development – CA Work Experience Program

Integrated Pain Solutions: Day 2 + Making Balms!

Another day at Integrated Pain Solutions in Southern Pines. We started the day off by reviewing our notes from yesterday. We all enjoyed getting to draw the structures (as shown by JR’s thumbs up). A highlight of the day was watching the formulation process for making balms and other serums. From precisely measuring out each ingredient to pipetting each extract, the balms were perfectly made so they will be effective in mitigating pain for patients. After, we discussed why each ingredient is added and how it contributes to the overall effect of the balm. We enjoyed learning not just about the balm process, but about future career paths and collegiate studies from Ryan. In addition, we spent lots of time researching different types of pain killers and drugs to understand how the urine analysis works on site. The structures all had very unique shapes and lots of benzene groups!

Integrated Pain Solutions: Orientation and Preliminary Knowledge

After a very fun, early morning, caffeine-hyped, carpool drive to Southern Pines (Thanks to JR for not hitting the giant snapping turtle on the road), we had an orientation at Integrated Pain Solutions. We thoroughly enjoyed learning, visualizing, and experiencing how their cannabinoid products are made from the plant to the serum to the bottles to the store within the warehouse. We loved seeing the machines used to bottle and formulate all the products. A highlight of the day was learning about the chemical structures of cannabinoids and how they work in the body to attach to pain receptors; as well, we got to apply some of Mr. Rushin’s Adv Chem curriculum to real-life by analyzing the cannabinoid structures and how the disconnected Oxygen off the Benzene on the THC makes it different than CBD. Shout out to Alekh for helping JR navigate the Chick-fil-a line.

Day 6

Today, we resumed shadowing by following somebody in a different building. She was still connected to research and development in SAS, but worked on a completely different product than the last woman I followed. When Allen and I arrived, she answered questions we had about her job and department. She took us around and introduced us to several others in her department, and then we sat in on a lunch meeting discussing different development styles relating to a conference they had all attended. After lunch, we were able to have a meeting with a developer in her team who also works as an admin for the internal company software. We discussed what she does on her profession as well as college and our careers.

Finally, we sat down and talked to interns about college and what life is like as an intern at SAS. Tomorrow, we will continue to follow the same woman around and continue meetings with staff in her department.

Day 3

In my final day shadowing Ms. Holland, I began with two separate one-hour meetings with different developers. They both had many different insights to offer, but very different stories. The first has worked for several years at AS, but before that was a part of several small companies and has really experienced everything possible in the industry. He taught himself to program when he was very young and has a large knowledge base – in fact, he was able to switch positions at SAS with no warning and no hiccup. He shared insights that he’s developed over his career and gave us advice on how to best prepare for our own futures.

Next, we met with a semi-recent employee at SAS who was much closer to our own age. He talked a lot about his experiences in high school and college that led him to selecting this career path. He offered a lot of memorable advice that was very relatable, and showed us some of the pretty cool stuff he gets to do each day.

After our meetings, we went to lunch- With Ms. Holland, the people we met with today, people from our meetings from yesterday, and new interns. It was great to see such a positive work environment- people from different departments that were not only coworkers, but friends. After lunch, we got to see all of the amazing buildings that make up SAS campus- including the solar farm- in our tour around the campus. It truly is a remarkable place, and an enormous one at that.

After our tour, we returned to Ms. Holland’s office and watched her work and help other people. Then, after some final words, our last day with Ms. Holland was over! We said our final goodbyes and thank-yous and left through the lobby.

Day 2

In my second day at SAS, I shadowed Ms. Holland for the whole day. When I got there, I joined a meeting she was leading featuring several interns and another Cary Academy student. We learned about automation in terms of testing, and how the SAS employees automate tasks in order to test their products. We learned about the different software they use for this automation as well as what its goal is to assist them in their jobs at the company.

After that, Ms. Holland taught me some more specific information about the software and we followed her around as she helped the interns set it up. We were able to learn quite a bit about it by simply observing. After this, we went to lunch in a new building- SAS has some pretty fantastic cafeterias.

After lunch, we took a brief tour around SAS. The most enjoyable part was definitely viewing Dr. Goodnight’s gem collection from all around the world. He displays it in the building so that all of the employees can come see it.

After this, we were able to meet with somebody named Max who worked in development. Since Ms. Holland works in testing, and Max works in development, we were able to see all the different important parts of development for SAS. He recently graduated so we got to hear about his schooling experience and what led him to working at SAS- It was very cool to meet someone close to our own age. After this, the day was over- I learned a lot and saw some very cool things.