Week Eight

This week wasn’t quite as exciting as last week. I might have mentioned that the picnic I was discussing had prizes given out. Well, those prizes have to come from somewhere, namely, the businesses of Neosho. So, I busied myself by stuffing envelopes going to the many businesses in town. Some places were in Joplin, but those attending the picnic are not snobby about where their prize comes from. Food chains were also asked to participate in the festivities by providing food, napkins, cups, or some other form of aide. I saw envelopes going to Subway and Quizno’s. I think it would be delightful if either one of those businesses participated. There were a lot of businesses asked to help, so I am assuming that they are overshooting the number they would be happy with. The more requests they hand out, the more likely they will have a decent number of businesses join in.
Later in the week, I had to go through files to determine which classes were current and which weren’t. There were some classes I’m sure haven’t been used for at least ten years or more. There were files for classes I had never heard of before. As I went through, I was looking for a paper stating the course’s focus. Many of the classes did not have one of these papers. I wrote down theses courses and my mom had to send the list to Mr. Cook, the assistant principal of the high school. He goes through the list and tells my mom which files it is alright to eliminate. I was rather surprised they hadn’t done something like this earlier.
This was my last week to volunteer, and I was interested in how the office interacts with each other. There are separate offices within the larger office, and these offices are essentially their own space. There are four offices: special services, finance, Mrs. Stipp and her assistants, and the superintendent. I am not sure if it is the layout of the building, but the only reason these offices seem to interact is to redirect an issue or chat about something insignificant. I had thought that I would be able to work more with Dr. Page during my time of volunteering, but he doesn’t seem to require that much help. I suppose he has the least amount of interaction with the rest of the office. He could be separated for several reasons, but it was still rather awkward. Anytime I had to go into his office, for whatever reason, I felt like I was interrupting him. It’s very possible that I was interrupting him, but there are ways to make people feel comfortable around you. I’m not sure if Dr. Page has managed to learn these ways.
Anyway, I had fun volunteering. I like working in an office setting. It is usually organized and easily managed. In a school office, the workers have a unique advantage; they are easily able to see the results of their work. I will be attending the end of the year picnic and will get to see some of my ideas in motion. It was a very enjoyable experience.

Week Seven

This week I worked with my mom and the other lady in her office, Tammy. They are getting ready for the next school year by comparing and looking at all of the different textbooks available. There are several companies who send textbooks to the schools on a trial basis. Mrs. Stipp is heading all of this up, and I believe she makes the ultimate decision as to whether or not they use a certain book. Companies send representatives with the book samples. I heard my mom and Mrs. Stipp discussing the quality of these representatives; apparently, many of these people are not well adept at presenting their materials. This doesn’t really surprise me because I don’t think most of these representatives have tried teaching kids using their particular textbook.
Anyway, I had to sort through the stacks of books that had come in since my mom and Tammy had somehow mixed them up and put them in the wrong boxes. It was tiresome work, especially at 7:30 in the morning, but I like sorting things. There seemed to be a lot of books for the younger grades, and several of these books were science or math related.
Later in the week, I helped my mom with planning the annual end of the school year picnic. I’ve been to the picnic before, and it usually has decent food. They typically give out prizes and have music playing, but it is kind of boring. Younger kids don’t like going to it because they don’t have much to do. I know, I was one of the younger kids once. This year, I think my mom is trying to give it a facelift. She had me look through a buy in bulk type of catalog with a bunch of party stuff. I was supposed to find items that would be good prizes for younger children. I had fun; there were sand dollars that you could buy in a basket of fifty at a time for a relatively good price. I found a lot of good stuff like that. Whether or not my mom will actually buy all of the things I picked out, I don’t know. I still had fun doing it. I also had to pick out games for kids to play. Three-legged races, fish in a pond, and a bean bag toss were a couple of the games suggested. I thought it would be nice to have hillbilly golf for the adults to play. If you don’t know what hillbilly golf is, you need to find out. It’s amazing. The picnic isn’t until May 24th, but I still plan on attending. It will be interesting to see a few of the things I picked out actually in use. I hope my ideas were helpful to my mom in planning the picnic; she told me they were. I also suggested that the workers at the picnic wear the same style of t-shirt to distinguish them from the crowd. I know that would make it easier to find someone if a question came up.

Week Six

I took spring break week off, and it was very nice to sleep in.
This past week I helped my mom and her coworker Tammie get set up for a middle school event. I had to run back and forth between the high school, where they were organizing things, and the building they are renting for office space because they had forgotten some supplies there. I hadn’t been around the high school since I graduated, and I was surprised at the changes that are happening. It especially surprised me that they were still working during the school year. The office had moved and there were signs of construction throughout. I guess they want to complete the project quickly, which is a good thing.
Before I helped my mom, though, I finished up the recruitment packets for Bekah Peters. She wanted around 100 packets. I also found out that the packets have applications in them; this is probably a good thing if they are supposed to “recruit” people. All in all it wasn’t a bad week.
I have noticed that the superintendent and his assistant are somewhat standoffish. It’s not just with me; everyone in the office is treated with the same sort of indifference. Makes me think they are either really busy, or really stuck up. Hopefully the former.
After talking to my mother about my concerns with Dr. Page and Mr. Brazeale’s behavior, I found out that they are both very busy, and Dr. Page isn’t much of a people person to begin with. I would think that a person in an authoritative position should be more open to people in general; however, I could have been in the wrong position to be judging his personality. My mom did say that he was very busy, and I am not sure if that is all his fault. Those beneath him, or Mr. Brazeale, could probably pick up the slack a little more. Those are my words, by the way. My mom made no such insinuation; I am assuming that this is one possible area of improvement.
Anyway, the high school as I said earlier is making major changes. The office was once at the north end of the building and has been moved to the center of the building in front of the auditorium. They are turning the old office space into new biology labs that will receive new equipment. There is currently an outdoor area next to the cafeteria; there are benches and tables for students to sit at. The school decided that students no longer needed an outdoor area, so they will extend the cafeteria and eliminate this area. One major improvement will be new seating in the auditorium. I know that was something my class had always complained about. The building will also be getting new windows. I think that this will do a lot for the looks of the high school. A completely new high school would have been preferable, but the school system can only do as much as the community allows it to do.