Internship #7

Project & Summary
Randy

Before I begin my blog, I would like to point out that at my internship site I will be completing multiple small projects instead of doing one main project. These projects are going to be in three different categories: community relations, education, and advertising. I wanted to do explore all of these subjects because it will help me view my site from different aspects, in order to get the full experience out of my internship. The project I will be describing will be the largest of them all and will take the most time. I am really excited for this one as well, but I have yet to meet with the employee in charge of community relations, so i do not have all the details yet but I have a meeting with her tomorrow at 2:30 where we will figure out all the small details.

Project description:

Internship site: Warren-Walker Elementary School

Department: Community Relations

Project Title: Warren-Walker Alumni "Teen Party"

General Description: For this particular project, I will use my social skills to reconnect with old Warren-Walker students from years before and after myself in order to put together a "Teen Party". A couple years ago Warren-Walker hosted an event to celebrate their 75th anniversary, and this party I assume will be extremely similar to that. I will have to figure out where this event will be held, how much it will cost, when the best time will be for everyone, getting food, music and plan anything else that is needed.

Learning Objectives: Through this experience I expect to learn how to finance and plan an entire event. I plan to improve my "people" and networking skills by calling around and finding the best deals with different organizations.

Organization/Company Objectives & Benefits: This event will benefit the school through donations that will be asked to made through it. Also the event will cost money so if we keep our budget low we can gain money through the teens attending this event.

Schedule: For the first half of the day I will be working with two new teachers starting on Wednesday, Mrs. Frans the second grade teacher, and Mrs. Huff the fourth grade teacher. Then after lunch at around 12:30 I plan to work with the community relations employee Mrs. Fisk, and the Student Store advertiser Mrs. Wamba.

Academic Skills: The academic skills I will be using for this project will be my skills with financing that I learned through my latest Math project, This American Life. I will use my skills on how to budget well in order to better benefit the school.

Technical Skills: The technical skills I will be using for this project will be my social skills, my design skills with Adobe Photoshop, and my organization skills.

Collaboration—Skills and Opportunities: I will be reconnecting with as many Warren-Walker alumni as I can through Facebook, old school directories, and any other way I can. I will also be collaborating a lot with Mrs. Fisk to get everything organized according to their plans.

Exhibition Plans: Hopefully by the end of internship the entire party will be up and running, with signs and advertisements made by myself for this event. I can exhibit all my work on how I planned the party, with the people I needed to call and how I reached them, along with the advertisements I made for this event.

Schedule & Timelines: I will most likely be working on this project (along with other smaller ones) until the end of internship on January 28th, being that I have to plan an entire party. Everyday I will meet with the community relations employee most likely after lunch at around 12:30. Like I said earlier I have yet to have a meeting with her and figure out the exact times, but coordinating with the two teachers I am interning for, after lunch would make the most sense.

Summary of my Week

What were the highlights?
There were so many highlights of my first week working at my internship, especially because I am constantly surrounded by people I love. The teachers I am currently helping out I have known all my life, and I love children, so being in my old elementary school environment is amazing. The main highlights of my week were making a project for the preschoolers, teaching the second graders Math, and everyday when the kids see me: they run up to give me a giant group hug.

What challenges did you face and how did you manage them?
I didn't face many challenges this week except for sometimes not knowing what to do while the kids were at their electives, like music, computers, or library. I ended up following them to their electives to see what went on there too, and so far my favorite has been drama. They have such a great drama teacher and she makes it a lot of fun. That was the main challenge I faces, and it was not even a tough one.

How did you work with others?
I worked with both the teachers I am helping out, and the students of those teachers. I would work with the teachers by teaching lessons with them, while they helped out. For example, I taught the second graders Math this week with some help from Mrs. Thein when they would not give me their full attention, or understand a concept. I worked with the students when I walked through the tables answering questions and helping them out with their work.

What did you see and/or experience that you did not expect?
Something I experienced that I did not expect was being able to actually create a project for the kids in the short time of a day. I was able to create a project for the preschoolers that was relevant to the letter "n". Every week these kids learn a new letter and this weeks letter was "n", so I made them a project called "noodle names." In this project they were to choose from multiple different types of uncooked noodles and then paste those noodles onto a piece of paper to make their names. Along with that I also cooked some noodles for the kids snack time. I did not expect to be able to do this because I felt I had a lot of freedom with the project, which I loved.

How would you describe your first week to someone who has never had an internship?

I would describe my first week as amazing. To someone who has never had and internship I would highly recommend getting one because this experience is something that you don't often get the opportunity to have. I would describe my experience so far as almost eye-opening. I had no clue about all the background work that goes into being a teacher, or running a school. You learn so much about the place you intern and I feel it is an amazing experience.