Courtney Skemp Methods II PDA Points May 9, 2012 Professional Memberships PSEA, NBEA, Pi Omega Pi NBEA Conference Each

h year, the National Business Education Association (NBEA) holds a conference is various cities around the United States. This year, the conference was held in Boston, MA, and I along with six other members of Pi Omega Pi attended the conference. When we arrived on Tuesday, April 3rd, we were all very anxious and excited to attend many of the events for the next three days as well as explore the city of Boston. We woke bright and early Wednesday to go down stairs and register for the conference. Dressed professionally, we checked in to the conference, got all of our materials, and then looked over the conference schedule to decide what seminars we would attend. First, I and a few other students attended Problem Based Learning: An Interactive Approach. During this seminar, problem-based learning was defined and challenges to problem based learning were addressed. As an activity during this seminar, we had to identify a business opportunity at the conference. We teamed up and chose to identify business opportunities from needs of ours that werent being met at the conference at that time. We had all woken up very early that morning, but had no opportunity for breakfast and coffee. One of the ideas we came up with was a vendor should be selling breakfast items in the lobby of the conference. Another idea we had centered on a problem we had when we checked in earlier that morning. We all wanted to purchase conference shirts but the only sizes they had were Large and Extra Large. We thought that to sell more shirts, NBEA could have asked you when you first registered for the conference if you would like a shirt. If you answered yes then you could have picked out your size specifically and the shirt would have been ready when you arrived. Another seminar we attended during the event was entitled Keeping Up With Technology. From the description, we expected to be introduced to new and current technologies for the classroom and their applications. Instead, much of what we learned during this seminar had to do with Peachtree accounting software, something used by the presenters at the school in which they worked. I was slightly disappointed with this session, as what it actually ended up being was not what was described to us. Based on our disappointment from that session, a few of us decided to buy flash drives that were for sale for $15 that had all of the PowerPoint presentations from every session on them.

Because so many sessions ran concurrently, it was impossible to attend everything that we wanted to. One of the last sessions we attended was called Maintaining Quality Education Programs with Fewer Resources. Based on the title and description, we were all very excited to learn about free software and other applications that were available, considering the current state of funding for public education. What the seminar actually ended up being was about all of the resources available at some public libraries. Although the speaker was entertaining, we were disappointed that the title and description didnt actually match the session. Not until the end were we given a few valuable links to open source materials, like www.schoolforge.net. On the bright side, we did learn about some resources that will serve me well as a student in college, such as online library resources like the John F. Kennedy Library (www.jfklibrary.org). All in all, I was a little disappointed with the conference, mostly in that the titles and descriptions of the sessions didnt match the information that was actually given. I was also a little disappointed that there werent more students and young professionals at the conference. We definitely felt out of place during a lot of the conference, being some of the only students there. Outside of the conference, however, we had a fantastic time! We figured out how to navigate the city via its subway system and we got around pretty well. During our time outside of the conference we visited Cheers, Fenway Park, the Sam Adams Brewery, and Faneuil Hall Marketplace. As a group, we all got very close. The trip brought us all together and we had a great time. I would like to go to another NBEA conference in the future. There is a good chance that we just happened to pick a few of the sessions that werent as good as the others. Much of what I wanted to attend were seminars that cost extra and I just didnt have the money to attend those on top of everything else. Hopefully, by next years conference, I will be a practicing teacher and will be able to attend the conference as a professional educator. Service Learning Project Expansion When deciding what to do for our service learning project as a group, we were stumped. Considering the countless charities and service projects out there, the task of deciding where we should devote our time was a little mind boggling. We all threw out different ideas over the weeks, but there really wasnt a cause that we could decide on supporting as a group that we ALL truly felt passionate about. Luckily, during the NBEA conference there was a Pi Omega Pi meeting that we attended that inspired us as a group. During the meeting the national President of Pi Omega Pi, Connie Forde, discussed a national fundraiser for every Pi Omega Pi chapter where we get involved with Stop Hunger Now, a charitable organization dedicated to ending world hunger. According the organizations web site, Stop Hunger Now is an international hunger relief organization that coordinates the distribution of food and other life-saving aid around the world. The organization

