Day 1 – So Many Screens! (FOX50)

Fox - CBC Front 1

Today I visited the FOX 50/WRAL studios in downtown Raleigh. There I met Kevin Kolbe who showed me around the studios a bit. First Stop was the master control room. All of the channels run by this station are controlled by the people in these rooms. These are the people who change between the program and the commercials, as well as make sure everything is working properly.  After the brief tour of some the other facilities such as the small and large scale studios, Kevin took me to a meeting where he and his co-workers meet every Monday. There I met Sierra, Pete, Gayle, and Mark. I listened to a fascinating presentation about color and psychology. Fox - Master ControlI spent the rest of the morning with Sierra seeing how she edits the website and how she goes about adding new pages and promoting the shows on the site, funny enough they use WordPress for their website. She also went over how she runs the FOX50 facebook page. I then worked with Pete for a while after lunch. He handles the some of the promo editing. He showed me how they go about doing their editing, at least for the Steve Harvey Show Promos. I also got an early look at the new season of So You Think You Can Dance: Next Generation. To finish off the day I met David Crabtree, an anchor for WRAL. He introduced me to a whole bunch of people in the News Room, from other anchors to editors and others in production.

Over all it was an amazing day, and I really look forward to going back tomorrow!

-CJ

Day 1: Patients with Patience

Day 1 at the Carolina Ear and Hearing Clinic was already a restless one… Dr. John McElveen had over 40 patients to attend to, and we were at his side in the examination rooms the entire time! When Jonathan and I arrived to the clinic at 8:00 AM we were first suited up with lab coats so that we at least looked the part of doctors (even though we didn’t fully understand all of Dr. McElveen’s medical jargon). The morning started with a staff meeting that we sat in on where the upcoming month pertaining to all of Dr. McElveen’s surgeries was discussed (mostly at least… an engagement was also announced during the meeting which provided some well-needed excitement to wake everybody up on an early Monday!). After the meeting, Dr. McElveen had to rush to get on a conference call, so some of his nurses took Jonathan and me on a tour of the office and let us sit in on some of the hearing tests performed by the audiologists. The audiologists were very good at explaining what they were doing as they went along, and what all of their charts indicated in the patient’s file. After Dr. McElveen’s conference call had ended, he pulled us out from the hearing test rooms as it was time for him to begin examining patients. We hopped from room to room as Dr. McElveen examined the patients’ ears. Conveniently, on his magnifying device that he looked into to see the ear canal better was a camera that displayed and enlarged Dr. McElveen’s procedure on a television screen. Most of the times it was really cool to be able to see real-time footage of Dr. McElveen scanning the ear with his instruments (he was very good with pointing out certain things in the ear to explain stuff to us as he went along); however, some of the times it was kind of gross, like when he removed all of a patient’s ear wax or scraped away their dried-up ear fluid. The worst was when he used a suction tool to suck up all of the patient’s pus-like ear fluid. Jonathan and I stood there staring at the screen pretending to be professional and unfazed by the nauseating pus-fluid, but we later admitted to each other that we were both repulsed by it. After seeing all of these repulsive and gross bodily substances, it was time for our lunch break… perfect! Despite this, lunch was actually really enjoyable because we became much more acquainted with Dr. McElveen’s staff who is a really fun group of people. After our lunch break, Dr. McElveen had Jonathan and me research some common medical procedures and terms such as cochlear implants and otosclerosis. One of the nurses then explained to us how some of the advanced hearing aids worked and how to custom-program them to meet a specific patient’s needs. After this, we rejoined Dr. McElveen and continued shadowing him in the examination rooms until the office day was over at 5:00. Although Jonathan and I complained to each other throughout the day about standing up for too long without sitting (it’s actually a pretty challenging task that we are not accustomed to doing on a daily basis), we have absolutely nothing to complain about regarding our day as a whole, or the Carolina Ear and Hearing Clinic. It was truly an amazing and informative day, and we cannot wait to shadow Dr. McElveen in the operating room tomorrow during a surgical procedure! – Kiran W.

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Introduction to Alliance Medical Ministry

Today I met with Dr. Lewis at Alliance Medical Ministry. I had the opportunity to shadow her and meet her patients. I also met the volunteer coordinator, Ms. Daniel, who gave me a tour of Alliance and talked to me about the facility. This clinic is a nonprofit clinic that is funded by donations. These donations allow working uninsured adults in Wake County to get healthcare. AMM focuses on treating “the whole person” (a phrase used multiple times today). In addition to primary care, the clinic provides counseling and wellness programs (yoga, cooking classes, etc.). Everyone I met at AMM was very kind and welcoming. I can’t wait to go back tomorrow!

