day8 – Page 3 – CA Work Experience Program

Last Day :(((

Today was my final day at Pentair. The first half of the day was dedicated to meetings and the other half was dedicated to working on a side project on solid works. The first meeting was cancelled because the other person didn’t show up, so we had some unplanned free time. In this time, Mrs. Rai gave me some Pentair “online classes”. These “classes” were short videos that helped Pentair employees with certain skills. After watching the specific video for the class, you could take a test to demonstrate your understanding. The first class I took was about marketing and it was pretty interesting and I passed the short test! Next, I took a lesson on sensing people’s emotions in the workplace, which was neat. The mini lessons showed that Pentair really wanted their employees on the same page, even though Mrs. Rai told me she hadn’t taken a single lesson.

After this and the next meeting, Mrs. Rai assigned me my final task or side project: to create a batarang in solid works. This task kept me busy for the remainder of the day. It was quite challenging, but I was happy with what I had learned about the software. Halfway through, I stopped for lunch. Because it was my last day, Mrs. Rai took me out to Ruckus, along with a few other employees. After a yummy and chatty lunch, it was back to my side project. I felt quite accomplished once I had finally finished the project.

Day 8- Last Day, Fast Day

Today was bittersweet, being my last official day of “school” and the beginning of summer as well as several goodbyes. We had a half hour at the beginning of the morning to prepare ourselves for the presentation. Then, our group, as well as the CTI Department, all met together in the conference room. They first went over their agenda and a few other members who work from home also connected by calling. We then presented our idea for the social media project– an Instagram page focused on water access and scarcity. We discussed partnerships, marketing strategies, post content, live stories, and polling. Overall, everyone seemed very impressed! I personally explained three different types of posts that were inspired by other popular accounts: current events like National Geographic, personal stories like Humans of New York, and informational maps like the many trending map accounts. We even made an Instagram for the presentation called water.wellness so that we could demonstrate the features and make real posts. Some faculty members even followed the account! After a few goodbyes, chicken minis, and gifts, the four of us went to Starbucks and said our final goodbyes. We were only at FHI today for about two hours and now I am catching a flight to Europe! I had a great time at FHI360 and am happy to say that I learned a lot about this organization as well as myself and where I see myself in the future.

The four of us with Dr. Dorflinger, Ms. Vasco, and Dr. Nanda.

The four of us with the FHI360 logo.

Walk West: Final Day

Sadly, today is my last day at Walk West. This morning I started off working on some AdCopy’s. When you google something, at the top of the search results ads come up that have two headers and some text explaining it underneath. I was tasked with creating the two headers and explanations for three different areas of the Walk West company. First, I was able to do some research to see what other companies — who were advertising similar things — had done. It took me some time to think through everything, but I eventually finished that task and was on to the next. I then began to work on helping for clients’ monthly reports. I went through multiple spreadsheets to check to see how many videos they had posted for the client. Today, I was able to meet with different people to talk about their jobs and many other things. I sat down with Kevin, the head of the design department, to talk. We did talk a little about what he does and where he went to college, but we also talked about a lot about random things. Kevin seems to be one of the funny guys in the office and loves giving advice (some of which you should take and some of which you shouldn’t). I was then able to sit down with the founder of Walk West — Brian Onorio. I had been coordinating the internship through Laurie Onorio, who just so happens to be his wife and on a much more important scale the head of governmental affairs. I got a little bit of background on his life and how his childhood led him to where he is today. We ended up talking a lot about social media and he wanted to hear more about my experiences with it. Today for lunch Suki, Luke, and I tried out the food trucks on campus today. Suki’s drive to meet me was about 10 minutes and so, 20 minutes later Suki and Luke arrived. We ate at Queso Monster and it was great! Once I got back into the office, I finished up some things for Candace. Most of the team was in a meeting when I got back, so I had a little bit of down time as well.

This week I learned many things. I learned that there is so much more to social media than meets the eye. I learned that things might not always go to plan, but you roll with it anyways. I learned that communications is not just social media — there’s governmental affairs, design, marketing, client services, and many other areas that you can be involved in. However, I didn’t just learn about business. I also learned that it takes a team to get work done. So here are a few of the things I’ve learned about the people that are the face of this company: Andrew loves Tootsie Rolls — he’s eaten almost 400 in a week and a half. Kevin can talk about literally anything and his goal in life is to be able to buy a cup of $5 coffee every day. Candace went to ECU for college and didn’t apply anywhere but ECU (she didn’t like the writing for applications, but who can blame her). Jen actually went to college for fashion design and is now in marketing. Ann Marie loves apple pie (and yes she can have as much as she wants — pregnancy pass as she calls it). Those are just a few of the people I’ve met during my time at Walk West. Each individual contributes something special to a company, and whether that’s being really good at designing or marketing or simply just being able to eat a lot Tootsie Rolls, it all matters.

Final day at FHI 360!

