Community Futures BC has recently become the agency responsible for the Industry Canada’s Small Business Internship Program www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/sbip-pspe.nsf/eng/home

The Small Business Internship Program provides small and medium-sized enterprises financial support to hire a post secondary student intern to assist them in their adoption of e-business strategies to increase their productivity and competitiveness.

A significant number of SMEs are currently simply connected to the Internet or are passively on-line, and might not be taking advantage of the possibilities offered by e-business. The Small Business Internship Program seeks to improve the competitiveness of SMEs by supporting businesses to actively market on-line and improve their competitiveness with e-business practices and technologies.

Your firm will receive financial support towards the employment of post-secondary students who will work on e-business projects. The Government of Canada will reimburse 75% of the eligible wages and related expenses such as statutory employee benefits, up to a total of $10,000. Your firm is responsible for covering other expenses such as fringe benefits and overhead costs. Support will be available for twelve weeks.

Students interested in being a part of the SBIP must meet the following criteria:

• be enrolled in a post secondary education program (or have recently graduated from such a program) AND intending to return to school;
• be under the age of 30;
• be pursuing education in an information and communications technology-related field where information technology (IT) knowledge and skills are important (e.g. business, e-commerce studies, computer science);
• be legally entitled to work in Canada (this includes permanent residents of Canada but does not include those awaiting permanent status, or persons with temporary work visas, such as students who have graduated and have temporary work visas); and
• be willing to compete for the positions.

Students gain valuable work experience as well as help fund their post-secondary education.

Call Community Futures Development Corporation of Central Okanagan for additional information 250-868-2132.