Last Day of Work/Farewell Tour

Today was the day.
The last day.
Le dernier jour. (French)
Am letzten tag. (German)
El dia anterior. (Spanish)
Ultimo giorno. (Italian)
Ninigii-pooni-anokii noongom. (Ojibwe/Native American)

I tied up some loose ends this morning, mainly sending an email for feedback on the new checkout process/forms. My email was a little wordy. I hope they understood what I was talking about. It's kind of all on Kas to describe everything, which I feel bad about because a lot of the generation and my work was based on my experience. I really wish I could be in the room when training starts for that. I sent out a few more emails, switched my google wave account, and turned in my office keys and phone.

Then I started to to say goodbye to everyone. It's tough to say goodbye. How do you thank everyone for all they have done other than saying thank you? It was all kind of overwhelming. For a guy who usually loves to talk a lot, I was pretty speechless.

I started with the Links. Naturally, they gave me a hard time for leaving them. They are a solid group of students and were a daily reminder of why I enjoy working with students so much.

I said goodbye to Student Activities. Kim Cassel, Director of Student Activities, grilled me on where I want to go after grad school, whether I would go into Housing, Student Activities, or something else. She also ribbed me a bit for not mentioning her in my blog (I would say mission accomplished Kim!)

I then went to the Residence Life Office. They threw me a surprise lunch with the entire Residence Life staff, minus Tim as he was on vacation. I think they were a little disappointed when I didn't have the "OMG I'M SO SURPRISED!" moment as that's not really how I am with surprises. We all had quite a few laughs, the biggest pizza I have ever seen, and Black Eyed Peas youtube video (long story). I also got more nifty gifties! Penn College Nike T-shirt and a hat that fit me perfectly! Again, tough saying goodbye and thank you to everyone. Of course, right before I walked out the door, I remembered I didn't fill out the time sheet. So I stayed behind, filled one out, took one last look as I stood in the doorway, and left.

However, no rest for this guy. Had to go to Target and Best Buy, went to Jiffy Lube for an oil change, napped (ok so I rested), and homework. Saturday, Santana concert. Sunday, pack and clean. Monday, 14 hour drive back to Illinois, move in, unpack, and start training on Wednesday.

Meetings

Today, I had a bunch of meetings. In the morning, I continued to look through information on Greek Life Standards for my meeting later this afternoon with Krista and Erin. I then had a meeting with Brian and we went over my time here. Both my feedback and his feedback was positive. He was really pleased with my work and what I brought to the office. I was really pleased with all the opportunities I was given here. We broke for lunch and then Krista and I had a meeting with President Gilmore. Turns out we received nifty gifties! We each got a sweater that apparently only the Board of Trustees and other high ranking officials have! We also received awesome leather portfolios! Also, having the opportunity to meet and talk with a college President is so awesome! After that we went into our Greek Standards meeting. We discussed how the students are doing on the standards and how things can be improved to get more student response. With a lot of the standards, I called for more assessment, which the students here aren't necessarily "fill out a form" students.

After work, the Links, Krista and I all went out to dinner at 33 East, a very high end restaurant in Williamsport. Although I was not pleased about it, I got dressed up. Navy blazer, tie, the works. The food was delicious! Krista and Justin (lead Link) presented awards to everyone. I received the "Most Likely to Mooch Connections Food" award. I still maintain that I was allowed to do so! (HAHAHA!) We took a bunch of pics and called it an evening. Good times!

DMB!!!

Last night Dave Matthews Band was playing the Toyota Pavilion at Montage Mountain in Scranton! The first and last time I saw them was in 2005 at the Target Center in Minneapolis, MN over Thanksgiving break. That was a good show. This was better. I didn't recognize some of their newer songs because I lost touch with the group and got into some different artists/styles of music but they dominated their set last night. The weather was perfect for the outdoor venue. Parking was a little goofy but the 3+ hours worth of Dave Matthews totally made up for it! I was also quite surprised by some of the older songs they played. They weren't the typical songs you'd hear on the radio. Picked up the Big Whiskey CD and a 2010 Summer Tour t-shirt to mark the occasion. The only negative was I forgot my camera so it's tough to prove how great my seats were! Getting back to Williamsport from Scranton was also kind of tough but totally worthy my heavier than usual eyelids. Such a good concert!

Here is their set list:

The Stone
Warehouse
Grace Is Gone
Seven
You Might Die Trying
Tripping Billies
Cry Freedom
Lying In the Hands of God
Gravedigger
One Sweet World
Improv
Pantala Naga Pampa
Rapunzel
Why I Am
Busted Stuff
#41
Shake Me Like a Monkey
Two Step

Encore:

Digging A Ditch (intro/tease)
You and Me
So Damn Lucky

Preparing for departure

Today I worked on a lot of loose ends. Tomorrow I have a meetings with Brian and President Gilmore, most likely discussing my work and what I think about Penn College. For Brian, I put together a little SWOTS analysis about my time here. Everything was quite positive, there were only a few minor things I would have changed. I also worked on a resignation letter in case Brian needs one. After that I started to follow through with the Blog enhancements, mainly by posting my work. I worked on a few other things that that over the summer but these were my main projects. Now, it's off to Scranton for Dave Matthews Band!

My Projects: Checkout Procedure

My most recent project has been working with Kas Williams on the Checkout Procedure/Forms. I really enjoyed working on this project. I enjoyed all my projects but this one really brought me back to my roots, which was following policies and procedures at the Bailey Hall Information Desk at Minnesota. They had a few forms doing similar things and based on the process I was familiar with, we redesigned some checkout forms. It collects their information, tracks their changes, and keeps the administrative process. I also made a flowchart to help explain the process a bit better with the new form. We also added a Room Change Request Form but I'm not going to post that because I did not design it. So here they are!

