HoundsGood: Chronicles of a Virtual Volunteer

With the news of school districts in various areas consolidating or downsizing, folks with dreams of getting their Teacher Certification are reconsidering their strategy. Even so, there is a dire need for science and technical teachers.

The Woodrow Wilson Teaching Fellowship is encouraging college graduates in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (“STEM”) to get a Master’s in the field to become a teacher. To qualify, you must have carried a GPA of 3.0 or better in an undergraduate degree and your graduation date can be no later than June 2011. Selected candidates will receive a $30,000 stipend to start and complete the Master’s degree which will include field experience. While no one can predict what the demand might be in the future, the candidate must commit to teaching in a high school classroom setting for at least three years. Therefore, applicants must be U.S Citizens or legal permanent residents.

Right now, the Fellowship partners with colleges and Universities in Michigan, Indiana and Ohio. You may receive your undergraduate degree from any accredited university or college, but the Masters must be completed at select institutions within these three states.  To apply or for more information, visit http://www.wwteachingfellowship.org.

At right: Former college professor, and of course, President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Lunchables. All opinions are 100% mine.

Did you know that 56% of American Schools are eliminating or deeply curtailing field trips for children 1st through 8th grades? Due to budget cuts, the extras are falling under the knife. There are some field trips that are truly educational and reinforce what is taught in the classroom. Some individuals learn better when they are shown rather than told. It can also create a hands on learning experience.

Lunchables Lunch Combinations is running a Field Trips For All contest, where 50 lucky classrooms will win a field trip for up to 30 students, a teacher, and one parent or guardian per child. The trip should be within an approximate 30 mile radius from the classroom and transportation and a meal is included. Individuals age 6 and up can enter their 1st through 8th grade classroom. Entries may be submitted until June 1, 2010, and the trip will take place before November 30th.

I remember going on several memorable field trips. The best one ever was a night at a museum. Not only did we get to see things we talked about in class, but it gave an appreciation of museums to children whose parents had never taken them. We saw lions, tigers and bears, but no aliens like these children saw.

I wonder if the class the student was in at the time of entry will be reunited, or it will be their new class for the Fall of 2010? I guess it might depend on where they decide to go.

Field Trips For All

There are many nonprofits and government agencies who try to solve problems once the child has fallen off the path and ends up a statistic. Also, in schools, parents who care sometimes can’t figure out what their child needs. I have recently come across Evangel House, which is therapeutic Girls Christian Boarding Academy. It is targeted at teenage girls who might be trapped by substance abuse, reeling from unrest at home or even physical abuse, and also girls who just are suffering from a “failure to thrive.”

Some schools are “anything goes.” Either the teachers are afraid to discipline the students by taking away privileges for fear of retribution, or some simple do not have control. I remember one class in the school I was moved on where the prior teacher left due to a nervous breakdown. In March, basic math was still on simple addition and subtraction as no one could concentrate due to the threats of knifings girls shouted across the classroom. The boys were not that much more stellar. As a contrast, Evangel house increases or decreases a student’s priveleges such as phone use, free time, and other priveleges. For example, girls who exhibit disruptive and dangerous behaviors are not lost, they are accompanied by staff whenever they go outside, etc.

In regular school, sending someone to the principal’s office or taking away their hall pass might be what you think is similar, but there the staff recognizes rescue responses. At regular school, kids can pester the monitor until they let them go back to class. Or, they can just count on the fact that mom or dad will raise Cain with the teachers, or when they get home, they can manipulate them. These are all poor me “rescue responses” that are recognized and girls are taught a better life skill before they lead a future life as a manipulator, or worse. As a girl improves, she is given more and more privileges.

This may sound a lot like playing “Mother, May I?,” but it is reinforced with excellence in academics, the opportunity to grow spiritually, and mentally.

From what I am describing, you may think that this is either a nonprofit or costs a lot of money. There is tuition assistance, such as student loans. You may not think paying for high school is the way to go. However, compared to the cost of ongoing psychological help, tutors, and the like, you are probably ahead.

In Detroit, the school district is in arms over charter schools. While attendence and test scores public at public schools, charter schools are growing and children are thriving. Some credit the actual education, but many others credit the lower staff to student ratio, were the teachers and kids can get to know eachother. Teachers are able to notice when a child is struggling or they are heading towards a destructive life choice. I, for one, was put into a school like that and I thrived rather than dropped out.

I was very intrigued by the idea of this school. It seems like girls can really turn around, which is important to all of us in society, no matter if we physically have children or not.

The job market isn’t too hot in my area, especially if you read or hear all of the doom and gloom.  I look at it a little bit differently.  It is time to shake yourself up and go back for some training, or to reevaluate your path.  That may sound like my rose colored glasses have firmly been welded to my head, but I found there is a choice between accepting reality and devising a strategy, versus letting it depress you.