During our final day of FHI 360, we presented our Water Wellness project to the entirety of the CTID team. Our project was about how instagram can be used to promote the global health issue of water. We talked about how the app can be used to not only educate users, but also gain feedback and connect with others. All of the members of the team seemed to thoroughly enjoy our project, and found it very interesting. I find it funny how we spent the whole week learning things from members of the CTID team, but we were actually able to teach them something for once: how to use Instagram!

Overall, I had a very exciting Work Experience at FHI 360, and will forever remember this profound experience!

day 8 :( last one

Today was sad because it was our last day but it was still a lot of fun! We learned a lot about social media by working with Hannah, who works in the digital department. She oversees, posts, and responds to followers on behalf of six different clients. She manages not only Facebook for all six, but instagram, twitter, and pinterest for a few. Considering I am on these platforms all day, it was incredible to see the behind the scenes of the large scale accounts I interact with. It’s more than just numbers – responding to comments and being strategically active all help best represent the brand and appeal to certain demographics. For example, if a brand is trying to appeal to younger people, they might try to make their instagram presece stronger since more young people use that platform. We delved farther into the analytics of these platforms and ended our day with Hallie, our supervisor. She took us how she does social media reports for her clients, which are tedious but provide a necessary visual summary of FWV work for their clients. Throughout our two weeks, we really got to see the different sides of PR and how everything happens efficiently but almost discreetly. People don’t realize how many little details go into brand representation, and it was truly eyeopening to witness this work first hand.

Day 8

This is the main workspace for the coders

Today at mighty Rabbit was such a good day! We yet again got to sit with a few of the employees, but this time we focused a bit more on the side of the game that everyone sees. Today we sat with two guys, one named Rob, and the other named Shotty. Rob was a character artist, and he was focused on creating the 3D mesh and skeleton for one of the characters that would eventually be implemented into the game. Shotty on the other hand was more focused in the animation of the characters, and setting up how the character moves like you see in the game. It was really interesting to see how these guys used their own software in order to create the final project that looks so smooth when you see it in game.

The time at Might Rabbit was so much fun and all in all just very inspiring. I enjoyed it alot and I would recommend students next year that would like to investigate this feel to check that company out.

Day 8

Today, I was back at SAS for my final day of work experience. I spent the day in the legal department, meeting different members of the department and learning their roles within it. I was greeted by two of the managers on the floor and they gave Emma and I an overview of types of projects they work on. After about an hour, we split up and got to meet with two different employees in the department. I spent the morning with Eric, and he taught me a lot about the programs that SAS employees use, as well as an overview of how they deal with certain clients and whatnot. We ate lunch in the T building, and I spent the afternoon with Jewel, the employee that Emma had spent the morning with. While Eric taught me about client information and talked about customer relationships, Jewel showed me how they interact and deal with issues by doing more hands-on work. I was able to observe her contact a few clients, as well as log current and future deals with the clients. At the end of the day, we met up with all of the other Cary Academy students at SAS and had a “pizza party,” where we got to talk about the program, and wrap up everything. Overall, I really enjoyed getting to see the many different aspects of SAS.

Day Eight Collaborate(ion)

Today, as you may be able to predict from the pictures, I spent the day with latent print examiners. Basically, they take prints that the agents retrieve and match them with local fingerprints from the database ( which includes conceal carry permits/ sex offenders/ prior arrests) and try to get a hit. Once the system gets a hit, it is sent to an official examiner to conduct up close comparison and then decide if they will affirm that it is positive, inconclusive or exclusionary. It was nice because they had an official schedule so I got to meet pretty much the whole department throughout the day which definitely kept it entertaining. Although after a few hours I had learned everything about what they do, so I ended up just having fun conversations with each person. One person I talked about my experiences in China and with another we got into Harry Potter.

The coolest part of the system is that if a print is entered and doesn’t get a hit, then it will stay in the system and the system will run reverse checks every day to compare with new arrests. This means that if you commit a crime and get away with it, but then get arrested later for something else then you could get charged with both. The most prominent case of this was a kid who had been breaking into houses since he was 10 and when he was finally arrested for something several years later, they matched him for TWENTY FIVE HITS for other burglaries. Pretty cool eh?

I had a great day with latents and they were definitely my favorite people to talk to since I probably had the most in common with them. The only annoying part was having to explain what I am interested in, where I want to go to school, how I got into this field and basically every other basic small talk question for EVERY SINGLE PERSON. After a certain point I just wanted to call them into a conference room and lay it all out to spare myself the trouble, but I kept my mouth shut since they were taking time out of their day to “educate the minds of youth” as one of the examiners had jokingly said.

I have had an incredible four days at the CCBI and am super grateful for the opportunity to have shadowed here and gain the perspective that I have. I also know how to commit the perfect crime now ;).

Day 8 (last day) at osceola studios

Today was a very relaxed shortened day at the studio. It was a little bit sad to leave the studio and it’s wonderful people behind, but I will surely visit them again in the near future. I learned many things most of which just by watching and seeing. The experience was priceless. Music is often the type of world where it things are easier said than done, so it is not unusual for explanations to be fruitless. This work experience has taught me so much by showing me, rather than telling me. I feel like I have become much more capable as a recording engineer, music entrepreneur, and business person. I am very thankful for this opportunity.