Course Work Connections

Group Work/Presentations:

In almost every class I have taken there has been some sort of group work/presentations at some point throughout the semester.  I can connect those moments with meeting preparations.  There is one meeting in particular that I can recall that used many group skills.  One of our most important meetings was with the editor of Bon Appetit so it had to be perfect.  We spent the week preparing for the meeting so we divided up the work load, just like I would have for a group presentation.  Obviously problems came up so we had to bounce off of what the other members were doing to help out.  The day of the meeting was crazy busy and stessful because there was still work to be done.  We had packets to get done, so in order to get done quicker we worked in an assembly line format and hurried through it. 

I think in every group project I have even been part of, this was probably my favorite.  Even though there was so much work and stress, this is the moment I am taking most of the fun memories from.  There is nothing like having three grown women stuffed in an office with papers flying about, or better than having three women and a grown man stuffed inside a vehicle driving around the city to prepare for those meetings. 

Meeting/Party Planning

Communication Courses

When I was a sophomore I took a communication class with Dr. Harris that helped me prepare for the time management that came alongside event planning.  For the second half of the semester we were divided up into groups and were to plan a major fundraising event. 

During my internship I was able to help out with planning the major meeting with the editor and Kraft clients and plan a Halloween party for David and his Kraft Clients.  I was able to use the time management and research skills I made during Dr. Harris' class in order to get the job done on time.  For the Halloween party I only had a little over a week to get done, so the first thing I did was research.  I researched decoration prices, food prices, delivery prices, and cocktail prices, and reference photos.  After that I broke down all those things into two different party theme ideas. After that I then had to pitch both ideas to David, receive his feedback and make those corrections.  I then had to order everything in order to receive them before the deadline.  This was a really fun really challenging experience for me; and probably the most beneficial.  I learned a lot from this experience thanks to David and his critiques.   

Design Work

Design played a small role during the Halloween party.  I say small because we don't ever learn interior design or home decor in our design classes, but we do learn what makes good design and that helped a lot when picking color themes and decorations.  This was very important to use because it was a party for people who are used to perfection and over the top.  The people attending would most likely critique the outcome, so I had to rely on my design skills to make everything work together.

Intro to Computers

I took Intro to Computers as a Freshman mainly to gain more computer usage knowledge.  It was a fairly easy course but I still learned about MS software non-the-less.

Throughout my internship this semester I have made numerous spreadsheets with a lot of different types of data using Excel.  I think it was good for me to recall information about Excel in order to carry out these assignments. You can refer back to my sample works page and view a few of the most recent projects I have finished using Excel.

 Although I have used spreadsheets a lot throughout my time at Loras, but using it in the workplace has proved to be a little different.  It is way more professional and technical.  When I would use it for other classes it was mainly for organizational purposes.  In the workplace I had to move past using it for strictly orgaization and use more functional capabilities. 

Econ 213

This is the course that I have been taking while in Chicago and I found it to be very benificial to my life.  There were a lot of topics that I didn't know too much information about.  Growing up in small town Iowa I wasn't really exposed to the same issues.  But I have found myself able to join in conversations or spread the word with other people.  When I was home I would talk to my mom and be like, "Mom, did you know that this was happening?"  I think the biggist issue that I was able to grow from would be that of racism. 

Again, small town Iowa with very little diversity, what did I know about racism? I thought it was good to not only hear what the professor had to say, but to hear what other students had to say as well.  Hearing from the students actually lead me to change my way of thinking and understanding of different topics to change.