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!