My Projects: Fire Posters

So my first project and the one that took the longest was the fire poster. I tried to do a lot of research on what other schools were doing. Although I'm all for innovation or originality, I also don't believe in reinventing the wheel. Unfortunately there was not much out there so I designed the posters myself with the information and policies Penn College have. By no means am I a graphic designer. I usually have an ear for music but not an eye for art. However, the important thing about these posters is I was given the opportunity to see what I could do. Residence Life saw this as a learning experience for me and I greatly appreciate it! So, here are my posters.

My Projects: RA Reference Card

So, Lee Plenn, Coordinator of Rose Street Apartments liked the card so much that he wanted me to put together a similar card for the RAs. Since the RAs have a little more authority than the Links and the procedures are a little different, I changed the card. It is still wallet sized but now has 3 sections per side (although one is a cover). I went back to the policies and organized it with as much information as possible. Lee had a couple questions on it and I'm not sure how the questions got resolved so I did not create a prototype. Anyway, here is the information!

My Projects: Link Reference Card

Since my time at Penn College is coming to an end, I think it's best to put the examples up of what I created this summer. This was inspired by classmate and fellow Blogger Drew Donahoo, who recently posted an item of his work, which looked awesome.

Anyway, the first thing I completed this summer was a Residence Hall Reference Card for the Links, our Orientation Student Team. Basically, I was asked to put multiple pages of Residence Hall safety policies onto a small wallet sized reference card. I was provided the information and went to town on it. Here is the result

Nothing too special, just really small font and a lot of formatting to make it print correctly. We also laminated them so they would stay protected. I'm not sure if the Links found them useful but I know the Residence Life Staff liked them. It inspired my next project.

My Placement for this Fall!!!

Yesterday I received an email informing me of my hall placement for this year!!! I will be working at the Bayliss-Henninger complex (aka BayHenn), which will primarily be for returning and transfer students. I'm pumped to be placed in BayHenn because I can continue my long walk to class, something I enjoyed quite a bit last year from living in Graduate and Family Housing, and the Rec Center is right across the parking lot! I'm not sure what my exact duties will be but I start training next week Wednesday. There is so much to do before then but I am super excited!

Form Editing Wrap-up and Recycling

Yesterday I wasn't quite able to finish editing the new form the way we wanted it. I had some formatting issues and Publisher was not cooperating. I got that squared away and then worked on editing the flow chart. Once I finished updating it, I decided it didn't flow aesthetically. So I redesigned that. I think it makes more sense and looks better. I then switched gears, as they probably say at the School of Transportation here at Penn College, and moved on to Recycling. Jenn has had some GoogleWave issues and I have no clue as to how to fix it before our meeting. Tough break. We, the Recycling Group, met with Jenn and had a solid discussion. We caught her up on what we have come up with and she determined the first thing we need to do is to design a logo. Again another thing I probably won't see the results of but it has been a project that definitely evolved into something bigger.

Check Out Process Presentation

Today was all about the check out process. After our work last week, Kas and I met to see if we needed to tweak the forms any more and then how to present it. There were some forms I hadn't seen or considered yet. Much of it probably pertained to Barb and Marion's work with the forms so I edited the forms to reflect what they would do. I think it was a solid addition and now I see that we aren't creating more of a mess and have tightened up the process. When we met with Tim, it seemed to make sense to him as well. He had some questions but we covered all of our bases. He had some edits which really won't be too difficult. I wish I was going to be around for the feedback, presentation to Brian, and hopefully the training of this process. This was a fun project for me and brought me back to my roots of working with this process as a Bailey Hall Office Assistant at UofM.

Post Weekend Review: Battlefield Tour

In an effort to try and Carpe Diem the rest of my time here, I went on a substantial battlefield tour this weekend. On Friday, it hit the Antietam near Sharpsburg, MD. I kind of had to rush through it because I wanted to get to Lynchburg, VA at a decent hour. The battlefield was still pretty cool. It rained all the way to Lynchburg, where I stayed at the Super 8. On Saturday, I started out with Appomattox Court House, where General Lee surrendered to General Grant. I spent a couple hours there with beautiful sunny weather. I then traveled to Petersburg, which was kind of confusing since it's three fronts spread out over quite a few miles. I saw an abbreviated tour of the Eastern Front mostly concentrating on the Crater, which is depicted in the opening scenes of the movie Cold Mountain (it's over dramatized in the movie, the Crater is not as large as it is in the movie but still really cool to see). After that I went up to Fredricksburg. There are actually 4 battlefields up there and I had planned to see them all but I only made it through Fredrickburg as it was all pretty awesome. I stayed in Haggerstown, MD at the Days Inn and traveled to Gettysburg on Sunday. I had been there once before but a lot has changed. There is a new Visitor's Center, the Bus Tour was different, new museum. It was all awesome! I did the Bus Tour, the Movie, Cyclorama, Museum, and the drove the entire battlefield to take pictures. I arrived there at 9am and didn't leave until 7:30pm. Well worth the trip and price of admission. I have 550 pictures plus a few videos to prove it. I got home at 10pm exhausted, sore, and satisfied. I do know that a future vacation will be taken out here again as I want to go back and see the battlefields again with the one's I missed.
















Dunker Church, Antietam National Battlefield














McLean House, where General Lee Surrendered, Appomattox Courthouse















Union Tunnel at the Crater, Petersburg National Battlefield















Memorial at Marye's Heights on the Sunken Road, Fredicksburg National Battlefield
















Cannons at Little Roundtop with the Devil's Den in the background, Gettysburg National Military Park













End of my Trip, East Cemetery Hill near dusk, Gettysburg National Military Park

Check Out Process

This morning Kas and I worked through putting forms and processes together to pitch our Room Change/Check Out process. I made a flow chart representing the process. Kas had put together a rough draft of a form and I took the information and made it into a grid. The more I piece together the process I more I discover how many other forms they have for different things. I have definitely come into a different system than I am used to. I'm also still wondering if we've now added two more forms to the grouping without eliminating any. Time/Monday will tell (since that's when we present).

The weekend. I'm going to attempt the battlefield tour this weekend, although it will be abbreviated. The weather is supposed to be not good tomorrow but Sunday will be great for Gettysburg!

