Day2 – Page 3 – CA Work Experience Program

Day 2 – Emergency Management and UNC-TV

On day 2, we immediately headed to the Emergency Managment building due to flash flooding and mudslide crises in western North Carolina. Specifically, there was an issue with Lake Tahoma’s dam in McDowell County where the amount of rainfall threatened the dam’s stability. It has now been deemed safe, but at the time citizens in this area were being evacuated and told to seek higher ground. I listened in to many phone calls between the various internal state departments as they discussed how to best approach the situation. Additionally, I got to listen in on phone calls to media outlets where my host- Mrs. Walker- was arranging for different media outlets to disseminate important emergency information and safety messages. I also learned about the techniques used in social media management and how the department effectively disseminates information through their various social media, using tools such as tweetdeck.com or hootsuite.com that allow them to track tags as well as post across different social media.

After seeing how Emergency Management operates in the morning, I was taken to the UNC-TV studio after lunch for the filming of a Public Service Announcement (PSA) regarding flood safety. Flood safety, as well as the mudslides and dam issues in western NC, is a prominent issue in the North Carolina Department of Public Safety right now due to tropical storm Alberto, which has caused many problems that the DPS must attend to. The PSA was made to alert people of the dangers of flooding and dissuade them from driving or walking in flooded areas. After filming was finished, I was able to tour the UNC-TV studio, which was incredibly interesting. They had large studios with high-tech cameras and bright studio lights, as well as various editing suites and rooms filled with countless TV screens and control panels equipped with a million different colorful buttons. It was very interesting to see the making of safety broadcasts and to get a behind the scenes look of such a popular broadcasting station such UNC-TV

The last stop of the day was the Highway Patrol training academy, where I toured the academy’s photographer’s studio. There, I was able to get a glimpse inside what kind of atmosphere these recruit’s train and live in; furthermore, the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) is also located within the campus, so I was able to see that, as well.

Sign outside of the Highway Patrol training academy.

Overall, my second day with the NCDPS was very exciting and I was able to see many different aspects of many different careers within and in relation to the department.

Day 2 at KW Elite

Oh what a day it was! It was a very nice morning, as I was able to sleep in since we weren’t required to be at the office until 10:30 this morning! Once we got there, Kristin put us to work with our 3 main ongoing projects: new development reviews, a social media revamp, and a calendar. With the calendar, Natalie and I googled fun holidays like Lazy Day, Chocolate Day, or Donut Day (this Friday!!) that the office can enjoy as a whole. After about an hour of work, we got in the car and drove out to North Durham for our first listing appointment. Truth be told it was far, but it was a super fun drive as Natalie and I jammed to our new WEP playlist! Upon arrival, we met Kristi’s fellow agent Dona and she gave us some quick background on the client. The client, Renee, was planning on selling her townhouse to move to a larger one closer to work. During the consultation, Natalie and I learned a TON. We learned a lot more about mortgages and loans, what work should be done to a house, as well as some people skills necessary for the job (aka managing expectations). As we continued the consultation, we took a tour of the house and learned something that stuck with me the most: don’t put too much work into a home! Afterwards, we headed to lunch and finished our work for the day! I can’t wait for tomorrow!

Second Day at FHI 360

In the beginning of our second day at FHI 360, we jumped in full force. We began the morning with an intense lecture on the process of human procreation, or in simpler terms, sex ed. It was quite interesting, and needless to say, I thought I knew much more than I actually did.

After this, we went up to the fourth floor balcony for a nice lunch and also had a chance to walk around downtown Durham. The Durham Bulls were in the middle of a game, so we had a chance to watch!

After our break, we met with various scientists and researchers at FHI to learn about disparate methods of contraception. We learned about the feasibility, effectiveness, and acceptability of various types of contraception, as well as how each of these factors differed depending on a certain culture. All in all, it was a very fulfilling, educational day!

The various types of contraception used around the globe.

Day 2 – Meeting New People

I started out my day by arriving to building C of SAS at 10:00. The first thing I did was meet with a woman named Courtney Vigil. Courtney has one of the coolest jobs I’ve heard of. Her official title is “Global Social Selling.” Basically, Courtney travels to all different countries meeting at the SAS headquarters teaching their sales employees how to use LinkdIn. In the two years she has been working with SAS she has traveled to over 37 different countries. Courtney was telling me how important it is to be on social media and stay active. She also showed me a software that they use that shows how effective her meetings are and in each of the different countries what an impact it has on them. The countries that are not as successful are the ones that she focuses more on. Next week she is traveling to Dubai and Mumbai, and the week after she’ll be in Johannesburg, Africa.

After meeting with Courtney, I met with a woman named Beth Bullard. Beth works in digital marketing and deals with digital advertisements. It was interesting to hear Beth’s perspective on how the digital and social world works. They have data, and within that data, they could get 157,000 leads, but then only about 500 people actually register with them. After meeting with Beth, I helped Liz on a project we have been working on, then we watched a webinar during lunch. After lunch, I met with Shawn and he gave me a tour of all of SAS’s video studios and how video marketing is huge. The picture above is pictures that I took of building V, down in the videography studios.

Pentair Day Two- Meeting in the Pacific Ocean?!?

Day two began with a meeting in the “Pacific Ocean” conference room. This was a huge meeting for Dr. Rai, as she was presenting her current project, in front the heads of Pentair, in order for some funding. There were several high-ranking members present for the meeting, through call, and Dr. Rai did a great job! The conference call had people from all across the nation. It was exciting to see how the high-ranking members would poke and prod at the protentional projects, and how the presenters would stand by their ideas. It was also neat to see that Pentair also uses Lync, just like CA, and they also had the same fears as we do. What if someone lync’s me during my presentation??I After the conference meeting, Dr. Rai and I headed back to her work space and began talking about what was next for me. Because I can’t legally aid any actual business at Pentair, Dr. Rai has given me a side project to work. Building on my exploration of solid works from yesterday, she has tasked me with creating a “Geneva Mechanism”, which is unique gear which turns intermittently, it will rotate, then stop, then rotate automatically, pretty neat. This type of mechanism is used in watches and other objects that require a motor, but not constantly.

