Jenny demonstrating her circular saw skills.
At first I was slightly terrified of the circular saw, but I have now conquered my fear. I was able to play with all sorts of fun tools during tool training last week.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
It's Getting Real Now
Training is coming to a fast close. Sun 3 (my team) takes off for San Antonio on Saturday morning. We were originally planning on a two day trip but in accordance with the AmeriCorps motto, the only constant in change, we are now taking a three day trip.
AmeriCorps regulations state that we are not allowed to travel over 500 miles in a day, and while the trip is slightly less than 1,000 miles total, there was no place to stay at the midpoint of the trip. Oh well. Our first day we'll get close to 8 hours of drive time to get to Amarillo as our stopping point. The second day will be a bit shorter as our target for that day is San Angelo.
That puts us at arriving at our final destination at the Land Heritage Institute early in the afternoon on Monday. Starting work on Tuesday.
Today was supply check out and our trucks are now partially loaded. We'll be sleeping on cots for the month, so we got those checked out along with our cooking supplies and some trail building tools.
I'm excited to get started but also sad at the same time to be leaving the friends I've made during CTI. Tomorrow is induction and after that we're all planning on heading into Denver for a farewell for now evening.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Fire Management
Three of the 28 teams on the AmeriCorps NCCC Denver campus are designated fire management teams. The members of these teams spend time in training to become certified type two wild land firefighters and spend their 2nd and 4th round projects dealing with fire. Mostly fire mitigation, but also with the possibility of actually fighting fires.
Due to the nature of the work, AmeriCorps members must apply and be chosen to be on these teams. As you know from my last post, I am on one of these teams. Pretty crazy, huh!?
There were a few different facets of the application process. Physical testing, an interview, as well as an essay. The physical testing consisted of two minutes each of sit ups, push ups as well as a 1 mile run. Believe it or not, I actually did 17 push ups. The interview was with Vaughn, the Sun unit director, and Nick, the sun unit fire management team leader.
After making the team our next step was the pack test. The pack test is one of the qualifications to becoming a type 2 certified wild land firefighter. It consisted of a 3 mile walk with a 45 lb. pack on our backs with a 45 minute time limit. We headed to Golden, CO yesterday to take our tests at Colorado School of Mines. I passed! I crossed the finish line in 41:01. Time to spare.
After making the team our next step was the pack test. The pack test is one of the qualifications to becoming a type 2 certified wild land firefighter. It consisted of a 3 mile walk with a 45 lb. pack on our backs with a 45 minute time limit. We headed to Golden, CO yesterday to take our tests at Colorado School of Mines. I passed! I crossed the finish line in 41:01. Time to spare.
Now, I just know some of you are asking yourself why I ever decided to apply to do this. Well, let me tell you!
I applied to AmeriCorps NCCC with the hope of getting some disaster relief experience. AmeriCorps NCCC teams have been deployed to do disaster relief for every major disaster for a number of years. Who actually responds to disaster is chosen somewhat methodically and somewhat randomly. After learning more about the fire management teams and what they do, I realized that they do a type of disaster relief with their work.
Much of what I will be doing 2nd and 4th round with be fire mitigation. I figure preventing a fire before it happens and gets out of control to a disaster state is a pretty worthwhile thing to be doing. Also, the potential 4th round (fire season) to actually put a fire out is pretty neat. Preventing a fire from getting out of control is also pretty worthwhile in my opinion.
Much of what I will be doing 2nd and 4th round with be fire mitigation. I figure preventing a fire before it happens and gets out of control to a disaster state is a pretty worthwhile thing to be doing. Also, the potential 4th round (fire season) to actually put a fire out is pretty neat. Preventing a fire from getting out of control is also pretty worthwhile in my opinion.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Ameri-family
Continued from yesterday's post
.................
"Welcome to Sun 3, take off your blindfolds." I happily obliged and as soon as my eyes adjusted to the light I looked around the van at my new team mates. The people who will become my Ameri-family over the next ten months were in the seats next to me.
Some of the faces in the van were familiar ones, people I had become friends with over the past few weeks. Others were unfamiliar, individuals I hadn't had conversations with before.
Now, remember back to yesterdays post when I talked about the fire management team I applied for. Well, Sun 3 is the designated fire management team. Our previously unidentified van driver turned out to be Nick, the Sun 3 team leader. Hearing his voice meant that I had made it. I was on the fire management team.
