Week 14 Internship

Ashleigh RoseThis week has been super busy for me between the internship and class work, but some how it is all coming along.

I was able to attend the meeting and get the minutes sent out on time. This week’s meeting discussed a new organization strategy other than Trello and Benefit plans they could get through their job.

I also started working on the digital check up project and got the due date for that, which will be next week. It matches up with Finals nicely. All I am doing is going to all of the Facebook pages , which there is one for each facility, and collecting data for one month and scoring each aspect. After I collect the data, I input and submit the spread sheet to Blake.

I submitted my vendorization form last week, but should be hearing back with in the next few days about booking my hotel room for the January DC conference. They scheduled the Town Hall meeting during the days I will be there, so I get to meet everyone. During this trip, I will also work out a new meeting/huddle to attend for next semester.

 

I am working hard on the projects given to me and I cannot wait until the conference. I appreciate that everyone is so easy to work with /for and the help I am getting to make the trip possible.

Week 13

Ashleigh RoseThis week was a short week for everyone, myself being on Thanksgiving break, and my VA supervisor took the week off for the same reasons. I wasn’t able to attend the weekly meeting so I didn’t have the chance to do the minutes. I sent over the final evaluation forms to be filled out, and also sent over my vendorization form so I can attend the meetings in January.

I am very excited to be given the opportunity to go and I appreciate David working hard to get everything in order to make that possible.

Blake sent out the instructions for the project I signed up for and I will be starting this week on getting it done as soon as possible. Blake also sent out a new project, but I had to refuse because my skill set would not have been an Asset to that particular project.

I am excited to see what comes next.

 

Internship Week 12

Ashleigh RoseThis week has been an exciting and busy week for my internship. I started the week with a group meeting for a project I signed up for with Blake and other volunteers. I was able to select the Facebook aspect of the project and will handle data research and input into their system to help them understand current posting habits on all of the facility pages.

Then I was able to attend the staff meeting and submit the minutes for on time. Here we went through a new way of filing information on their stored drive. We also talked about travel plans and I was made aware that I was able to attend the trip in January. I worked closely with David and Suzanna who worked with Monica, in order to make it possible for me to attend and pay for the hotel room that I will stay at. I appreciate their help through the process and look forward to the trip.

I also had another project due on Wednesday to Blake. He needed the interns to do research on when the best time is to post on social media pages. It was fascinating to learn that there is better times for certain companies to post certain topics at certain times to boost the viewing levels. We had to find data and summarize and submit to Blake so he can review and learn as well.

 

This week has been fun and informative in may aspects, whether it was organization ideas or about the research we did. I am looking forward to the Facebook project with Blake and to see how the statistics I gather will compare to their other social media pages.

Internship Week 11

Ashleigh Rose

This week at the VA and around the US, we celebrated Veteran’s Day. Not only am I interning with the VA, but most of my family are active military or retired veterans. Throughout my life, it was these family members that I would look up to and aspire to be, although I never had the desire to join the military.

Below are photos of some of my family members, not including My grandpa (Army) or my uncle Jimmy (Reserves). My Aunt Shelly met my Uncle Sid in the US Navy, and now their son will be joining within the next year. My brother wanted to make my grandparents proud so he joined the Army Reserves soon after high school. My dad too, wanted to follow suit of his parents and joined the Army after high school. He was stationed in Korea and in Germany before being medically released. My grandma served four years in the Air Force and my grandpa served in the Army and was an MP on base for a while, when released my grandma fell in love with photography and my grandpa became high ranking in a local police department. My Uncle Steve and Uncle Jimmy still serve in the Army reserves and get stationed overseas often. My Great grandpa served in WW2 and I actually never had the chance to meet him.

My cousin Timothy wanted to follow after his dad and joined the US Air Force, he is currently stationed in Italy. My uncle Bill, Air Force, just recently moved back from the US from Italy, but before he moved back he had to get home from Kandahar.

It was my uncle Bill who let me live on base with him in Italy for several months, to travel to Germany and France.

In support of Veterans Day the VA made several blog posts and various posts on social media, and in my meeting we went around to those who weren’t there last week and discussed their military ties.

This week I attended the meeting and got the notes published on time. I am still waiting to hear back if I have the okay to go to DC next semester. I was also selected to participate in a data entry project and a research project. I accepted both projects, one will be due next week and the other will be ongoing. I also was able to submit my family members photos and information to maybe be nominated for Veteran of the Day on the VA website! My uncle Bill was chosen but since he is still serving he was not eligible, I am submitting my Grandma, in honor of her passing, next.

Internship Week 10

Ashleigh Rose

This week the meeting went on without any issues, we discussed more of the weekly report (which was cancelled last week), as well as leadership charts, Veterans Day, and travel plans, along with the usual round robin discussion.

