Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Hours: 8:00am - 4:00pm
1. Finalized Lesson Plan for the Civil and Caring Community
2. Met with Art at the Planetarium to preview his 25 minute session(s) to take place on August 25th from 5pm-8pm. Kim will be in charge of making tickets for the event, advertising, etc.
3. Created a lesson plan for the upcoming 1 day TR2 session OL training. My topic is "Motivation & Engagement". Plan plan is to begin with the "Evaluated Experience" exercise (photo above),sharing evaluations with the entire group, and in doing so focus the conversation on some specific goal setting focused around engaging transfer students (in accordance with OL feedback immediately following the last session). How to engage students will be put into the context to Maslow's Hierarchy; mainly on "Social and Belongingness Needs", with specific attempts to relate it to Dance Floor Theory from the last training session. Finally, I'll end by "building them up" by validating their authority over new students through a discussion of the 5 different types of Power.
4. Cruised 4imprint promotional products for a giveaway for the saturday of service
5. Compiled a list of events happening in the immediate community the weekend of August 29th and 30th as part of "Discover Buffalo" planning.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Hours: 8:00am - 4:00pm

1. Began the day by compiling time cards/hours from Orientation Leaders, who over the past couple weeks have become increasingly tardy and inconsistent in completing hours. I've made a commitment to hold my OL's to high standards of professionalism and this is a fundamental part of that. A conversation today revealed that in the past OL's were not held accountable for completing the hours. That's not the case this year.
2. 9am one-on-one meeting with my supervisor to go over tasks/progress. Meeting went well. We had briefly checked in the day before regarding setting in stone a "registration process" for the FY WoW Saturday of Service. TD has practice managing large groups, so Laura Hill Rao and I thought she would be a good source of advice.
3. In keeping with the Saturday of Service, I finished checking and re-entering that information for FY students into Banner. from the first two weeks of registrants, I projected that we would have 375 students signed up to participate (and planned budget and project-wise for that number). Instead, as of yesterday, 1,243 FY students had registered, and only 224 have indicated interest (18% interest rather than 25%). There are positive aspects of these adjusted numbers as well as negative aspects.
4. Put together a "lesson planning guide" for OL's to work through in structuring activities that accomplish the goals/learning objectives for the Civil and Caring Community. Submitted to TD and Katie for review.
5. Established the time and place the VSLC staff would come to FY OL training to discuss the Saturday of Service

Hours:8:00am-9:00am; 11:00am - 3:00pm

Compiled time cards from last week, putting together a "Naughty List" of those OL's that have not been religious about time cards. I sent out a strongly worded e-mail last week letting them know that if i had no record (timecard), then I would assume the work hours were not done.

Put together a quick-reference guide of "OL time Discussion Topics" for the OL's to have as a resource during their small group time. It includes quick information about campus resources, office locations, free stuff to do both on and off campus, etc. I submitted it to Katie and Trish for feedback beginning tomorrow.

Interviewed Bob Mead-Colegrove and Kristin Catalano for CSP 624 Class Assignment. I got to know both at the ropes course we did for part of OL training, and was really interested to pick their brains a little more.

Hours: 8:00 - 4:00pm

Above: the other interns and I at the ropes course with an OL.
Staff meeting from 10am-11am. Mostly consisted of progress reports from each staff member. Lunch meeting with Kate regarding OL training to take place in August. My session will be "Motivation & Engagement". We brainstormed ideas for our presentation. Compiled feedback from Orientation Leaders from Transfer session 1 into one document. And updated new student interest in the Community Service Project in Banner.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Hours: 8:00am - 4:00pm

Had a 1:1 check in meeting with my supervisor, followed immediately by a meeting with Fred Howe, and Ron George in the Residence Life Office concerning RA training to take place in the middle and end of August. We discussed the topics the counseling center would present and how they would be presented.

During the first 2 weeks first year students were permitted to register using the online FastTrack form, the administrative assistant did not record whether or not the student indicated interest in participating in the Saturday of Service Community Service project. It's ecessary to obtain a prediction of how many students will be participating for planning purposes in every respect (bus reservations, number of projects, registrations, staffing, etc.). Today, i went through the first 2 weeks of registrants individually and updated his or her record in Banner to say if he or she indicated interest in the Saturday of service.