We all piled out of the van and headed into the park that Nick had driven us to. We all sat in a circle with the biggest grins on our faces. We had put our hearts into applying for this team, and we had made it. The nine of us were chosen out of a very qualified applicant pool to make up Sun 3. Five guys, four girls, and Nick our team leader.
The biggest question in our minds now; where are we going?
.................
"Welcome to Sun 3, take off your blindfolds." I happily obliged and as soon as my eyes adjusted to the light I looked around the van at my new team mates. The people who will become my Ameri-family over the next ten months were in the seats next to me.
Some of the faces in the van were familiar ones, people I had become friends with over the past few weeks. Others were unfamiliar, individuals I hadn't had conversations with before.
Now, remember back to yesterdays post when I talked about the fire management team I applied for. Well, Sun 3 is the designated fire management team. Our previously unidentified van driver turned out to be Nick, the Sun 3 team leader. Hearing his voice meant that I had made it. I was on the fire management team.
We all piled out of the van and headed into the park that Nick had driven us to. We all sat in a circle with the biggest grins on our faces. We had put our hearts into applying for this team, and we had made it. The nine of us were chosen out of a very qualified applicant pool to make up Sun 3. Five guys, four girls, and Nick our team leader.
The biggest question in our minds now; where are we going?
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Team Reveal
This past month all 280 corps members have been organized into four units. Earth, water, fire, and my own unit of sun. Within each unit are teams of roughly 10 to 12 corps members each with a team leader.
In order for us to get to know each other and for the team leaders to get to know us before they placed us in permanent teams we shuffled around every couple of days in temporary teams.
I am happy to report that the shuffling is over and I have been placed on my permanent team. Now, there is a little side note to go with team selection. Of the 28 teams on campus, 3 are designated as fire management teams. I, Nathalie Besse, applied to be on a fire management team. Can you believe it? (To apply we had to do a number of things which I will cover in another post.) So to add to my nervousness about finding out my permanent team, I was also nervous about whether I would make the fire management team or not.
Finding out our teams was quite the adventure. The team leaders put together a scavenger hunt of sorts.
We started out with all 70 sun unit corps members in a circle facing inward with our eyes closed. The team leaders taped words to our backs and told us that we needed to sort ourselves into teams based on our words without talking. We started this process and were having a tough time. None of the words seemed to really correlate with each other.
After 5 minutes of confusion and frantically trying to figure out how words matched up in silence a staff member comes outside to where we are and stops us. He tells us we all need to immediately go back to our dorm rooms because they need to investigate an incident that happened on campus over the weekend.
Disappointed we have to stop our team search, we all reluctantly head back to our dorm rooms. When I arrived at my door, I found a note with my name on it. I read it and immediately started laughing. It read something like this... "Haha, Gotcha! To find out your team go to (place on campus) for your next clue." We each ended up having to visit a few places on campus before we were directed by our final note to go to the AmeriCorps offices.
I head on over to the offices and find that everyone is being blindfolded and directed to sit on the grass. I sit there for 5 minutes or so blindfolded, and in silence as directed, as everyone else in the unit arrives and is also blindfolded.
Next, a team leader comes, takes my hand, and tells me we are going to go somewhere else. She leads me to what I eventually figure out is one of the 15 passenger vans and tells me to hop in the back, buckle up, and remain silent.
Now, as you may know, I have a little bit of a claustrophobia issue. Mostly when I feel trapped. Sitting in the back of a hot, stale aired, van while blindfolded induced a little bit of a panic. For a minute or two I thought I may have to bail and go stand outside, but I held strong. I took a few deep breaths and opened the back window. But man, that was definitely a heart pounding minute or two.
Eventually the van filled up with people, someone got in the drivers seat, and said person started the van. Next thing I know we were in motion and driving. Keep in mind we were are all still blindfolded and not allowed to talk at this time. We drove for 5 minutes or so and then the van pulled over and the driver spoke.
................
Come back tomorrow for part 2 of team reveal.
In order for us to get to know each other and for the team leaders to get to know us before they placed us in permanent teams we shuffled around every couple of days in temporary teams.
