Additional Post #2

So now were back from where we began, my supposed mentor hasn't contacted me in a long time, I've tried to call and email him, but I would get more replies. Instead of trying to keep reaching him, I think it'll be best to move on and find someone else considering it's time sensitive. Luckily I do know two, three people in my topic, but I'm not going to limit myself to it and I am open to what ever comes my way, I just need to ask around. For example, my best friend's mom owns a sort of type of novelty shop at the Montclare Mall, it's pretty cool, so I'm probably going to ask.

Considering I do go on with my current topic, I've been doing a lot of research on the A+ Certification after the first interview.

^How the 2013 A+ Certification looks like.

Where was mentioned that the A+ Certification is a good start for like a high school senior. My interviewee also lended me a text book specifically made to study for it. So I am strongly considering getting it, depending where I go from now.

Blog 6: Second Interview Questions

1. Who is your mentor and where do they work?

• Bryan Gielen is a computer technician, he owns his own Computer Repair Shop named "Computer Parts Inc" at the Claremont Village.

2. What five questions will ask them about their background?

• Where and what did you study in College?
• How did you learn to fix computers? (College courses, High School courses, self taught, etc.)
• For how long have you been repairing computers and been interested in it?
• What made you want to repair computers?
• In my research I have read about certificates like the A+ and was mentioned in my last interview, do you have the A+ or any other certificates?

Blog 5: Project Reflection and Working EQ

The Pentagon: 
(1) Positive Statement: What positive thing happen as a result of what you have completed so far?

• Well, I have chosen a topic, which is computer repair, computer technician, something in that sort, I just need to narrow it down. Over the summer I was expecting to do Film Production but things didn't work out. Luckily I was able to get things started with my new topic.

(2) EQ Content: Pick a piece of research or your interview. How has it helped you improve your understanding of your topic?

• Its not just one piece of research, multiple articles I picked mentioned a specific situation which was competing against large companies like Best Buy/Geek Squad when owning a small repair shop. "Work from Home Businesses - Computer Repair" mentioned this first, and looked up more on it and found an article titled "Computer Shop vs National Chain Computer Repair Service." I'm planning in narrowing down my topic to this, but I'm not sure if it's a good idea or not.

(3) What has worked for you so far in the senior project?

• Being able to find a potential mentor within one day of completely changing my topic.

(4) What hasn't worked so far?

• Finding valuable research that contains good and useful information. I haven't really been able to find anything good. I may just need to use better key words, but I hope to find a book on it.

(5) Finding Value: 

• What is a potential question you would like to study this year? (working EQ)
• "How does one successfully compete against big named computer services?" or "What goes into becoming a valued computer technician?"
• What do you plan to do for mentorship? If you haven't found a mentor yet, then discuss where you are currently looking and who you are talking to to find it. 
• I contacted a local computer technicial named Bryan Gielen that is stationed in the Claremont Village. I have yet not started mentorship with him but he seems very willing to help me out, hopefully I would begin soon.

Additional Post #1

 First of all, I hope I am doing this correctly by basically giving an update on where I am in my Senior Project. To get into it though, I am currently waiting for a call or to call a computer technician who runs his own computer repair shop at the Claremont Village. Right off the top you can tell my senior project is going ta have to do with computers. It was actually supposed to be in Film Producing initially. At the end of last year, I found a mentor, whom I meet in the ROP Film class, that offered me and another fellow student internships. Unfortunately because of communication difficulties the end of the summer was approaching and we weren't able to get our mentorship started in time, so I did my ten hours else where. I didn't think I would be able to find another producer easily so I decided to email and call the local computer repair shops and see if any could help me out. Thankfully on the 22nd of August I received a call back with someone willing to help me out but mentioned he will at San Francisco for a week. What I am mostly focused on right now is being able to get a interview scheduled with him. That's where I am so far now.

When it comes down to a specific topic, I probably will like to follow through with the business running a computer repair shop because a lot of the research that I've read mentioned that advertising and getting your name out there for your shop is hard, and that the biggest obstacle that gets in the way of your success are the big guys. By big guys I mean like Best Buy/Geek Squad. Of course there's some advantages over the big guys, such as when someone recommends you by the word of mouth, the person who received the recommendation follow through with it because it is more likely they will get similar if not exactly the same service. With the big guys, they have squads of many technicians and not every one of them are the same. I just want to look more into this situation.

