Blog 11: Lesson 1 Reflection

1. What are you most proud of in your lesson, and why?
• I'm most proud of my final lesson template component because it's detailed, it's very organized, and because it's easy to follow. 
2. What assessment would you give yourself on your lesson? Explain why you earned that grade using evidence from the component contract.
   
• Based off the component contract, I qualify for a "P", however that may not be the grade I get. Overall, I think that I deserve an AP, due to the fact that I cited more than 1 source and mentioned my mentor and my 1st interview. I believe that because of my fast speed in talking, I wasn't too clear, so that may be brining my grade down. In addition to that, I don't know if I proved that I had all the knowledge and points across the way I thought I did, so that may have brought me down as well. 
3. If you could go back, what would you change about your lesson?  How can you use that knowledge to give a better Lesson 2?
• If I could go back, I would change the overload on information. I think that because I had such an overload of information to provide the class with, I panicked so I spoke fast. I would change the way I grasp my peers' attention and the way I presented my points. I believe that for lesson 2, I should learn from all the mistakes that I may have done and improve upon everything. One thing I'll take into consideration is to practice my presentation more than twice; I should learn it and try to teach the class more on the topic, rather than just spit information that may not make sense. For lesson 2, I should be a lot more prepared of what's expected and I should be a lot more educated on my topic - making it easier to talk about. 

Blog 10 - Interview 2 Reflection

1. Please explain how you are spending your mentorship time (Is it at a workplace or somewhere else?  Are you shadowing?  Are you able to do tasks that are meaningfully related to the topic?  If so, what?  Are there other people who are experts in the location?  Etc...)

• My actual mentorship is actually starting Monday, November 2nd at 2:00pm. I've had quite some trouble finding a mentor, but as of last week, I was able to finally find one that's willing to walk the journey with me. I hope that I will be able to shadow her and her working projects.

2.  How did you find your mentor?  How did you convince this person to help you?   

• Mrs. Flores actually helped me find my mentor. One day, she walked into Mr. Rivas's class and they were talking about the senior project. He then decided to point out the fact that I, Itzia, still didn't have a mentor. She decided to ask me for my topic, and I told her. Immediately she smiled and stated that she had a friend that can potentially suit my topic, and she told me that she'd email her. So, I reminded her and she emailed. Within a day, I had a response  - yes. So, Nurse Johnson, my mentor, decided to meet up in person on October 23rd, so that we could talk about how this whole mentorship would work out. On that exact same day, after we figured out our schedule and stuff, I decided to interview her and we got to know each other quite well. I'm guessing that my persistence and my eagerness convinced her to say yes. 

3. How would you rate your comfort level with your mentor at this point in your relationship?  How does this relate to the time you've spent so far at mentorship/with this person?

• From a 1 through 10, I would say that my comfort level with Nurse Johnson is a 6. This is probably because we haven't quite started on the mentorship. 

4. What went well in this interview?  Why do you think so?  What do you still need to improve?  How do you know?  How will you go about it?

• Everything went well with this interview. I think this because her answers were straight to the point, very concise and straightforward. The questions were simple, things felt nice. Maybe I need to improve my questions, and come up with a lot of more in-depth questions. I know this because our total interview time is literally like 5 minutes - it could've been longer if I had asked better questions. Maybe next time, I'll ask peers about my questions, and ask for feedback on how well they're asked/written. 

- Link to voice memo: Interview #2 - 

* CLICK HERE* 

Blog 9 - Advisory Prep 3

1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).

• Finally, I think I may have found my person - or my mentor. The interview is scheduled to actually be conducted on Monday, October 25. 

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic.  Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.   

• I'm actually not quite sure about these topics yet. However, after I get to meet my mentor and talk to her about everything, I believe that I will be able to answer this question in more detail. 

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth?  Where will you go to get them?

• I believe that articles will be my main key of sources. I rely on them, I depend on them. To get more in-depth information, I believe that I will try to grasp more detailed articles, look into books, or even read journals. 