Greek Life Standards

Yesterday, I continued to look at the Greek Life standards. I had some trouble wrapping my head around a few things, mainly the scholarship plan. At my chapter, only a person who fell below the grade requirements needed to develop a scholarship plan. The way I'm reading the standards it looks as though they have a scholarship plan for the entire house? It seems a little confusing. Also, I think there are time issues in the documents. There are a lot of required events. I'm sure someone could go to an event that covers multiple categories but the chance of that is slim. I think I'd rather spend the time studying than going to a bunch of events, but that's just me.

Update on various shenanigans, this weekend I'm going to try tour Civil War Battlefields. The weather doesn't look to hold on Saturday but hopefully I can catch a few things. However, Sunday looks great for Gettysburg, hot but great! Next Wednesday, I'm going to Dave Matthews Band in Scranton. My seat looks awesome! Then I have to pack up and go, although I'm debating whether I go up to Bethel, NY (aka Woodstock) on Saturday to see Santana play. I SOOOO want to go but I think I'd be cutting it close for moving in and training. We'll see.

Charisma

I might be the only person to find this funny.

My Dad is probably one of the funniest people I know. He always seems to inject humor into the most random situations. Depending on his "audience" the nature of the humor will change. Leadership and charisma are a couple of his most used jokes. In a situation or task that needs very little leadership, he jokingly takes credit for the success of the task, citing his leadership skills as an important factor. In another random situation, he will cite leadership again but then tack on his charisma as another important factor to the task's success. Sounds confusing, but it's really funny to hear and really hard to describe.

This weekend I found this in the book I'm reading for my summer class:

I sent this to him. I believe he is forwarding it to everyone he knows and probably citing leadership and charisma while he does it.

Continued Progress

Today I organized and sent out the Google Wave for the Recycling marketing. Hopefully the way I set things up will keep things organized and help people use it. I think the recycling project turned into a larger project than originally anticipated. When I started, I think we were just thinking of a few posters but now it has a larger scale to try and get people to recycle.

In thinking how I am going to end my blog for the summer, I decided to do a Top Ten List on why working at Penn College is awesome (I'll be more eloquent than that). I emailed all the student affairs professionals I've interacted with this summer and asked for their top 5 reasons. I'm hoping this will be a cool ending to the blog.

Late in the afternoon, I met with Krista and we discussed/brainstormed a bit on New Member Education for Greek Life. It was hard to brainstorm something without having a solid picture of what is currently being done. We both came up with our ideal educational and hopefully they can use some of that.

It's like 8:30 and I already feel like going to bed. Uffda.

Enhancing the Blog

Today I made a list of things I should add to enhance this blog. I probably need to expand on my profile a bit so people get a better understanding of me as the blogger. (Sounds lame but you never know). Even though I previously posted a link to a virtual campus tour, I think I need to take and add more pictures of campus or Williamsport. Also, I've noticed there are some limitations to the size of video that can be posted to the blog so I'm thinking about starting a YouTube account so I can post links to videos.

I brainstormed for much of the day, however then I realize I needed to work on a new Wave for the recycling stuff. I'll have to do that in the morning. It was also quite hot today. I find it a bit humorous that Pennsylvania is having days of record temperature while I'm here (take in mind I am most comfortable when the temp is around the freezing point). I am very glad I have an office with an air conditioner. My apartment is also quite cool.

Carpe Diem (Seize the Day)

As I had previously mentioned, I have two weeks left of my internship. What has also hit me was that I am not going to see everything I wanted to see while I am out here. I didn't create a list but here is what I was looking at:

New York City (with an expanded list of individual things, see Post Weekend Report: NYC)

Scranton, PA (The Office motherland, yes I know it's filmed in Hollywood, but still)

Lake Placid, NY (Herb Brooks Arena, 1980 Miracle Hockey Game site)

Niagara Falls

Woodstock (which is actually in Bethel, NY)

Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY

Penn State Campus

Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame (Cleveland, OH)

Native American History Museum in Washington DC

Philadelphia

Valley Forge

Civil War Battlefields (all would have been this past weekend)

- Gettysburg (PA)

- The Antietam (MD)

- Monocacy (MD)

- Manassas (VA)

- The Wilderness (VA)

- Chancellorsville (VA)

- Spotsylvania (VA)

- Fredricksburg (VA)

- Richmond (VA)

- Petersburg (VA)

- Appomattox Court House (VA)

Boston, MA

I am probably forgetting a few more things but I'm not going to come close to completing this list. Who knows when I am going to be back this way? It is another reminder to always Carpe Diem, Sieze the Day. It is one of the first things I learned at Sigma Chi along with the standards and principles we strive to live our lives by. You never know what is going to happen in the future and I forgot that whenever a weekend came my way this summer.

One of my favorite movies of all time is the Dead Poets Society. So many lessons can be taken from it. Here is a YouTube link to the Carpe Diem scene (you may need to turn the volume up).

The last time I had a Carpe Diem reminder, I got into Grad school so who knows what lies ahead. Just one of the many things I have to thank Penn College for!

Friday and Post Weekend Report: Healing

Not much happened on Friday. I just worked on some recycling stuff. Overall, it was a disappointing weekend. I pretty much had to lay around so I could heal my back. It was all I really could do. I tried working on a few projects but technology failed me. It also dawned on me how little time I have left here at Penn College, which is like two weeks. I got a few other projects done and stayed out of the record heat. Definitely looking forward to work this next week.

Production

Even though I'm not feeling the greatest, I was fairly productive. I spent the morning working on some ideas for the recycling marketing. I reviewed the notes from our initial meeting to see what I could find that could be used as a visual representation of single stream recycling. The idea of a funnel popped into my head and I came up with a few mock ideas using Publisher. After lunch, the recycling team met and we discussed ideas and brainstormed. We got some solid directions to go and will probably come up with more before our meeting with Jenn George. I wrapped up a few things in the afternoon but my back was starting to get painful and it was tough to concentrate. The day was still productive but it's probably a good thing tomorrow is Friday.

