transportation (WTS), the Society of Women Engineers, Society of Professional and Hispanic Engineers, MESA, LA Metro's Transportation Career Academy Program, Introducing Youth to American Infrastructure (Iyah+), the Cal in Sac program, Civic Spark, and various other organizations that connect low income and minority students to career pathways through sponsorships, competitions, programming, hands on workshops and site visits.

Situation Challenge: In 2020, the Authority expanded our student outreach to they were aware of the high-speed rail program and potential employment opportunities. According to McKinsey, Generation Z (Gen Zers) have strong values related to sustainability, equity and climate change is one of the issues GenZers care most about. Furthermore, according to PEW Research, "fully seven-in-ten Gen Zers say the government should do more to solve problems, while 29% say government is doing too many things better left to businesses and individuals." The I Will Ride program has also contributed significantly to promoting diversity, inclusion and multi-cultural awareness within the high-speed rail organization. We do so by utilizing strategic partnerships to increase career participation by underrepresented communities.

Results Impact: In 2022, the Authority did a total of 64 student outreach events, reaching almost 3,000 students. This year, The Authority sponsored the Fresno State Transportation Institute's first annual railroad model competition, which required student teams to design their own railroad track models, create operation plans and present those plans. This summer, we also took the 2022/2023 cohort of Executive Fellows on a tour of the high-speed rail construction sites. Upon completion of the program, many of these Fellows will influence policy and decisions involving transportation upon permanent employment. The Authority highlights stories and events of students through and social media campaigns, with a focus on Instagram and YouTube. Videos from these two events for over 13,000 views,

Why Submit: This entry was submitted because the I Will Ride student outreach efforts are setting the standard for student engagement with transportation programs. As passenger rail expands in the U.S., the vision of the I Will Ride program is to educate, engage and inspire the next generation of professionals that will design, build and operate our high-speed rail project. The I Will Ride program also provides an increased awareness of passenger rail, planning and the government's important role in planning for and creating a sustainable future for its citizens to students and young adults that are interested in how they can help mitigating climate change and increase transportation mobility equitably.