4. Write down a possible EQ.  Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers.  At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.

• What is the best way that a primary doctor can ensure the well being of a patient? 

Blog 8: Independent Component 1 Proposal

1.  Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

• For my 30 hours of my independent component, I plan on probably doing mentorship hours. This way, I get to do 30 hours of something totally different rather than the usual work at mentorship. It'd be cool if I were able to actually get the chance to work with someone else for these 30 hours, just to see the different opinions and judgment calls within my mentor and a co-worker of hers/his. However, this may mean that I may want to learn about a more specific topic within the area of my topic, or learn about a topic that goes hand-in-hand with mine. 
• I may just want to do a mini project, based on what I've done with the extra mentorship days. I'm currently, still thinking. . .

2.  Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

• What I'll do to meet the expectations of showing 30 hours of evidence is by taking a picture of every hour at work. Of course, I'd also have the person I'm working with sign off, along with writing a small summary of what we did for that hour. So, evidence will be supported by details and pictures all through the 30 hours of this component. 

3.  Explain how what you will be doing will help you explore your topic in more depth.

• What I'm doing will allow me to see a different perspective, or a different topic that ties in with my topic. So, this means that I'll have questions that contradict my topic and my Independent Component, allowing me to research answers and gain more knowledge of both. I'm technically using these 30 hours, to allow myself to learn about my topic in a slightly different way. 

4.  Update your Senior Project Hours log.

Blog 7: Second Interview Preparation

1.  Who is your mentor and where do they work?  If their workplace does not reflect their expertise, what makes them an expert? 

• Mentor: Cara Johnson
• She's an RN - Manager Regional Care Management 
• Works with Health Care Partners - North Region
• I'm not quote sure what she does exactly, but I will as soon as we meet in person and I start going in for mentoring hours. 

2.  What five questions will you ask them about their background?

1. Where did you go to school and how did you come across in choosing the school?
2. What motivates you to keep doing what you're doing today? 
3. What is one of the biggest struggles or obstacles you had to face, if any, to get to where you are now? How did you face it?
4. How did you come across choosing the career path? Were you influenced? 
5. If you were to look back to where you first started school in college, if you could change one thing that would impact or would have impacted your life today, what would it be? Why?

Blog 6 - Advisory Prep

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year?  What has made it a positive experience for you?   

• When speaking of my senior project, I'd say that my determination has probably been the best thing so far. This is because currently, I still don't have a mentor, I don't have a set topic, and I'm stressing out over this. However, the most positive experience was my interview #1. That was such a great thing to experience, because usually I'm the interviewee, not the person who conducts the interviews. So, in regards to my senior project, what's worked well is are the blog postings, and the turn it in submissions as well. I'm a great big geek when it comes to technology, so having this senior project blog excites me very  much.

2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project?  How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you?  How might the senior team help?

• With my senior project, I'm finding difficulty obtaining a mentor. Sure, people can assume that it's quite easy, but unfortunately for me it's been quite the struggle. Since I'm struggling so much with finding a mentor, that leads me to question my topic and asking myself if thats really what I want. An adaption that I can make so that this project betters out for me is maybe seeking for another topic, and trying to find a mentor within that topic. The senior team can help out by maybe letting me know if they know anyone in the medical field, in the dentistry field, or in the criminal justice field. Hopefully by the end of this month I'm able to come up with a new topic, or find a mentor that will stand by my side throughout my senior year. 

Blog 5 - Interview 1 Reflection

1. What is the most important thing I learned from the interview?  Is there anything I would do differently for other interviews?

• The most important thing I learned from the interview was that being in the medical field has many challenges in which you're forced to find yourself before you start falling apart. I learned that you can't help a patient, or anyone in general, if you yourself aren't okay. Accepting yourself as a person, knowing your strengths and weakness, and reassuring yourself of your beliefs and morals are very critical to do while living by this career. However, I also learned that if this is something I wasn't to do, something I love, something I'm passionate about, then it's worth every second of my life. Something that I can improve upon for future interviews, is get more specific with my questions. 