PS. It's July 1st. The summer is going by so fast. It still feels like I just got here!

Bad Back

First of all, I finished 4 drafts of fire posters and sent them off to Brian. I still think they need a little touch up but at least we know the look I'm going for. Brian will be on vacation the next few days so I'll get feedback on that later.

Unfortunately, I spent my afternoon at the hospital here in Williamsport. I have a lower back infection that is getting worse and I went to see if they could do anything for it. They prescribed me some antibiotics and it's a wait and see thing. If it gets worse, they will have to perform a procedure. This has happened to me once before so I'm not too nervous. Just disappointed. Also, this probably spells the end of my Civil War Battlefield marathon I had planned for the weekend. The plan was to drive to Lynchburg, VA on Friday and over the weekend hit Appomattox Court House, Petersburg, Richmond, Spotsylvania, Chancellorsville, The Wilderness, Fredricksburg, Manassas, Monocacy, The Antietam, and Gettysburg. I don't even know if I would have got to all of those but the chance is now very slim.

Work

Ever since Connections started, my days have been simplified. Instead of taking tours and bouncing around from place to place, I walk to my office and work on my projects. Although I value what the tours brought to my view and perspective of Penn College, it's good to sit down and just work on the projects I've been tasked with. I think the reference card is going to be approved. The fire safety posters are nearly done. We're making progress on the Recycling marketing and I've started a new project working on procedures. I also think this blog is going pretty well. I met with Brian before lunch and we had a solid conversation. I hope I didn't take up too much of his time as I ended up having a lot to say. I've started to think about various projects to end my experience and help Penn College attract another intern next summer. I'm learning a bit more about what I will be doing this fall in my assistantship. I'm getting a little anxious about where I will be but I'm confident things will be great!

Morning Walk!

So here's what I experience every morning when I walk to work. It's best not to watch it full screen as my camera is not that powerful for videos and you lose a lot of clarity. I made another video of my office but it is too big to load to the blog. Unfortunately, if I can't load large videos, my New York video may be a bust. Or I'll create a YouTube account which I reeeallly don't want to do. I'll figure it out.

Oh boy!

So I have discovered in my extreme laziness of the weekend that all that sitting around caused a possible pinched nerve in my lower back. It is really uncomfortable to sit. But I'm not complaining too much since Sara Hillis has a bulging disc in her back and feel that would be even worse.

As far as work today, I finished the draft of the reference card for RAs. It looks pretty good. Had a little trouble with the formatting but I think it should work out. Lee liked it and I passed it along to Brian and Tim. I then started playing with the information needed for the recycling posters. I'm not sure how it's going to work but we shall see! Here's to a better day tomorrow!

Post Weekend Review: Heat!!!

OMG! It was so hot this weekend that I threw all plans out the window. I watched the World Cup Soccer match between the US and Ghana, which was a losing effort on Saturday and did my laundry Sunday night. Those were the only times I went outside. I was perfectly fine staying inside, posting New York Pics on Facebook, and creating a New York Picture video for this blog. I also started researching a possible Civil War Battlefield Tour for the 4th of July weekend. Like the New York Trip, it's ambitious and I'm not sure if there will be time to cover it all.

Senior Visit Day!!

After a morning of putting together the GoogleWave tutorial for the Recycling project, I helped out with Senior Visit Day. Penn College invites students who are going to be entering their senior year of high school to come visit the campus. From what I understand, these are students who have already shown an interest in Penn College. I assisted with the tour of Rose Street Apartments, basically greeting and delegating visitors to one of our 5 tour guides. It was a lot of fun hanging out with the Summer RAs and Adam, a Conference RA. We also received pizza from Wegman's which was delicious!

As far as the tours go, most were really short tours. I did not go on one of the tours but I remember the tours I gave at Bailey Hall at Minnesota. I was always 20 to 30 minutes and I showed them everything and had time for questions. I will say I am a little bias as we had to really push Bailey Hall as a place to live since it wasn't on the Main Campus of Minnesota. From what I gather, the emphasis for this Senior Visit group was to see a room. Also, this group of "tourists" may not have started their research yet. It just seemed really short to me but short and sweet may work here!

We called it a day at 2pm. Plans for the weekend: I'm probably going to head north and see the Baseball Hall of Fame, maybe up to Lake Placid to see Herb Brooks Arena, and then work on the pictures I took in NYC! Definitely taking it easy tonight though.

Recycling

This morning I met with Katie, Krista, and Kyle Baker (Summer RA) to discuss recycling ideas. I did a bunch of research on what other schools are doing and also discovered RecycleMania, which is a nation wide recycling competition. There were a lot of great ideas that we could totally "borrow", although Penn College is registered as a team.

Once we got into the meeting, there were a lot of ideas but Kyle had a great idea keying on the statement "What's Your Number?" Plastics with numbers 1-7 can be recycled, it's kind of humorous and we can take it several different ways. Krista also had the idea of "Go Green with Penn College Blue!" which the recycling bins in the rooms are blue. Both are solid ideas. Then I started talking and things got confusing. There was some sort of communication issue going on but it was hard to identify and fix. From my perspective, Katie, Krista, and Kyle were focusing more on what they can do with those two examples while I continued to look for more ideas. At one point, I switched over to talking about what we could do with their ideas but that might have made things more confusing. I'm not sure if there are different philosophical things going on or if there was just too much trying to be discussed at once but hopefully things will go a little better next time. I definitely need to take some time and figure out how I can better communicate.

I continued looking at Recycling information the rest of the afternoon. Kyle passed along some information and ideas and I had the idea to use GoogleWave to communicate and share information because I can see our in boxes being overloaded. Brian and I have been using it and it has worked out but I think for the recycling project to be sustainable after Krista and I leave. or even Kyle, someone can see what we've done and picked up where we left off. I'm not sure if this will help communication but at least we can keep information organized in a single space. I'll see what they say.