Blog 4: Interview Preparation

1. Who do you plan to interview? Why?

- The person I plan to interview is called Bryan Gielen, my soon-to-be mentor. Bryan is a computer technician who repairs computers, desktop and laptops, and also some cell phones, but mainly computers. He does all this in his repair shop which is located in the Claremont Village.

2. You have to ask 5 questions. What additional questions do you plan to ask? Ask open-ended questions.

- What would you say is the most common challenge you come across while working?

- Do you prioritize your work in any way? If so, how?

- The typical computer repair shop charges per hour, you charge per repair though. Is there any particular reason why you decided to do it per repair instead of per hour?

Blog 3: Topic Choice and Semester 1 ESLR Goals

1. List your topic here: Computer Repair
2. What do you plan to do this year to show growth in each of the ESLRs? Be specific and use an example. Examples can come from senior project, model assembly, core, and/or participation in senior class ASB or other organizations on campus (clubs etc).

• iPoly Citizen
• We can all agree that iPoly has a lot of enjoyable events where we have fun every year. We can also agree that those events don't just pop out of no where, there is work to be done. For the past three years at iPoly, I've had the privilege of attending these events, and coming into senior year, I do believe it is my turn to do my part and become the iPoly citizen I am expected to be. Wither it is running a booth at Scare Fair, or a food stand at iFest, I am prepared to do it and look forward to doing it. What I look forward to the most though is Powerpuff which I had the pleasure to coach last year. Not only because I am a huge football fan but because it feels good to contribute to an event a lot of people look forward too and also because of the learning experience. While coaching the junior team, I discovered that each player was on the same level, and that level makes the team. That there is no good player with a bad player around, because at the end of it all, both of them will be playing on the same field and on the same side.
• Effective Learner
• Besides turning in my work in time, not procrastinating and the obvious stuff, I believe that growing in each of the other three ESLRs, I can improve my Learning habits. The reason why I say this is because you can only learn so much from a book, or school work in general, but you can learn much more from others by communicating with them and involving yourself in activities. Such as, finding out new ways to study, new ways of looking at a problem, or maybe even change your way of thinking if it helps you improve your learning capabilities. Basically, my idea here is that I'll become an effective learner by adapting to other people's ideas and trying them out.
• Effective User of Technology
• I do already consider me an effective user of technology because I take full advantage of it in situations regarding school or home. Knowing more than the average computer user does greatly pay off and most examples that I can come up with come from my Junior year. If you are not aware, in one of the components we were assigned to do was modeling a city based off of a energy source (mine being nuclear energy) and we had to advertise our city using marketing mediums. One of the marketing mediums every group had to do was a poster and with that was a contest attached where the best poster of each energy source gets an E. Looking at the posters, you were able to tell who had more than the average computer user (by average I mean knowing how to surf the internet, using word documents, basic stuff) in their group. Me, being able to do graphic design, made the poster and won the E for my group. Of course there is always room to improve though, and I plan in doing that with my senior project. As you can tell by my topic listed above, I am going to be going deeper into computers and expanding my knowledge on technology.
• Effective Communicator
• I often have a tendency of not speaking out when it matter because something I may be afraid of what others might think or because I might offend someone else's idea. I can date this back all the way to freshmen starting with the storybook. The way I plan to fix this is speaking out my mind when I deem it necessary regardless of the outcome because the situation I'll be in could only possible improve from me speaking out or just go unchanged. 

Blog 2: Summer Mentorship Component

Literal: 

1. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AtPbi-xgbclwdC1pRUNkRXp6Um5wZ3JJbjNWVTZGZVE#gid=0


2. What is the contact name & number of where you volunteered?
- Tomas Arellano; 1(310)345-6739


3. What questions were raised because of the 10 hours of experience?
- During talking about business and all, we talked about keeping customers with good service with no contact issues and all, but how about gaining them? Which I believe will be the harder part.

Interpretive

4. What is the most important thing you gained from this experience? Why?
- The knowledge that every customer expects the same which is the obvious, good service. Also that you need a good relationship with each customer and know their persona. Mainly because it is a necessity in every business, since a business can't succeed without clients.

Applied

5. How did what you did help you choose a topic? Please explain.
- Honestly, it wasn't much from what I did, but what was mentioned by word. I did generic things not really specific to the topic but when it came down to talking, I was taught the needs of a business specifically regarding clients that make sense by logic. I am still unsure of a topic though, considering I couldn't get my ten summer hours started where I wanted too in time.