One of the big expenses about going back for training is the textbooks. Sometimes, the books for a class seemed to cost more than the class! My cousin was even considering renting books to get her through, or sharing them. Sharing doesn’t always work because you don’t get to use them the minute you want to. For most, the alternative is just finding them as cheap as possible. I found that Cheapestextbooks.com has a comparison took to find cheap textbooks on the web. The site doesn’t have every single book that you might need. Universities have a way of publishing a few of their own books for specialized classes that are unique to them. However, I thought of a few titles and most of the supporting or secondary textbooks that I remember having to buy are all there.

Hopefully, someone out there will be helped knowing about this.  Shaving a couple hundred dollars off your books could mean being able to afford an extra credit hour or two.

Some of you know that I played musical instruments as a preteen, but truth be told, I was horrible at taking violin instruction from my orchestra teacher. Even my extremely approving grandparents agreed that perhaps it was not my “calling.” All was not lost, as I later picked up the cornet and made it to 2nd chair in the school band. Perhaps my problems is that with the corner or trumpet, you only play or consider one note at the time, where with the violin, there are many at once. Or, it had to do with my orchestra teacher writing the names of the notes on the bridge of my violin and looking crosseyed at it.

There is a proven link between aptitude at math and playing a musical instrument, at least in children. Children who are better at math can grasp the concept of sheet music better, but it is also belived that introduction to music at a young age can improve a child’s ability to understand mathmatical concepts naturally, such as fractions. I was woefully inept in math, prompting people who knew my advanced placement in English and History, to question if I had someone else sitting for tests.

Despite all the diversity, I always wondered if as an adult I would “be better.” That includes both math AND the violin.

What intrigues me now is that there is actually a correspondence violin instruction program. More specifically, it is on video (actually, DVD!). Individuals can learn at their leisure, in the comfort of their home. What immediately came to bind is not clumsy fiddlefingers like me, but children with no or little axis to musical instruction. With many schools cutting their arts programs, I don’t think it replaces music in schools, but if a child was interested in trying the instrument and the parents didn’t have access to instructors, nor could afford one on one lessons, this would be an alternative. It would be good therapy for children who have various communication disorders as well.

The disc are from the Academy of Music Performance studio. It may be $94.99 for the set of beginner discs, but the first intro disc is $9.99. So, if you want to find out if a child truly has an interest, you can buy the initial disc and have it percolate for awhile to assess their interest and commitment. You may think the price is steep, but consider that someone can watch them again and again, rather than being dropped off for a 45 minute lesson and if they get it, the get it.

I really think, and it has been proven, that learning an instrument increases a child’s confidence, mathmatical aptitude, and more. It gave me, as a shy child, something to talk about also. If your child has no access to music in schools, or just wants to try something new, this is definitely worth a try!

Part time jobs have been hard for me to find lately. I have a lot of skills, including management skills, but for part time jobs, they think I am overqualified. They imagine that I would get bored and would want to run the place! I have to assure them that I most certainly only want a part time job. There are entry level temp and office jobs that I am after, just for a few days a week. While I have advanced project management skills, I am finding I need to go back and learn some of the very basic programs one might need to learn if one was a part time receptionist. Unfortunately, most places don’t have a Macintosh, and don’t use Adobe design programs. I need to go back to basics. After all, I have two hungry dachshunds to feed.

What companies do need, if I were to get a part time job that was a bit more than a receptionist job, would be to learn microsoft access. It would put me head and shoulders above the rest, as I could actually build and manage databases, and not just input at the desk. it will make a great deal of difference. I found that Brainstorminc.com offers many different online training programs, including for Access.

My cousin recently has shopped around for assistance for her mba school application.  She has found that the application process and acceptance is extremely competitive. It is hard to imagine that if your academic record is very impressive, that it would be so hard to get into a program that you will be paying into, rather than them paying you. On the other hand, I have been looking for a job lately, and I second guess myself time about my qualifications. I couldn’t comprehend until now that she was going through the same internal dialogue.

Admit Advantage is a service that she has looked at. It is group that focuses on helping you mold yourself into a stronger candidate.  Indecision really plagues many potential students. On the one hand, you want to appear to be open minded about the ultimate career path you will take, but if you are not careful, it looks like you are very unfocused and not quite so driven.  There is no way that you will be accepted into the program that is your first selection if you appear that you are willing to blow whichever way the wind takes you, rather than exhibiting the more positive trait of adaptivity.

There is complementary admissions assessment that helps you determine if you are truly ready to send in your application, and if not, how to get there. Often, when you apply to a program, there is only one chance to make a first impression.  One typically does not get to amend their application if they think that it is poor.

If you are pursuing this path in life, I wish you the best of luck, and encourage you to put your best foot forward.