Went to Wegman's to pick up some food supplies. Two things I am missing from Midwest grocery stores: microwavable bbq pulled pork and cheese curds. I can't find them any where in Wegman's and I'm thinking about branching out to a different store in my quest.

Surprise!!!

So Friday is Ashley's birthday and the Residence Life staff have been working on a surprise party. Apparently, Ashley loves celebrating office birthdays, organizing some elaborate extravaganzas in the past. The staff decided to have a surprise lunch at LeJeune Chef! The rest of the staff arrived at the restaurant early and we strategized how to surprise her. This was kind of funny to listen into because we kept changing what we were going to do. We finally decided on something and when Ashley arrived we unleashed the surprise! She was totally surprised, quote "I'm not even in birthday mode!" (This tickled my funny bone all afternoon!) The lunch was delicious. I had some beef dish, the name of which I cannot pronounce.

As far as the work day goes, I'm getting close to completing the RA reference card. I'm having trouble getting things lined up but have the bulk of my information. In the evening, I went to the Connections dinner, which was delicious. However, I had not seen the Links in a while. So, they razzed me a bit for that. I also showed up in shorts and a t-shirt, which they razzed me for not looking professional. I informed them my work day ends at 4:30 but they were hearing none of that! Haha! Good day!

Rainy Day

It's raining really hard here. Good day to be inside. The ResLife staff is interviewing another candidate for a coordinator position, I think. I had a short meeting with Brian. He wanted to check in on how I'm doing here, which I'm doing great. I think he feels a little bad that we haven't spent more time in conversations as he has had a busy summer with building a new residence hall, interviewing candidates, handling the end of the year closing, and preparing for next fall's opening. He's a busy guy.

I think part of having an intern is so they can continue to move forward with projects or ideas they had over the course of the year. I'm not sure who would work on these things or who would have the time if they did not have an intern. Basically, even if it wasn't me as their intern, I'm glad they have the opportunity to host an ACUHO-I intern.

Connections!!

Connections has officially started and the campus is buzzing! Nearly every employee is wearing a connections polo. The Residence Life staff is helping with check in. Since Link training is over, I no longer need to have a schedule printed for me by Barb. It's kind of sad that I won't be making my daily visits to the ResLife office and I won't hear the awesome/funny/weird conversations they have. However, it also means I won't wonder each day what my schedule is going to look like and I can plan my work week more efficiently. I really hope the Links' video went over well!

Post Weekend Review: New York, NY!!

So, this weekend I went to visit Tim and Lindsay Amundson in New York City. Tim is one of my best friends from the University of Minnesota and I was the best man in Tim and Lindsay's wedding. We had been talking about a possible visit to NYC for a long time but I've never had the money or time to go. Tim and Lindsay are moving back to Minnesota at the end of June so I had to go! Plus, it was my birthday weekend, so NYC was my present from me.

From Williamsport, I drove 2 hrs and 45 mins to Dover, NJ where I caught the Amtrak. Tim met me at Penn Station and we went to eat. After that, we went to their local pub where Lindsay's friends threw her and Tim a surprise going away party! Good times were had by all. The next morning, Tim and I hit the ground running with the touristy spots. In order, this is what we accomplished over the weekend:

Saturday

First New York Subway ride

Chrysler Building (outside, plus my first NYC taxi ride!)

Grand Central Station

Chinatown/Canal Street (Lots of replica stuff, I heard "Oakley, Rolex, Gucci" a lot)

Walked over Brooklyn Bridge

Grimaldi's Pizza (New York Style Pizza, delicious!!!)

Brooklyn Bridge Park

Boat Tour of the Hudson (aka view Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, USS Intrepid, Chelsea Pier)

Battery Park

Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian (George Gustav Heye Center)

Wall Street Bull

Outside of New York Stock Exchange

Outside of Federal Hall

Ground Zero (Lots of construction here, tough to see and understand what is what)

NHL Pro Shop (Lot's of Blackhawks stuff, aka awesome!)

Outside of Radio City Music Hall

Sunset at The Rockefeller Center (Amazing view, probably better than at the Empire)

Mexican Radio (It's a restaurant, amazing food!!)

Times Square at Night

Sunday

John Lennon Tribute in Central Park (Went early to get pics before tons of people showed up)

- Strawberry Fields

- Dakota Hotel (Across the street from Central Park)

Shake Shack (Great little burger place!)

Columbia University Campus (One of the original colonial colleges! Beautiful campus!)

Grant's Tomb (Pretty awesome little museum, got some sweet pics and video)

Central Park (Took some pictures, tossed a baseball around, there is so much to see there!)

After Central Park, I was beat. I'd been in the heat all weekend and decided to throw in the towel. We went back to Tim's, I gathered my gear, and pushed west to Williamsport. I got home about 10pm. I may have been exhausted but it was well worth it.

I will recommend two things: 1. make sure you have an extra camera battery with you at all times and 2. you can do so much more with someone who knows the city and subway really well. I would not have seen half the things had it not been for Tim. I'm not sure how I'm going to post the pictures. There's kind of a lot. Maybe a movie? We'll see. Overall, great weekend! Thanks to Tim and Lindsay for their hospitality!

End of Links Training

In the morning, I stopped in to the ResLife office to pickup my schedule for the day. While I was there, Barb, Erin the Friday Work Study student, and I followed up on the bulletin board project. Jerikah apparently had a ball cutting out little pictures of items to have and not to have in the Residence Halls. Erin, who was previously in Graphic Design, had the duty of posting everything. They picked my brain a bit more for the project and we also talked a little student affairs.

Eventually, I had to leave and help with with the last portions of Links training. The students made an awesome video to introduce the students to Penn College. The administration really liked it, saying it was the best ever! They had a little work to do on the closing but overall sweet video!

Then we went back to do some scenario training as a wrap-up to all the things the Links have learned. I played the role of student and asked about going to class and getting Penn State tickets. I must say all of these students are really prepared to help the new students with orientation. They all gave great answers to the scenarios and they have retained a lot of information. Penn College has a solid orientation leader training process!