2. Did I get additional resources and contacts?  What is the most useful?  Why?

• The most useful additional resources that my interviewee provided me with, was reading and looking into nursing journals (AJN), to provide me with more in depth answers to any questions that I may have. The reason to why these journals would be helpful, is because of the fact that their vocabulary is a lot easier to read and understand, than the vocabulary of a specialized doctor. Another helpful suggestion, was to talk to or interview a beside nurse, an LVN, or a PA, since they'd have a little more background in the the primary care part of this project, than a regular doctor would. 

3. What makes my interviewee qualified to help me? 

• The reason to why this interviewee is qualified to help me, is because of the fact that she's a registered nurse that works in the emergency room department of a hospital that's located in Pasadena. She can tell you all about patients, being a leader, taking care of yourself, and working for long shift hours. The fact that she knows so much about everything, and she's able to explain how everything ties in and comes together makes her more than qualified to help me. Her skills, qualities, and her persona allowed for her to be qualified to start me off in the right foot with this project. 

 - Link to voice memo: Interview #1 - 

* CLICK HERE* 

Blog 4 - House Advisory Prep 1

Through my senior topic, Primary Care with Patients, I hope to accomplish lots of things in which I can appreciate later in life. First of all, I'd like to learn what it truly means to give care to someone in which you've never met before in your life. How is it exactly that you help someone else get better, when in reality we're all a bit messy ourselves. I'd like to learn how things work and correlate to one another allowing for a nurse or a doctor to provide the assistance a person needs. I hope that I learn enough about this topic, so that I can make the choice of whether or not I should remain in this particular medical field in the future years to follow. Communication skills, lots of patience, and optimism are also great qualities in which I hope to discover while working through this particular senior project. I hope that my mentorship allows for growth upon learning not only the basics, but also the entire picture of making sure a patient has been fully satisfied with their medical services. Last but not least, I hope to accomplish a great year of knowledge. Starting from researching sources, to interviewing people, all the way to the day of the presentation, I hope that I'm able to expand qualities, skills, and create lots of new experiences through the course of time.

Blog 3 - First Interview Preparation

Who do you plan to interview? 

• I plan to interview Cecilia Maldonado because she's a nurse that works in the ER, and that's very fascinating to me. It's quite amazing how a human being can function normally, and be able to assist with her knowledge in an ER; So, getting an inside on that should be quite the adventure. Allowing her to express her experience with patients, her love for her job, and her admirations for surgeons will be quite amazing to hear. Understanding her passion towards medicine can highly influence my future career and me. 

Questions that I will ask my interviewee:

1.  I'm interested in studying health medical practices, working with patents, and being in the environment of a hospital. What can you tell me about it? 
2.  In your perspective, what's the hardest part of being a nurse? Why?
3. Who do you recommend I talk to get more information?
4. What's the reason you chose this career?
5. What makes you want to do what you do every day of your life?
6.  How are you supposed to react to a severe situation every time you're in the ER?




Blog 2 - Summer Mentorship

1. List the contact name, phone number, and organization of the person with whom you volunteered.

- Temporary Mentor - 

• Alejandra Robledo - Mariscos Martin 
• * I can email personal information (number, email address, etc.). *

2. What qualified this person as an expert in your topic choice? 

• Alejandra Robledo is a qualified expert of this topic due to the fact that she comes form a family that owns quite a bit of businesses. So, as she grew up, she understood the foundations of owning a restaurant, and as she grew older, she decided to run her dad's restaurant. Of course, nothing is ever easy in life, so I thought that Alejandra would be the perfect expert in the topic of Small Business Managements: Restaurants because of her attitude and her perseverance through all of this. In order for Alejandra to be where she is right now, she struggled quite a bit, and its truly inspiring all that a human being can do. So, I look up to her, and I will now learn from her abilities of running a successful restaurant. 