I am happy to report that the shuffling is over and I have been placed on my permanent team. Now, there is a little side note to go with team selection. Of the 28 teams on campus, 3 are designated as fire management teams. I, Nathalie Besse, applied to be on a fire management team. Can you believe it? (To apply we had to do a number of things which I will cover in another post.) So to add to my nervousness about finding out my permanent team, I was also nervous about whether I would make the fire management team or not.
Finding out our teams was quite the adventure. The team leaders put together a scavenger hunt of sorts.
We started out with all 70 sun unit corps members in a circle facing inward with our eyes closed. The team leaders taped words to our backs and told us that we needed to sort ourselves into teams based on our words without talking. We started this process and were having a tough time. None of the words seemed to really correlate with each other.
After 5 minutes of confusion and frantically trying to figure out how words matched up in silence a staff member comes outside to where we are and stops us. He tells us we all need to immediately go back to our dorm rooms because they need to investigate an incident that happened on campus over the weekend.
Disappointed we have to stop our team search, we all reluctantly head back to our dorm rooms. When I arrived at my door, I found a note with my name on it. I read it and immediately started laughing. It read something like this... "Haha, Gotcha! To find out your team go to (place on campus) for your next clue." We each ended up having to visit a few places on campus before we were directed by our final note to go to the AmeriCorps offices.
I head on over to the offices and find that everyone is being blindfolded and directed to sit on the grass. I sit there for 5 minutes or so blindfolded, and in silence as directed, as everyone else in the unit arrives and is also blindfolded.
Next, a team leader comes, takes my hand, and tells me we are going to go somewhere else. She leads me to what I eventually figure out is one of the 15 passenger vans and tells me to hop in the back, buckle up, and remain silent.
Now, as you may know, I have a little bit of a claustrophobia issue. Mostly when I feel trapped. Sitting in the back of a hot, stale aired, van while blindfolded induced a little bit of a panic. For a minute or two I thought I may have to bail and go stand outside, but I held strong. I took a few deep breaths and opened the back window. But man, that was definitely a heart pounding minute or two.
Eventually the van filled up with people, someone got in the drivers seat, and said person started the van. Next thing I know we were in motion and driving. Keep in mind we were are all still blindfolded and not allowed to talk at this time. We drove for 5 minutes or so and then the van pulled over and the driver spoke.
................
Come back tomorrow for part 2 of team reveal.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Ameri-isms
Lately we've been making words up like mad around campus. I like to call them Ameri-isms. It's pretty simple to do.
Ameri-family - Refers to the teams of 10 we've been placed in. These are the people we will eat with, sleep next to, and spend all of our time with for the next ten months.
Ameri-loving - Refers to the couples that have formed around campus. My friend and I have quite a laugh at the amount of Ameri-couples that have formed between our corps members. Paul and I have been mistaken as an Ameri-couple multiple times. We're finding it quite comical as we feel more like Ameri-siblings. Other words falling into this category are Ameri-marriage, Ameri-baby, and Ameri-skeeze.
Ameri-dog food - The not so wonderful food we eat in the cafeteria.
Ameri-bubble - The bubble we live in. We've been eating, sleeping, and breathing AmeriCorps this last month in Corps Training and find ourselves constantly talking about AmeriCorps.
Ameri-(insert word here) - The possibilities are truly endless.
I've got a problem.
Saying I have internet access on campus right now is a little misleading. While there is internet, it has always been quite slow. Recently, Colorado Heights University has added another hurdle to using the internet.
That hurdle is called filtering.
I believe the filtering is meant to keep people away from sites using tons of bandwidth and completely clogging up the network.
I am all for that type of filtering, however the university has taken it to another level I'm not thrilled with. To help explain the batty filtering I have compiled a list of sites which have been blocked:
1. The New York Times
2. CNN (My morning news intake is only through the unblocked NPR at this time. Pretty disheartening as I like to check the top stories at a couple of different sites each day.)
3. Blogspot (I am unable to access my own blog and unable to read anyone else's.)
4. You Tube
5. Pandora
6. NetFlix
Believe me, there are many more I just can't seem to remember them at this time.
The only site that pops up with any relative speed is Facebook. Lame. Even the Winona Daily News takes forever to load and not all of it shows up.
My only solution at this time is to keep my butt in this coffee shop chair and catch up on posts with some real internet. A lot has happened since my last post, I now know my permanent team and where I'll be headed first round. I'm going to get some some posts cranked out today and put publish dates on them so stay tuned for new posts all week.
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