After that we unpacked some linens and called it a day! I'm off to New York!!!

Fire Safety Poster and Avation Tour

It was tough to go to work after an awesome concert last night but it had to be done. In the morning, I continued to work on Fire Poster Research. I reviewed Brian's comments on the Google Wave for the fire safety poster/video. Apparently there is already a video used so I am anxious to see that. I put more ideas to paper as far as a poster goes, I really want to find or make a fireman's cross logo. We'll see if I can find that or accomplish that.

In the afternoon, we had a tour of the Aviation Center. What a cool tour! I'm glad I brougt my camera to take a few pics. The Aviation Center is connected to the Williamsport Regional Airport and is part of the school of transportation. They work on planes, engines, study the aerodynamics, and all sorts of stuff. It was awesome! This is the last of our academic tours. I would say we ended on a great note! Here are some pics:

Bryan Adams!!!

So, I'm sitting in the Residence Life office and Elliott Strickland walks into the office and asks if I want to go to the Bryan Adams concert at the Community Arts Center. I hesitated for a moment because I have a lot of homework to take care of before my New York trip this weekend. Then the moron truck hit me and I immediately said yes, receiving a free ticket!

The concert was amazing!!! It was an acoustic set on a nearly empty stage. The tickets were on the floor, about 13th row. He played a lot of songs I recognized, told a few humorous stories, and took a couple requests. He came out for a 4 song encore and was about to leave the stage but the crowd response was so strong, he stuck around to play 3 more songs! To add a little twist, he informed us that they have been recording their last few shows to possibly make a live acoustic album and would record this entire show!!!! I really hope he uses the Williamsport recording cause I would so buy that CD!

Directors Meeting and a New Project!!

This morning we had a meeting with the student development directors. I worked on a little fire safety research before that. They discussed some reorganization of the "Awareness" weeks and talked about having one group take care of those instead of trying to recruit a whole new group. They also talked about Penn College Promotion and really keying in on the Blue Crew, which apparently started out as a tshirt fundraiser. They're also thinking about using that with the alumni. Elliott Strickland, who was leading the meeting, went on a weird email tangent but it was really about using Penn College signature lines properly. It was kind of one of those "just kidding" moments.


After working on some more campus fire safety research, I met with Kas to discuss check out procedures. I had asked Tim if he had any information and he provided a diagram, which was kind of confusing:

Kas and I really looking to improve this process. I was very involved in the University of Minnesota's process and believe I know it pretty well. Kas and I had a great conversation about this and I think we're going to solve the issue.

Recycling, Tours, and a Surprise!

After looking up more fire safety information, I went to General Services with Katie, Krista, and RA Kyle. This is the team that will be tackling the Recycling programming in the Halls. We spoke with Don Luke and Rick Shaffer about the single stream recycling program. He told us about the things that worked, what didn't work, and we all brainstormed for a bit on educating the students on recycling. We also talked about how Dauphin Hall changes some things. I think this is going to be a fun project!

Centered around lunch were two tours, one of Construction and Design Technologies and the other was Transportation Technology, mostly focusing on the Automotive part of the school. Both of these tours were pretty awesome. Stuff like this always sparks the "I wish" syndrome in me, like I wish I knew how to be a stone mason and lay my own bricks or I wish I knew a lot about cars so I could restore one. Again, students are really getting practical experience in their schooling.

Once that was over with, the Links were off to Diversity Training with Brian Johnson. I assumed it was my supervisor Brian Johnson and went with the Links to touch base with Brian. I then discovered it was not ResLife's Brian Johnson but Campuspeak's Brian Johnson!!!!! I read about him in a Campuspeak magazine and thought his message would be really cool to see but I've never had the opportunity to see him. I stuck around for his diversity session and it was awesome! I love the way he uses movies to help reach his audience. It's what I want to do in the Greek Leadership Class I am co-teaching this Fall. There were a bunch of things I could have accomplished this afternoon but I had to jump at the chance to hear Brian Johnson speak. So Good!

Links' Residence Hall Training

Today was the big presentation of Residence Hall training for the Links. I was up bright and early to get to Student Activities so I could laminate and cut out the Reference Cards for the Links. It took forever and we started our morning a little late. Once we got started, we went around the room and talked about our best on-campus or residence hall experience. People shared some great stories. I was a little worried about going around due to last week's events but it seemed to get people energized. Joe Worth gave a good talk about facilities, although I think he made the Links a little nervous about overflowing toilets. He is right though, water can be very damaging! We then had a little break, which I ran over to the ResLife office and turned my time sheet in. I keep forgetting that thing. I'm so used to being under contract with Western.

Tim talked a little more about Housing policies, using my reference card for the Links to refer to. Ashley then came over to talk linens for a bit, check in and check out procedure, and when to call the RAs or Conference Assistants. We tried to provide some time for them to ask some questions and talk about fire drill procedure but maybe when they got the reference card, their questions were answered. Not sure.

There were a lot of questions about Dauphin Hall and what that looks like. I think some learning style issues were being played out. They had a hard time visualizing the way Dauphin Hall is going to be set up. "Who was going to use what bathroom, are there people cleaning those bathrooms, what about guests, is there a door that locks people out of the common area in the pods?" It was endless. Tim did a great job answering their questions and I, personally, think they could have figured it out. However, what they were really after was a tour of the new building. They weren't going to be satisfied until they got a tour and continued to ask crazy questions in their pursuit. Granted, some of the questions were very valid, we didn't provide visual substitutes to accommodate different learning styles, and I'm close to this training. However, they're all smart students and it's been the only point where I wanted to raise an eyebrow at them and ask "Really?" It's good to see they're thinking about it though.