The weekly report was discussed briefly; they were all included on a list, and they each voted for what they thought the best ideas would better. Suzanna will pick the best and it will be discussed at a later day.

Travel plans were discussed for January 6th through 17th, I reached out to David about me being able to join in on the meetings for the first week. David thought that would be a good idea and will look into it for me. I am very appreciative that David is so nice; the atmosphere is very open and inclusive and I genuinely enjoy working on things for them.

For Veteran’s Day, We went around and spoke about all the veterans in our lives. They asked me to submit my family members to their “veteran of the day” social media campaign.

Suzanna handed out leadership charts, to make sure everyone knows their audience and knows the tiers of the organization. The charts are extremely helpful for everyone in the organization.

Internship Week 9

Ashleigh Rose

This week in my internship was different because my direct boss was still at a conference and many others were preparing for events. So the meeting was over about ten minutes early.

I was able to attend the meeting and take the minutes, I submitted them to both David and Blake who are both my lead contacts. I was unable to attend a video conference via skype that was planned because of class on Wednesday and I was actually sad because I was looking forward to seeing everyones actual faces, but I am sure there will be more opportunities for this in the future.

This week’s meeting was fun because there was an intern attending from Florida. She was visiting the office, and we got to hear what she does and her background. We went round robin for most of the meeting discussing who everyone was and what they do.

The two presentations on the weekly briefing and organization of shared drive were rescheduled to next week. But, we did discuss the VA’s plans for Veterans Day and the trip where everyone is going to DC in December. I wanted to see if I could possibly go, but they don’t know dates yet so I’ll wait and find out more at the next meeting.

Week 7 Internship

Ashleigh Rose

This week we discussed the purpose of the weekly staff meeting, which is to be an informational meeting that promotes cohesion across all team members, regardless of their primary duty.

We discussed some rules to a beneficial round robin and how to be respectful to others times during the round robin.

Also this week the interns participated in a survey with a 24 hour deadline on how the VHA can stream line and enhance communications between the team and the interns.

Also this week I handed in my midterm survey, which tells the school about my experience thus far in the year. I am enjoying my time with the VHA and I love everyone on the team. I have been successfully been able to attend meetings and submitted minutes while learning about the organization. I hope to be apart of more projects in the near future. I can see myself working on a team like this for my career.

Internship Week 6

Ashleigh Rose

During this week of my internship, I attended the weekly staff meeting as scheduled and produced the meeting minutes within the 24 hour deadline. I tracked my process through the group’s Trello board as instructed.

During the meeting they discussed Employee surveys for their previous year that ended Sept. 30th. They use these surveys to see what the supervisors are doing right and wrong and to see what in the office can be improved to lessen stress.

Also, they use the surveys to decide what their goals for this year will be. They have different goals for specific tasks, such as leadership, media, etc. The team works together to compile a list of goals and they narrow the list down to just 10 goals.

The team has various huddle meetings to breakdown goals and projects and they typically last an hour and meet once a week. They just created a huddle for all the team members related to students, intern or volunteer work so they can brainstorm projects and not take up time in the weekly meeting.

The weekly meeting always ends in a round robin where everyone says what they are working on or important dates coming up. They include the interns in this, so this is where I reached out to my supervisors and told them about the midterm assessment.

This week went by quick and I continue to look forward to the next weeks.

Internship Week 5

Ashleigh Rose

During this week of my internship, I was able to email back and forth with a few people in regards to upcoming projects. We scheduled a video chat for all the students and staff to get to know voices with faces. Also, I started to put my assignment on Trello and move it through the steps as necessary.

During the weekly staff meeting, I was able to take the minutes and submit them within the 24 hour window. This meeting was interesting because the team started a new year at the start of October instead of January. They are also forming a huddle meeting specifically for students and staff members to provide a better learning experience for the students and brainstorm more projects.

I reached out for more assignments and there is not any available at the moment for me, but are available for other types of interns so I am going to reach out again to see if I can aid in any projects they have.

The office has been very busy and stressful for the team so my team of interns is just attending the various meetings for now, but will soon be doing more.

I continue to look forward to the upcoming weeks.

Internship Week 4

Ashleigh Rose

This week of my Internship was a bit more individual work than the previous weeks. It was my own responsibility to know what I was doing and to get what I needed to get it done.

My weekly meeting felt short even though it went over time, but I planned ahead and made sure my professor knew I would be late just in case. I had to reach out to get the agenda and submitted the minutes on time to my lead.

I have noticed that most of the items that we discuss get taken care of at other meetings so I miss the actual break down of action items. Its unfortunate that I am in class during these meetings.

I believe new projects are going out next week so I plan on picking one up that fits into my schedule. I look forward to next week.

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