After explaining my project, Dr. Rai walked me through the Pentair project process and how my process should mirror theirs. The process is longer than I expected, but thorough and seems to be quite effective. For me, I began by figuring out the dimensions of my product. Before I could start my project, I joined Dr. Rai in her meeting with some of her project team members down in Florida. The meeting was shorter than the one in the morning and was just a weekly check-up on operations. Next, I began to create the mechanism in solid works. I learned more skills on the software and it became even more complex than yesterday. I did notice, however, that I was starting to understand the basics of the software and was getting quicker and quicker. In the time left in the day, I was able to create 3 of the key pieces necessary for the mechanism, progress I am quite proud of!

Day 2- (Excel)-ing in my Field

Today was a day devoted strictly to working on my project. In the morning, I worked in an office space to continue compiling the final data for my project in Microsoft Excel. I spent all morning sorting through each patient’s operative report to determine age, gender, graft type, months since surgery, and the femoral fixations. For some patients, I additionally noted if they had a meniscus repair or a microfracture as these affect data. In total, I sorted through approximately 150 reports. The next step in the project is to begin an analysis of the sorted data. Based on the results, I will find averages and find trends and sort the data based on it.

To continue to the research, I will be calling each patient to discuss whether their surgery was a success or a failure, depending on whether or not they needed a revision surgery. A lot of work is still impending, but the data shall be interesting to see when it’s all said and done!

Day 2 with Dragonwing Girlgear

Today I met with Ms. Gucciardi at the The Frontier, a collaboration space in RTP. It was a great space and it was so interesting and exciting to interact with such creative people. We started off in a conference room and then moved to the collaboration space. Today we expanded on what I did yesterday. I completed my clothing bundles and learned about SKU numbers, scarcity as a motivator, and pricing. I figured out pricing for my products as well as discounts for certain packages. I never knew how much went in behind the scenes to create websites. I learned so much, but again it was a little overwhelming. I love how much freedom I have and how many decisions I get to make. Typing in the SKU numbers was a little painstaking and took awhile, but definitely makes the site so much easier to use and manage. We also started to talk about methods of advertising and tomorrow we will create some ads. Can’t wait to do more!

Day 2

Once again, Nathan and I arrived at 9 AM for our second day at Field2Base. The morning started with the usual Stand-up; however, after today’s standup there was subsequent meeting to discuss what everyone needed to get done in the upcoming weeks. I learned more about how the programming style functions here as they explained their method of breaking down ‘bugs’ in the software code into shorter tasks that multiple people could be working on at the same time to resolve.

After the meeting, Rachel showed us Zendesk which is the program that the company uses to track customer issues. Since the software is still being developed, the customers often run into issues when trying to use newly released versions of the program. The customers can go on the website and submit issue alerts, or they can even request new features. All of these requests filter into Zendesk where Rachel and the staff can work to resolve the issue.

Rachel also showed us a new program that Field2Base is working on that allows companies to send one-time-use forms to customers who aren’t a part of the company. For example, a company who wants to use Field2Base to make their job applications all virtual might use this feature so that people can fill the job application out from their house rather than having to go to the company and fill out the form on one of their computers.

After explaining this to us, Rachel instructed us to install another piece of company software that sent all of the forms to a designated database, so the company could have access to it. Once we got it working, it was time for lunch. After lunch we met with Brendan, who showed us around the company website for about an hour. After this, we wrapped out for the day and headed home. Looking forward to tomorrow as today was really fun!

Day 2: My Own Weird Room

I can’t believe it’s already Wednesday! Today I did a lot of cutting things out. Thankfully no paper cuts. I got my own weird room to sit and cut in. The best part of the day was working with the head gallery attendant, Ruth. She asked for my advice on new activities for kids to do at the teen party on Saturday and she was really happy with what I came up with. There is a sculpture of a sound suit in the West gallery and I came up with the idea of having boxes of different items and kids have to shake to guess the objects by their weight and sound. Don’t get me wrong this wasn’t round breaking but if I was a kid I’d want to make as much noise as possible.

These are the outside and inside views of my room.

Day 2

My second day at the state legislative building was a very busy one. We started off the day by attending a Board of Education meeting so that we could watch the implementation of legislation that Ms. DeVivo had gotten passed a few weeks prior to my arrival. Following the meeting, we went down to the quad and helped Ms. Sams (DeVivo’s partner) set up for a lunch catered by the pit for 500 people. The lunch invited all senators, reps, and optometrist to join so that they could generate discussion about the optometrist bill that we lobbied for the day prior. And following lunch, we met with a client from Riskcor to talk about upcoming legislation involving immigrants. We took the client to a couple of senators and reps (including the president pro-tempore and the majority leader) so that he could express his concerns with the legislation, and try to win their support.

One thing that I learned during my day is the importance of making connections. While shadowing Ms. DeVivo, I noticed that she had very good relationships with pretty much all of the officials. She knew pretty much everyone in the buildings, and was genuine friends with them. By developing these friendships, it became a lot easier to do her job because they knew that they could trust her. And while she was fairly liberal, most of her really good friends were conservative. While I assumed that there would be conflict because of party, there really was not because she said that she has a long history of being fair, and that goes a long way. As she said, people remember everything. If you mess with someone, they will fight back. Making friends is a whole lot more effective than burning bridges.