We broke for lunch a bit and then came back for the Quiz Show, where I got to utilize my game show host voice. However, the remote to the screen was dead and the computer tower had no screen. It was one giant technical malfunction, so we had to abandon the game show aspect of it and simply go through each question. It was disappointing but at least they did a good job of answering the questions and raising good questions for Tim and I. After that, the new Links went to tour Delaware Hall at College West and the returning Links and I prepared for our behind closed doors session. I liked each of the scenarios. It gave them a good taste of what they might experience. It was a little hard to change around the script I had but it was still fun to participate. Each Link group had a different approach to the issues they faced. After the Dauphin Hall stuff in the morning, they really stepped up and used their talents. Again, a very impressive group. We wrapped up a bit and then called it a day.

Overall, great training. I think the reference cards will help them. I think we broke up the day with enough stuff to keep them active and we covered the things we needed to. Maybe for next year incorporate some more visual aids and double check technology before using it. But, still great training!

Post Weekend Review: Good Times

I got off to a lazy start, sleeping to about 11:30 on Saturday morning. However, things took off from there. It was the opening match for the US in World Cup Soccer against England. Krista and I went with Erin and Keith to Rivals to watch the game. They had some good wings and the match was a well contested tie. I thought about being lazy the rest of the day but Link Bryann Bingaman and his girlfriend Jess were looking for something to do, so Krista and I went to dinner with them at a great bbq rib place and then we toured around Bryann's home area, especially going to the awesome river shore park (can't remember it's name). It was a great little evening.

On Sunday, once I confirmed a New York City trip, I solidified a list of places to go. I also made a large push for on my homework. Since I was going to be gone much of the next weekend, I needed to get ahead cause I know I won't want to do homework next weekend. Great little weekend!

Thursday and Friday: Race to the Finish

Thursday and Friday consisted of two things and two things only: the slide show and the card. Everything kind of blended together. Tim and I continued going through the slide show and replacing questions and answers. Once that was done, Tim emailed them to me and I proceeded to clean the slides up. In testing the slides, I noticed the last two sets did not progress or function the same way the first set of slides. It took me a considerable amount of time to fix this but I got it done. I then had to finish up the reference card. I waited as long as I could for Brian's approval, which he did, and I arranged the printing with various colors. Printing and cutting them definitely took some time. Unfortunately, I did not finish in enough time to to go laminate the cards at Student Activities. I will have to do that on Monday.

Thursday was the memorial service. I was definitely thinking about Liz, Amanda, and Brian. Not to sure what the weekend will bring!

BLACKHAWKS!! STANLEY CUP CHAMPS!!!!

What a game! It looked as though the Blackhawks were going to run away with it but once again the Flyers tied it up in the final minutes. A few minutes into overtime, Patrick Kane slips one by the goalie and it's pandemonium!! 4-3 in OT! Former University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux and Blackhawk captain won the Conn Smythe Trophy too!! Chicago Blackhawks are Stanley Cup Champs! Great night!!!

Reference Card and Gameshow

A lot was accomplished today! Since I was gone all day yesterday, I just started mocking up the reference card with the information Tim gave me on Monday. With the information I had, I was able to knock it out in a couple hours. I sent it to Lee and he liked it so much that he asked if a new copy could be made for his RAs. After looking at all the information, I determined that a different card should be made for the RAs because they have a little more authority than the Links do. A couple other things will take priority before I actually look at reworking the card.

Once we had a mock-up of the card, Tim and I went to work on editing the PowerPoint for the game show. A couple of policies have changed so we needed the slides to reflect that. It was kind of slow going. I had read the policies beforehand but I had a lot of questions on why things the way they were. Although I'm sure they have a specific procedure to follow when doing this, I can tell Brian and Tim have a good amount of authority to change the policies when things come up. Tim told me that any policy changes usually happen as a result of a student doing something wrong. Even though it was an entire revision of the policy, there were a bunch of steps to go through when editing the social function policy for Greek Life at Western Illinois. We barely made it through the first two sets of slides and there is still one left and we have questions to replace. We'll have to get them tomorrow. I also experienced my first Residence Life Staff meeting. Once again, the staff get a lot done in a meeting and cover a lot of topics but it is a lot of fun being in the room with all of them together!

Morgan Valley

Today was our diversity day with the Links. Penn College owns land up on this mountain and there is a cabin for people to host retreats. It has a really cool deck over looking the valley. And the temperature was nice and cool!!!

The Links had been working on a privileges journal and a few questionnaires on how diverse they are prior to going up there. During the day, we had several activities to help them recognize their own privileges and diversity. In many of the activities we (or maybe just I) found out a lot of things I did not know about people. My hopes were probably a little high for the talk I thought we would have. Some people opened up, some didn't. I tried to open up some gates by talking about my own experience but that worked to an extent. I think they are still a little nervous talking about those subjects around each other, afraid of saying the wrong thing. That's ok though. I was probably the same way when I was 20-22 years of age. I did have a pretty awesome conversation with Bryann Bingaman about Fraternity.

Remembrance

Upon arriving to work, the rumor I heard over the weekend ended up being true. A student of Penn College died in a car accident over the weekend. The whole campus is feeling pain right now. She was a really involved student and close with a lot of people, including the Residence Life staff. I never met her and didn't know a thing about her but I can relate to what the campus is going through as I had three friends pass away from smoke inhalation in a house fire.

I couldn't find the original article but here is an article that remembers the incident. Here's the story how I remember it:

During my First Year of college in 2002, I lived on the 3rd Floor of East Wing at Bailey Hall on the St. Paul campus of the University of Minnesota. The people I lived around were all different but a lot of fun. Over the course of the year, everyone seemed to have a connection with each other and we seemed to be like one giant family, not always happy, but a family no less. We all went our separate ways after the year ended, some people living in Bailey again, some to off campus housing. I returned to Bailey Hall with 2 of my neighbors from 3East, John and Tim.