There have been quite a few layoffs in my are due to the close of car dealerships and others. There are people finding they are competing for a smaller number of jobs, but there are others looking at it as an opportunity. They are going back to school, or retraining themselves with new skills. It is hard sometimes to get plugged into a course, as you may have decided that to take it while the semester was already in progress. There is Microsoft training available online at Learn.com. They don’t merely have computer training, but they have a wide range of other courses that test you on measurable skills. In fact, you can choose to have your results shared with potential employers.

I remember taking some computer based courses when I used to temp. They used it as a pre-hire exercise to assess my skills in a very concrete way. The format allows you to take an online tutorial to learn the skills, or you can dive into an assessment right off the bat. The choice is yours. The most common usage, just like I alluded to, is to assess potential hires and expand the skills of current employees.  However, it can be used to increase the amount of skills that you can bring to the table.

When I was in my early trainings, training like this helped me jump from working in a production plant to being at the customer service desk and making more money.  I think production is a lot of fun, but I needed a way to prove my skills so they would look at me for the other job rather than using subjective criteria and just thinking that I might be good.  One of the reason I wanted it was because I was going to school, or trying to, and the hours were amicable.   Of course, I had to run around town to do so, unlike having Learn.com for my employer to test me or take initiative on my own.

When anyone grumbles that the sky is falling, I always remember that there are great opportunities out there when the status quo is broken.  So, seize the day.  If that position above you opens at your company, why shouldn’t it be you?

When I was a kid, I took to the water like a fish.  My parents made sure, even though we lived in the city, that I knew how to swim just in case anything were to happen.  We went to the metro parks on occasion, and had relatives who had cottages, and it gave them peace of mind that we would be able to right ourselves if we slipped or fell in.  The other important thing is not panicking.   Even if you know a little bit about swimming, if you panic, you can sink like a stone.   Actually, I think I took it all for granted.

There were kids that lived near us that had never been swimming before outside of a small wading pool.  I just thought it was a given that other kids could swim.   MidwestSportsFans.Com and DallasSportsFans.Com, in partnership with Generational Equity, have donated money to the YMCA to bring swimming lessons to low income areas.   Each group of children is given eight weeks of basics and survival skills.   Many children drown each year, and sometimes it is due to panic, and even having parents who cannot swim themselves.  The groups involved want to make sure the children not only have a fighting chance, but they learn a new activity that is fun, and will benefit their health as well.

A woman I recently met was telling me about her children. She has a daughter in medical school and a son in college. The son is participating in a australia study abroad program this year, while the daughter is volunteering for Doctors Without Borders. Her children are very well rounded and wildly successful, which should make any mother proud. However, they are that way despite the upheaval, trials, and tribulations, that the mother has had with her husband. I know so many individuals who had a parent that constantly threw family life in a tailspin and their lives seemed to never be able to right themselves, and here were two young people who were confident.

My new friend explained that when times were rocky, she encouraged her children. She sent them on mission trips in high school, while other kids went to the beach or puttered around the house.  She send them on to semesters abroad, or just in town to their local Habitat for Humanity build.   She would scrape and save and work two jobs to do so, but at an early age, they helped others and broadened their horizons. A outfit like Carpediemeducation.org has a lot of opportunities for individuals to go on a semester abroad, even if a particular school that you are attending doesn’t offer it.  All trips include a strong basis in community service.

Another new concept that is popular in Europe, but relatively new here is “gap year.”  It is common for students to transition from high school to college by taking a year off and traveling, volunteering, or exploring themselves in other ways.   I have known people who have taken a year off, and it actually made it harder to go to college because they were mired in a full time job and other commitments had also cropped up.  However, I would imagine if you had a structured environment, such as these programs allow, you would have greater success.  You may just find yourself, when the time comes, being a bit more narrowed down on a major versus spending your first year at college figuring out just what you would like to pursue.

The only thing that left me a bit quizzical was an answer to a question on the site, where they are asked if the program has any religious affiliation, like other “helping” programs do.   It is not, which is perfectly fine, but they go on to state, “If anything we try and expose our students to as many different perspectives as the program can provide and make every effort to be welcoming of every perspective. We believe that no amount of dogma can truly capture an individual’s relationship with the world that surrounds them.”

I was a little disappointed by their elaboration, as how can it be stated that they are “welcoming of every perspective,” make it a point of exposing students to other cultures, yet the language implies a judgment that traditional faith is automatically dogma by proxy.  It would seem to me that this statement goes directly contrary of being welcoming to every perspective, unless I somehow misread.  As for myself, I find that my faith actually enhances a relationship with my surroundings.  There is no way to compartmentalize my wonder, and for some that wonder is their inner drive to reach out and help others, or to just sit in wonder at nature.

No matter, I encourage you to allow your teenagers and college students the opportunity to reach out beyond their four walls and touch the world, and how to travel independently.  If you had a gap year between high school and college, please let me know how that worked out, and if you have ever been on a semester abroad, I would be interested to hear about it too.   Did it propel you into a lifelong love of volunteering, was it a one shot experience, or did you already have the drive before you went?

