Something to learn: Networking!

I hope all of your internships are going well!

I believe the most important lesson I took away from my internship is to NETWORK. It could not be stressed enough how important it is to get out there and meet people, who can potentially become professional contacts. There are actual events that organizations and institutions plan out on a monthly or bi-monthly basis that primarily focus on networking. It's shocking to see where a simple question or small talk can go. Some tips I for when it comes to networking

• Ask questions, especially if you don't like to talk about yourself
• Have a speech prepared when people ask what you do or what you want to do after you graduate 
• PRACTICE, either with friends, classmates, or anyone who will give you suggestions
• Have a business card; even if you are a student, because it allows people to better remember you

Do you guys have anymore tips from what you have learned?

Valley of the Sunflowers

A special trip we made during my time at GGP was taking the long walk down to 3rd St. and Garfield to Kitchen Sink studios. There we met the historic preservation advocate, Jim McPherson, and the art and park advocate, Dorina Bustamante. As we spoke about their roles in Phoenix, we walked down to a previously vacant lot down the street. A lot behind Bioscience High School was vacant and, through much effort and hard work, was transformed into a sunflower lot, name Valley of the Sunflowers. This project is meant to start up conversation about vacant lots in downtown Phoenix and how they can easily be filled by temporary uses, while waiting to be developed. The sunflower seeds of the flowers being grown on the lot will be used to extract oil, which will then be used for an automobile that Bioscience High School students are building. Currently, there are a number of initiatives taking place that revolve around vacant lots, including the Ro2 lot or "The Lot: What Should Go Here?", where Mayor Stanton discussed the need to temporary projects on vacant lots.

OffSET App?

One of the weeks of my internship I focused on attempting to make OffSET a mobile app. Let me just say, that making an app is not an easy task. You have to come up with the right coding, go through various trials and formatting, and put in many many hours of work. Honestly, I am not that technologically savvy, though I would like to be. I found that there are websites where you can just input that information you want in  your app and they make the coding for you, but the app never comes out the way you really wanted it to. Though it takes time and critical thinking, I would rather make an app out of scratch, however long it takes.

Career Fair in Tempe

Today I had the opportunity of attending the Career Fair at the MU on Tempe Campus. I have to say that I was not to impressed with the companies that attended. The vast majority dealt with sales, investment, or insurance. I know this is not a time to be picky, but I was not interested in any. I spoke with a few representatives, but none really sold me on the job. I currently have two jobs, bot in retail, equalling out to ~50 hours per week. I would love to find a job I can make a career of after I graduate, but at the moment, I don't know what that job is (I just know it's not in sales, insurance, or investment). If any of you attended, I hope you had better luck than I did.

The elevator speech.

Since I took my internship last semester, my post will not be as detailed as the rest of yours. I apologize in advance. The first few weeks at GGP entailed studying OffSET, the program itself, how it was created, the research that was used in order to create it, and how to calculate what we evaluate as far as kilowatts used and the money it costs. It was a great deal to comprehend, but after looking over the documents dozens of times it becomes pretty straight forward.

Something Jonce ask the other intern and I is how would we describe sustainability, in terms of our degree, for someone who doesn't understand the concept? He advised us that the best way to think about an answer is to pretend that we were doing an elevator speech. It is important to give a direct and comprehensible answer in the time it took to get from one floor to another. This is what I came up with:

A degree in sustainability entails balancing the economic, social, and environmental sectors within a certain institution, city, region, or country, through a diverse skill set ranging from innovative problem-solving to building effective and strategic efforts that will have a long-term effect. I am able to focus on a specific project, such as bringing affordable, sustainable development along a transit line or using the holistic approach on a broader scale by creating a sustainable program within a company or region that will in turn become a part of the company or region's problem-solving mechanisms.

Hopefully, my explanation was understandable. 

Something to talk about...

I hope all of your internship are going well so far!

According the Class Information, we are supposed to have 5 posts about anything we want to write about... This will be my first.

A bit of exciting news, I officially applied for graduation this week and am contemplating on ordering my cap and gown. I have a cap bedazzling date with miss Holly Williamson, who is also in this class, sometime this semester which I am really looking forward to. But that's not what i would like to talk about.

I am currently taking a class, Intro to Urban Planning, where the professor likes to updates us on news, any news, mostly political. Anyway, this week he showed us an article called "McDonald's confirms that its no longer using 'pink slime' chemical in hamburgers." I have attached the link to the article if you are interested in reading it. The 'pink slime' the article is referring to is ammonium hydroxide, which is a chemical used in fertilizers and households cleaners, among other things. This chemical is being used in the process of making ground beef. Not just McDonald's used it. The ground beef you find in grocery stores and other fast food places uses it as well. A video about 'pink slime' is also included on the page and we watched it in class. It pretty much shows the process of how ground beef is made. I don't want to state my opinion, but instead want to hear what you guys think about this article. Enjoy!

P.S. Ammonium hydroxide is not required to be put on the label for ground beef.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/mcdonald-confirms-no-longer-using-pink-slime-chemicals-171209662.html

What is Maricopa County Green Government Program?

As I mentioned in a previous post, I learned about the Maricopa County Green Government Program (GGP) through a Luncheon held at ASU a few semesters ago. GGP was actually written developed by my Supervisor, Jonce Walker, along with a few colleagues. The main purpose of the program is to is "to develop a long-term strategy whereby the County will reduce it's carbon footprint, help save money, and enhance the region's environment" (Maricopa County GGP website). The overall environmental focus of the program is divided into subcategories: air, community, energy, land use, waste and recycling, transportation, and water. So far, GGP has undergone several projects such as creating a greenhouse gas inventory for the county, creating an Environmentally friendly Purchasing Policy (EPP), developing a county wide recycling program: "bin here, do that," undergoing renewable energy projects for county buildings, and taking part in assuring that the county's buildings are LEED certified.

The most recent project GGP is focusing on, other than OffSET, is opening a bike cellar in downtown Phoenix close to the Van Buren and Central Light Rail stop. This project is still in the early stages, but it will be interesting how it plays out.