3. List three questions for further exploration now that you've completed your summer hours.  

1. What is the basic foundation to keeping a good reputation and great reviews of a restaurant?
2. How do you manage time, money, and patience all at once?
3. What types of managements work best when trying to create a successful restaurant? 

4. What is the most important thing you gained from this experience? Why?

• The most important thing I gained from this experience was probably learning that the voice of a person has so much more power than we think. A single person's voice on yelp can either make or break a business, book, etc. I was taught that business revolves around money, and people revolve around money, therefore if you want a successful project, then you must have both.

5. What is your senior project topic going to be?  How did mentorship help you make your decision?  Please explain.

• If this mentor works out, my senior topic will probably be 'Customer Service in Public Restaurants'. Working for 10 hours with Alejandra allowed me to understand that the customers are responsible for either making or breaking a restaurant. It allowed to acknowledge that not every customer is polite and nice, so how do you deal with a complicated guest and succeed in your facility all at once? How is it that customers, their feedback, and their opinions dictate whether or not the restaurant is good or not? It's impressive how strong the human being can be. 

Senior Project Hours (Summer Mentorship)

Blog 1 – Senior Final Lesson/Interview Reflection

1. What three lessons were most helpful for you to see, and why?

1. Psychiatric Support was a helpful topic because it talked about providing the best possible services to someone who takes apart of that facility. This topic explain what the required Vital Tests are, and how they're conducted. In fact, in this activity, we were able to try out the medical equipment and play role of a patient and a doctor with a partner. 
2. Nursing was a helpful topic because I personally want to pursue my topic in Primary care, so this topic was sort of a foundation base of how the nurses provide primary care to those in need. This topic explained that without a nurse, there really isn't anyone else who can provide that care that you need when you go to a doctor/hospital for a checkup.
3. Clinical Psychology was a helpful topic because it allowed me to become an open minded person and accept the fact that no one is a "normal/perfect" human being. We all have our phobias, our imperfections, and our mental disorders, whether it be noticeable or not, we're all on the same boat here.  

2. List one thing that you learned about the senior project in interviews that will help you get off to a good start?

• One thing I learned about the senior projects in interviews that can help me start off on a good note, was to get to know my mentor and to start forming a close relationship with that person, since we'll be spending about 60 or more hours together throughout the course of the year. If this first mentor isn't the one, then the seniors advised to keep my head up and keep searching for more. Eventually, I'll find the one mentor who will care and be able to assist me throughout this journey. 

3. What topic(s) are you considering, and why?

• The topics that I'm considering are Primary Care and Criminal Profiling because I've always had a passion in helping those in need, especially when it comes to the health perspective  Becoming a doctor, and then specializing into a neurosurgeon, has always been my dream since I was little, so why not take all the opportunities that come my way to make this dream come true. I also like to figure things out and work with a team to find a solution. I'd like to possibly have Criminal Profiling as a topic, since I like being able to gather clues, and identify who did what, and why they did what they did. 

4. What EQ do you think might be interesting to consider in guiding a project like this? (Please don't worry about any sort of formula...we want this question to come from your genuine interest).

1. What is the best way that a primary doctor can ensure the well being of a patient? 
2. What is the best influential state of mind that allows a serial killer to convict danger towards a victim?
3. What is the most efficient way to provide a patient with their medical care plan?

5. What are some ideas you have about finding summer mentorship?

• One of my ideas for finding a mentorship this summer is to apply and volunteer at Casa Colina since I want to pursue my career in the medical field. When speaking of primary care, I can also find a way to volunteer at a fire station, but with the paramedics since they provide anyone with the primary care needed in a state of an emergency. Another idea is to find my mentor at a hospital like, Queen of the Valley or in Kaiser Permanent. 
• Some ideas for finding a mentor in the Criminal Profiling range, is to go to a police department, and sign up to volunteer. Then, I'd talk to the Sergeant in charge and explain my whole senior project, hoping that he'll support this explorer and start to work with me throughout the course of time.