September 20th, 2003 did not start out to be a normal Saturday. John usually spent his Saturdays in the Fall out hunting but for some reason he decided to stay. Tim usually spent the night with his girlfriend but he did not on this day. John and I had plans to attend the Gopher football game against Louisiana Lafayette later that night. The three of us were watching some football pre-game that morning when our neighbors, Kellen, Joe, and Eric (all three residents of 3East with us), knocked on our door and asked if we heard what happened. We said no and they told us Liz Wencl, Amanda Speckien, and Brian Heiden, members of our family, had died in a house fire. They were visibly upset as they were much closer to the three of them than John, Tim, and I. Between that moment of shock and going to Liz's funeral, everything is a blur. I remember bits and pieces but everything happened so fast.

Liz's funeral was first and time seemed to slow down. I had been close with Liz. We had a couple French classes together and I talked her a couple days prior to the accident. She always lit up a room and made everyone feel like they would always have her as a friend. Amanda's funeral was a couple days later and on the same day as Brian's. I went to Amanda's so I was unable to attend Brian's funeral. The finality of it all was unlike anything I had ever experienced. All I knew was how much I would miss them.

I can't claim to be their best friends like others can. I don't know if they considered me a friend. What I do know is they had an impact on my life. We shared the common experience of living in the Residence Halls of Minnesota and the trials of navigating our way through our first year of college. They taught me not to take any friendship for granted. I strive to make everyone feel welcomed, even if I know nothing about them. I strive to live life to the fullest, just as they did. I continue to remember.

There is no comparison to a fire and a car accident except that both are tragic. However, I can't help remembering what it was like. I feel for the faculty, staff, and students here at Penn College for what they are going through. I hope their wound will heal with time. Take care Penn College.

Email again??

So the days of me having a Penn College email address were short lived. I got to work to check my email and found I could not log on to a computer. I couldn't log on to anything. Turns out they switched my email address without telling me so I was quite blind for a while. I should say, they tried telling me but sent the notification to my new email of which I did not have knowledge of. Anyway, it made a lot of sense since I hadn't received an email since Wednesday last week. Hopefully everything is squared away with that.

In the late morning, we toured the School of Business and Computer Technologies. We spoke with the coordinator of matriculation and retention, who actually graduated with a master's degree in student affairs. Students in the School of Business and Computer Technologies will learn info about business and tech, but they will also work with the health and legal fields as well. This tour was also different as we spent the majority of out time in a classroom with a PowerPoint presentation, which most of our tours have been through all the different technical classrooms.

In the afternoon, I met with Erin, Ashley, Kas, and Krista to go over the Morgan Valley Retreat info for tomorrow. I'm excited about this as it is on diversity and I haven't had the opportunity to talk about diversity with a large group of students. I've had discussions one on one with students but not a group, other than my classmates. After that, Tim and I went over some procedural stuff for the Links reference card. On initial glance of the information, I think the information will fall under a few main categories that I can organize on the card. I have to jump on the project quick as there is only a week before the actual training.

Post Weekend Review: Hockey!!

Friday night was Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs!! Unfortunately my Blackhawks were not victorious. They got handled for most of the game and started making a comeback but they were down by too much. The series is tied 2-2. Sad face.

I didn't do much Saturday morning but I spent Saturday night with Krista. Neither of us had plans so we went to the Bullfrog Brewery and had some great food. Highly recommended! We then decided to have an mini Office marathon, watching 4 of our favorite episodes. It was good times!

Sunday was Game 5 of the Stanley Cup and the Blackhawks dominated! I went shopping before the game started, picked up a few new clothes but I was super focused on the game. Byfuglein finally woke up and Pronger is finally wearing out! The line changes worked out really well. One more game. Victory is in our grasp!

Free Friday Afternoons

I worked on some more campus fire safety research this morning. Nothing too special. I've tried to save what I can on another Google Wave. Much of it is repetitive. I then with the Links to the School of Health Sciences. This was an interesting tour. Like other tours, they point out the equipment because it is similar to or the same equipment used in the real world. Again, these students are getting a lot of practice in their work. The programs are also extremely competitive. Although this makes the programs tough to get into, it probably makes them more prestigious. Our tour guide also took us into the cadaver lab. We didn't actually see a body but it was freezing in there and definitely had a distinct odor. After that, it was a little fire safety research wrap up and then the weekend. Big hockey game tonight, Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final. Go Hawks! Past that, I don't know what the weekend holds!

Email Day!!

I spent much of my day figuring out email stuff. I received my password in the morning and sent out mass emails, celebrating my email address acquisition! Penn College uses Microsoft Outlook quite a bit, something I had never used before. I can access my email from the web and set up a calendar but it does not have a lot of the features that the Microsoft Outlook program has. I was unaware of this and ended up wasting much of my time trying to figure things out. Barb was a great help in trying to help me figure things out and her questions helped me figure out the disconnect between having the program and not having it. I hopped on a different computer and opened my email via the Outlook program and everything was the way it should be. Barb then taught me how to share my calendar and hopefully I will be able to see where I'm going in the future to help me plan my time and work. Because I have an email address now, I started to play around with Google Wave a lot more. I had found a fire poster that was done by the National Fire Prevention Association and posted it on the Wave started for our fire poster. It's a good poster but I think we can do a better job of marketing and tailoring the posters to Penn College students. I come from schools where the mascot is used as a marketing tool inside and outside the university. It makes sense to me to try and capitalize on the Wildcat.

In the afternoon, the Links, Krista and I took a tour of the School of Industrial and Engineering Technology. This was a tour that was spread all over campus. We pretty much walked from one end to the other. The students here have the opportunity to use a lot of different technical equipment, some of which I think is pretty cool (like making plastic bottles!!).

The tours have become a little more entertaining with the Links, mainly because the fact that I hold open nearly every door. Some of the guys are complaining that it's making them look bad. They say it in a joking manner but it could stem from a angry thought. I was taught to do those sorts of things and I tell the guys that it is a good habit to get into. One of the Links has taken notice and has started doing the same when I am unable to catch the door. I just hope it's not playing too much into the "typical" gender roles dynamic that was exposed at the Ropes Course. That's all for now!