AmeriGlide is a company that makes stair lifts and residential elevators to aid individuals in mobility. Not only are they a company that makes products that help people, but they also give back by having a scholarship competition two semesters a year. Pictured, at left, is Kristen Jackson, who received the previous award.  She is from Anchorage, Alaska, and is currently enrolled in the St Louis University Clinical Psychology Doctorate program.

The scholarship is open to any college student that uses a manual or electric wheelchair. They must be enrolled in college full time, be a United States resident or have a legal visa, and maintain a grade point average of 3.0 or better. Deadline for entry is July 31st.  You must submit the application online, or have it postmarked by July 31st.   Although the award is merit based, there is an essay question that will also be weighed.

For this entry period, the choice of essay questions are as follows:

1) What area of your school do you think would benefit from improved accessibility and how would you improve it?
2) What area of your school do you feel has excellent accessibility and why?

Students must write an essay of at least 500 words.  It can be submitted in hard copy or online, but must be turned in attached to the application, rather than under separate cover.  For more information, visit http://www.ameriglide.com/scholarship

A recent article in the paper stated that success is created by education, not by someone’s initial financial situation, ethnic group, or even IQ.   That is why it is so important to make sure children are exposed to a foundation in the basics.

While public schools do receive funding from property taxes, there are often projects that are not funded that teachers and parents feel would make a certain difference in the education of children. Donorschoose.org handles and solicits School Donations in a very novel way. Teachers write a proposal of what they would like to accomplish, and donors can choose to fund whichever teacher’s project catches their interest, rather than blindly donating and not knowing if the money is going to an actual project or not.

One teacher pleads:

“The “book room” in my school hasn’t changed too much since they first opened their doors in 1939….

If I were to get a class set of these books (35 copies of each book), I could share them with the rest of the classes and teachers. The outdated books we do have are falling apart and barely scratch the surface of what students are interested in today. There usually isn’t even enough copies of any one novel for one or more classes. I cannot even begin to describe how important materials are to my ability to reach my students. The biggest obstacle facing my department and school are resources and the money to buy them.

Stephen Colbert is the celebrity spokesperson for Donorschoose.org, encouraging donations to projects for military base schools. These schools are not always on bases, but may serve children of military families as well as children at the poverty level. Some children have the additional challenge of having a parent who is deployed. One such school has a teacher asking for sterile slides and the like for biology class. It is harder for her students to learn with contaminated material.

If you have been wanting to directly donate to a cause that supports the education of students rather than give to a large organization, where you can’t be sure where your money goes, consider checking out DonorsChoose.

Many folks that I have volunteered with mentioned that they might like to start a career as a Vet Assistant. This way, they can make a bigger difference in helping animals at their organization. There is often some confusion on what the difference between a Veterinary Technician and a Vet Assistant is.

I just found a site that lists all the requirements for various career paths at MyPursuit.com. There are not only job duties listed but skill sets, requirements, and ways to train for over 350+ jobs and schools. It did, in fact, outline the differences between the two roles.

Veterinary Technician:

If you are thinking about becoming a veterinary technician be prepared to attend a minimum of 2 years of college, pass a 4 hour exam, and work in a clinic before you are eligible to apply for license and/or certification.

Certification is offered for 3 levels of technician competence: Animal Laboratory Assistant Technician (ALAT), Laboratory Animal Technician (LAT), and Laboratory Animal Technologist (LATG).

Veterinary Assistant:

Most veterinary assistants gain experience from on-the-job training, volunteer opportunities, or via veterinary assistant internet courses. Distant learning courses over the internet can lead to certifications, which provide an overview of the career, including: animal handling procedures, medical procedures, treatment techniques, business transactions and pharmacology. Training usually takes 6 months or less.

While a Veterinary Technician can perform all the duties a Vet Assistant can, the key difference is that a Vet Tech is able to provide clinical care, and assist during surgery under the supervision of a Vet. A Vet Tech can also administer vaccinations as well.  While the Veterinarian may perform your dog’s spay surgery, the Vet Tech would assist, and later give your dog their necessary vaccinations.  In this scenario, the Vet Assistant would have handled your intake forms, and could have given your dog a soft blanket and something to drink during recovery.  In a small practice, the Vet Tech may have handled that role as well.

Income for a Vet Tech ranges from the approximately $18,000 to $40,000, depending upon geographical location and time on the job.   A Vet Assistant averages about $22,000. This may be a differential as many Vet Assistants may be part time, but also has to do with not having the additional formal schooling, ability to stand in for a vet, and experience to command a larger salary.

Good luck in whatever career path you should decide.  The role of Vet Assistant is something you can more easily break in to, but income directly depends on schooling.