The Nike Footwear Test Lab is dedicated to measuring footwear’s properties using machines to ensure that the shoes are meeting the requirements of the sports for which they are designed. This team creates test procedures, experiments with hypotheses, and communicates technical advice to teams across Nike including designers, other engineers, and product developers. The interns selected for this position will gain unique experience in the field of mechanical engineering in a lab setting. Interns selected for the summer can expect to research topics including materials, biomechanics, and mechanical testing; run tests with lab machines; analyze data with Excel and other analytical software; and prepare and communicate results to a wide-reaching audience.
The Nike Apparel Lab's mission is to inspire total confidence in every athlete by being the industry leading apparel testing center of excellence. They work to elevate partner capabilities and enable data-driven decision making through expertise, agility, advanced solutions, and connectivity.
The interns’ projects will support larger Nike Apparel Lab studies in the areas of thermal regulation and customer perception of apparel textiles. Interns will work alongside their mentor(s) to research, plan and conduct studies using a variety of lab methods. Research incorporates elements of physics, chemistry, and engineering.
The interns selected for this position will gain unique experience in the field of textile engineering in a lab setting. They can expect to research topics including materials, biomechanics, and mechanical testing; run tests with lab machines; analyze data with Excel and other analytical software; and prepare and communicate results to a wide-reaching audience. Overall, they will gain a broader understanding of apparel textile material properties and how they can be characterized in a lab setting.
Two interns will be selected for the footwear lab, and two interns for the apparel lab. All will work collaboratively with a group of mentors. Applicants should be enthusiastic about being part of a team. This is a full-time in-person internship, with the expectation that the interns will each work at least 300 hours over the course of the summer. In-lab work would include running tests while remote work may include research, data analysis, and presentation preparation. Experience with Windows and Microsoft Word/Excel is preferred.
The mentors provided the following statement about their mentoring philosophy: Our most important job as mentors is to support you -- we are your mentors and you are our junior coworkers. We will be challenging you to understand, communicate, and expand on the concepts you’ll be learning – the further you push yourself in this internship, the more you will get out of it. As a mentor team we will be there to provide guidance and fun but not necessarily answer all the questions for you.
Learn about a past project supported by Nike Apparel Lab: https://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/trends/a43451859/nike-one-period-shorts-2023/
Applicants can learn more about Nike Company Culture here: https://about.nike.com/en/impact
Applicants must currently be in 11th grade (rising to 12th grade). Students must be minimum age specified by June 15. These age requirements are strictly enforced by the mentoring organization, and there are no exceptions.
We strongly encourage students to apply who are from one or more systemically and historically excluded group, including but not limited to, non-cis-gendered students, girls, BIPOC, first-generation college-bound students, low-income/low-resourced students, students with disabilities, students who are neurodivergent, and those who speak a primary language other than English.
If you have any questions about the application, website technical issues and/or this position description, please contact Saturday Academy at ase@saturdayacademy.org. Do not contact the mentor directly. Contacting the mentor directly is grounds for disqualification of your ASE application.