is driven by a vision of a world without hunger and a mission to end hunger in our lifetime by providing food and life-saving aid to the world's most vulnerable and by creating a global commitment to mobilize the necessary resources. As a group, something excited us about this cause. It was worthwhile and it was something that every one of us could stand behind passionately. Ms. Forde also explained that each chapter of Pi Omega Pi could then participate in a meal packing event, where all of the money raised by every chapter would be put towards packaging dehydrated, high protein, and highly nutritious meals that are used in crisis situations and in school feeding programs for schools and orphanages in developing countries around the world. Each of these meal packs costs only 25 cents, so each dollar really goes a long way thats what really made us excited. Knowing where literally every penny would be spent is a good feeling. The chapter that raises the most money will get a cut of their charitable earnings back, which we felt was a nice incentive, but not really necessary. Once back home from the convention, we started throwing out ideas for how we could actually raise this money and how much we were going to try and raise. Small scale fundraisers like bake sales and car washes can raise some money, but to raise any substantial amount of cash, we would have to do several of those small scale fundraisers. For us, it seemed more advantageous to devote our time to one large scale fundraiser; something that we could plan over the summer and then put on early in the fall of 2012. Through some discussion, we all came to the conclusion that hosting a 5K Run/Walk for world hunger relief would be a great event that a lot of people would want to participate in. It is also something that is large enough that would generate a lot of cash flow but small enough that we could handle putting on as an organization. So, here we stand in the preliminary stages of the planning process. We have decided that we will try to raise at least $1,500 and all of the proceeds will be donated to Stop Hunger Now. An email has been sent to the organization letting them know that we are planning to raise money for them and any help and/or guidance they could offer would be truly appreciated. The 5K will be tentatively held on Saturday, October 13, 2012 from 9am-12pm. Once we get all of our plans into place, we plan on forwarding this information to Dr. Gracey and the organizations within COBSAC to see if any other group would like to help organization and/or participate in the event. The walk is slated to be held on the IUP campus and in parts of downtown Indiana, PA. As soon as we get the ok, we will contact University and Indiana police to set up a potential route. To promote this event, we plan on putting up flyers around IUP and downtown Indiana, PA. We will also visit local businesses to see if they will allow us to put up and/or place the flyers. We will promote this event in The Beak, The Penn, and The Indiana Gazette. We will put up information on IUPs web site, Facebook, and Twitter. We are also planning to create a web site, using Weebly, for this chapter of Pi Omega Pi, and we will also post information about the event there as well. We are hoping that IUP students, faculty, staff and community members will participate in this event. The entry fee up until 2 weeks prior to the event will be $15. This entry fee will guarantee participants a t-shirt and a number for the event. 13 days prior up until

the day of the event, registration will be $20, but that cost will not guarantee participants a tshirt. We plan on having mail-able entry forms, which will be the actual flyer itself, and potentially online registration and payment if we decide to pay to use Weebly. A conformation letter will be mailed (or emailed) when payment is received. We are planning on reaching out to local businesses to sponsor the event based on set dollar amounts in exchange for recognition at the event and their companys name on the event t-shirts. A written letter will be presented to each local business: Platinum sponsorship is $125+, Gold sponsorship is $100, Silver sponsorship is $50, and Bronze sponsorship is $25. We will also accept donations of prizes for the winners as well as donations of refreshments for the event itself. Potential costs for the event are as follows: shirts, numbers, refreshments, promotional printing/advertising, web site, and prizes for the winners. Also, to raise additional money during the event, we plan on having a 50/50 raffle at the registration table. The standing committee for the 5K Run/Walk for Stop Hunger Now is listed as follows: Chair: Courtney Skemp PR/Sponsorship: Rachael Aufman and Lora Roxby Advertising: Kayla Hemminger and Hannah Lockard Registration/Money: Scott Mehall Advisor: Dr. Lucinda Willis Inner-City School Visit Pittsburgh Science and Technology Academy Period 1... Miss Griffith's first period class is an advanced web design course with approximately 24 students (1 female). Today they were learning how to create forms in HTML using Dreamweaver. First, the students did a warm up activity, where they had to find an example of a form online, take a screen shot of the form and place it in a Word document. The also had to list the characteristics of the form. After the warm up activity, Miss Griffith proceeded with introducing the lesson, using a PowerPoint presentation from the textbook with adjustments and additions made by her. The lesson took longer than usual, as she has a lot of information to cover in a short amount of time. The school uses block scheduling, so this fist period class in 85 minutes, allowing the students plenty of time to complete the in-class activity. Those who do not complete the activity are assigned the activity for homework. The in class activity requires the class to create a form online for a fake university's technology help desk page. The form had to include elements that were reviewed during the development of the lesson. Miss Griffith used direct and indirect instruction techniques during this first class period. Classroom management was somewhat of an issue but not nearly as much as I had

expected. The students were well behaved and generally stayed on task as much as one would expect them to at this grade level (grades 10-11). I was pleasantly surprised as I expected classroom management to take up a lot of her time. Period 2... Miss Griffith's period 2 class consists of only two students, Application of computer science. Non computer science students can take this class as an elective for computer science exposure. There are only 2 students in this class. The class is using java script to create a multiplication table. The two students are very quiet and work together to help each other before asking Miss Griffith for help. Miss Griffith prepares for her 3rd period study hall, which consists of students who have Ds or Es (Fs) in a class. Grade checks are completed every two weeks so if a student pulls up their grade, they are removed from the study hall and placed back into regular Activity Period. However, this means that the study hall is constantly changing and there are a lot of disciplinary issues. Period 3... I was shocked at the behavior of many of the students during this study hall. Coming from where I grew up, I was amazed by the lack of respect for the rules and punishment set forth by the school for misbehavior. The students were not fazed by threats of being written up or sent down to the office... and the language that was used! I couldn't believe some of words that came out of their mouths. I couldn't say anything, so I just sat there quietly observing, my blood boiling. I know through more experience I will be able to keep my cool, but I give Miss Griffith a lot of credit for remaining calm. These students can be very intimidating at first, but it's important to remember as a new teacher that you are the adult and you are in charge.