-Biruk

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Civil & Environmental Engineering @ Cornell

Today I mainly was just dipping my toes in the water. I met Joe, the post doctoral student I will be helping, as well as some of the technicians that will be helping us. I did some basic programming in the free version of matlab to try to get a little experience. I was introduced to all of the equipment that we will be using and the plans of what we will use the equipment for. I also received some background reading that I started to work on and will continue to work on. I am looking forward to tomorrow. — Iain

Katie Day 1-I’m Official

Today was a crazy busy day! First I met with Ms. Karkare, a nutrition consultant and registered dietitian. Later, I had a tour of the Interfaith Food Shuttle building and an overview of what they do there. I met the team of interns, and even experienced a webinar of how the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans will impact Cooking Matters (one of Interfaith Food Shuttle’s programs).  Plus, I got this pretty sweet official-looking nametag above. Then, I interviewed the outpatient dietitian at Wakemed Cary, Ms. Kharod. Each interaction I had today gave me a different example of all the ways nutrition experts impact the world. Ms. Karkare works with her clients in a one-on-one setting, while Interfaith takes more of a community-centered focus around improving the diets of impoverished Americans in the Triangle. Ms. Kharod’s work is similar to Ms. Karkare’s, but in a more clinical setting. I look forward to experiencing and exploring many different aspects of this diverse field of study!

Day 1- The Autism Umbrella

Today was my first day working at Camp Royall: a camp that specializes in working with kids with Autism Spectrum Disorder. My first job was helping set up for a Special Needs class from Carrboro High School that was coming in as a field trip. The first activity was boating which consisted of helping the kids into either a big row boat or smaller paddle boats and letting them boat around the small lake. Then, we set up a campfire and sang campfire songs which all of the students loved. My favorite part though was the hayride we took all around the camp. I wasn’t expecting to be able to interact directly with these amazing kids, but I’m so glad that I was able to hang out with them. What I learnt was how wide the spectrum is for kids with Autism. The varying symptoms and degree of the neurological disorder is why Autism Spectrum Disorder is often referred to as an umbrella term for different types of diagnosis including Asperger’s, classical autism, and high-functioning autism. After the school group left around 1:00, I was assigned to sorting out binders for every counselor that comes to camp this summer. It was quite a tedious job, but an important one as the binders allow counselors to create a visual schedule for each individual camper.

I learnt that kids with autism are often very visual and might really like the structure and order which they get through schedules. Overall, I had a great first day!

-Fiona

Cameron’s Excellent RTI Adventure

Hey all!

Cameron here (of course?). So here’s how my first day has gone. I met Mrs. Michelle, as shown in my earlier post, before I had an intro session about the program. After the session, we went on a tour of the building, meeting several of her coworkers along the way and we were also promised a demonstration of one of their experiments, where they test the effectiveness of firefighter gear. Sounds cool, right? Well, the guy actually has to stand, in the gear, and exercize in various positions for 30 minutes, all the while being in a wind tunnel with Fluorescent aerosol flown around. Afterwards, they sit in a uv light area while the scientists determine where they need to reinforce the gear. I think it’s awesome they just sit there and glow…

Anyways, after the tour we tested several ECMs by lighting a kerosene lamp and placing them in this thing:


The kerosene lamp is in the right compartment, while the ECMs are in the glass door. They use pumps to take in the smoke, and then we evaluate their efficiency by checking for white lines, which indicate blockages (these are bad, if you don’t realize…). A picture of the graph is below!


After a couple of tests, we left and went to a safety meeting (concerning the department, not me :P), where we met this guy:


This is Mr. Stan Parker, head of security at RTI, and I gotta say… Doesn’t his moustache look awesome?! Literally, I want that moustache when I grow up. Now I only need to grow facial hair…

Other than his awesome moustache, Stan Parker is also pretty nice, and has some very interesting, if not fun, stories.

After meeting Mr. Parker, we went to lunch, had a delicious cheeseburger and fries (I know what I’m eating for my two weeks!) and then headed back to the office to continue working with the ECMs. After a ton more tests (all of which were perfect, if I do say so myself), I was offered the chance to try it by myself. Mine vs. the master’s is below.

The Master (above)

Mine (above)

They’re pretty close, right? The control (left) has a palm tree-like blockage, and the test (right) is ideal (as in, no blockage) for both. A job well done, if I do say so myself.

After receiving a delivery containing more ECMs, the day ended. Tomorrow, we go back to testing them. I hope you enjoyed my post!

Thanks,

Cameron L.

Day 1: SAS-ing it up!

Today, Grace and I started our 4-day shadowing experience at SAS. First, we got a tour of the Finance building with Lisa, the head of this sector of finance management. We met the rest of her team, and then she gave us an overview of how she and her team fit into SAS. We learned that there are over 6o countries where SAS has locations, and Lisa even told us about some of the struggles that come with collaborating with international employees! In addition, we talked to two employees about analyst and budgeting careers.  And finally, we got to sit in at a Finance Division Meeting.

-Khushi

 

SAS Day 1: M&M’s!

This week another student, Khushi and I, Grace, are shadowing the Global Research and Analysis team at SAS under Lisa. This group works within the Finance branch of SAS, analyzing, collecting, and managing the ledgers and expenses SAS undergoes. We learned the ins and outs of SAS financial analysis, from the data collection systems to how to coordinate international marketing, as well as budget distribution amongst the SAS community. We even got to attend a finance department meeting!

The breakroom perks at SAS contain a generous supply of M&M’s.

The T building on SAS’ campus has a beautiful water fountain! (no sign to be found, though.)


Receiving my badge for the week in the main lobby.