Then, I ran a report through Banner and found only about 13% (138 of 1051 students) had indicated interest. It turns out that the administrative assistant has not been consistently recording the data on Banner. it is now my responsibilty for tomorrow to go over what she has already done and fix it.

Monday, July 13, 2009

Wrote up a review of the transfer orientation on thursday, answering the questions:
1. What went well during Orientation?
2. What didn’t go well during Orientation?
3. What are some things you think we need to fix or improve before the August Orientation? Identify the problem areas and be sure to include some suggestions on how to fix it!
4. How did you facilitate the Compact for a Caring & Civil Community exercise? (Describe in a sentence or two). How do you think it went? Would you facilitate it that way again? If yes, why? If not, how would you change your delivery style to be more effective?
5. How can Trish / the staff better support you during the next Orientation?

Discussed with supervisors alternatives to facilitating a civil and caring community, while empowering our student leaders. Organized materials from the past two weeks.

Transfer Orientation # 1

The past Two week have been a combination of orientation leader training and Transfer Orientation # 1. Below is a summary of my hours and tasks from that time:

Monday, Jun 29: 8:30am-12:00pm
Last minute preparations with fellow interns for training beginning Wednesday, including last minute OL staffing changes (2 OLs left, we hired 1) and housing arrangements.

Wednesday, July 1: 7:00am - 9:00pm
Day 1 of OL training. Facilitated ice breakers, coordinated meals, presented on communication and active listening, and ran an evening photo scavenger hunt. Guest presenters included Bryan Le Duca and Melissa Williams from Commuter/Minority Student Services, Ray Lorigo from Disability Student Services. Note to self: allow presenters more than 15 minutes. 20-25 is ideal.

Thursday, July 2: 7:30am - 7:30pm

Training Day 2:
Presentation on a Civil and Caring Community from Dr. Kenyon, observed by select administration from the counseling center (Ron George, Meredith Beck, Tammy Kresge, etc.) The CACC committee planned out how the OL's would spend their 1 hour with the transfer students by 5 and 10 minutes increments. It was not accepted by the OL's at all. We debriefed later in the day, and my groups constructive feedback (we practiced compliment sandwiches) will be used to construct the CACC exercises in the future. Guest presentations from Kim Jablonski, Tammy Kresge, Dierdre Kennedy, Curtis Brickhouse. I presented Dance Floor Theory as Leadership Training. The OL's (in core group debriefing sessions) said it was their favorite part of the past 2 days:)


Monday, July 6: 6:00am - ?

The professional and paraprofessional staff met at the office at 6:00am to prepare for our trip. The OL's arrive beginning at 6:15am to load the bus to go to the low ropes course at the SUNY Fredonia College Lodge. We departed BSC at about 6:45am, and arrived at the Lodge to do ice breakers and safety information (lifting, etc.). Ropes course exercises all afternoon, followed by more icebreakers, 1:1 chats with OL's and a bon fire. Evening debrief session with the professional staff. Went to bed at 1:30am.

Tuesday, July 7: 8:30am - 2:30pm, 5:30pm-6:30pm

Ropes course projects in the large group in the morning (after breakfast), followed by boxed lunches and diversity workshops in small groups in the late morning/early afternoon. Left the College Lodge at SUNY Fredonia at 1pm, arrived at BSC and released OL's by 2:30pm. Met again in the library at 5:30pm for an evening session with Maureen Lindstrom and dinner.

Wednesday, July 8: 8:30am - 9:00pm

Bookstore session and breakfast with Kathy Hanaka and staff in the Bookstore Java U. Banner training with Bob Mead-Colegrove, and transfer orientation prep the remainder of the day. Prep included, location set up (outside, rockwell hall, library, and social hall) distributing signage, and stuffing envelopes with degree navigators, etc.) It takes until 9pm to print and stuff 400 envelopes.

Thursday, July 9: 5:30am - 6:00pm

TRANSFER ORIENTATION SESSION #1
Supervised core staff throughout the day, mainly in Rckwell hall lobby. Kept OL's on task, smiling, being spatulas. Reprimanded tardy OL's effectively, supervised resource fair that took place in the library - was the designated "damage control"/ "troubleshooting" person throughout the day. [also attended class at Hilbert College]