(Report) The Mock Interview Project

SCENE: A Boys and Girls Harbor hallway on a late August afternoon, muggy, and overcast.

Peeking through the door of room 473, passing Harbor students inquired about "the woman in the pretty suit."

Meanwhile, sitting on the opposite side of the table inside 473, three FW participants donned alter egos one after another and talked about their experiences as a Purple-Heart Marine, a preschool principal, and a former GamePro graphic designer.

Quietly in the corner, a digital camera hummed along, as if to second that this week at First Work was not just business-as-usual.

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Project Background

In July, participants at First Work began a workshop series that asked them to consider what it is that makes a good job interview candidate good and put it all down on paper—everything from fictional stories of their character in action to illustrated pictures of their imaginary person.

In the initial stages of developing their characters, participants were asked to consider such things as: What kinds of music do their characters like? What kinds of movies do they watch? What sorts of accomplishments, education, and experience have gone into making these characters the best interviewees possible?

The discussions generated by the month and a half of subsequent character development sparked interesting intrigues into the relationship between one's personal life, demographics, and job marketability. Participants questioned if/how race, personal hobbies, and even one's ability to make difficult, extemporaneous choices affect one's apparent suitability for a position, and how one can present oneself in the best possible light at an interview.

Towards Mock Interviews

The purpose of the July-August character development activities was to set up FW participants for the August Mock Interviews, in which participants would be asked to role play their characters, whose education, experience, and circumstantial were necessary for successful consideration for a position of the participant's choosing.

In this, the overarching aim of the Summer Mock Interviews was to promote and allow the students to demonstrate their understanding of the interpersonal and presentational skills necessary to convince an interviewer that one is the best candidate for a given position, and not to focus on any lack of experience or education that could impede one's chances for the position.

To help with the interviewing, a Human Resources specialist at Chase Manhattan Bank, Ms. T. Lilly, offered her expertise as a fair and impartial interviewer with whom the students were not familiar, and offered the students invaluable advice about sharpening their interviewing skills.

The Mock Interview Project took the place of a MIYB project, and participants who were either recommended by Ms. Lilly for hire or were requested for a second interview achieved passing marks.

"I thought the project today was good," said Caryl as he rounded out his first full week in the program. "It helped me get a better sense of how I interview. I haven't been on that many interviews, so it'll help me do better on [them]."

(Assignment) Identifying Career Interests

Identifying career interests is the first step on your way to getting yourself together for the future. Identification can be a difficult thing, especially if you aren't completely sure about what it is you want to do, but if you can identify and understand your job options first, you'll know exactly what it is you're getting into before it's too late to change your mind.

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The Assignment

1. Go online to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Website and click on Occupational Outlook Handbook under the Publications section.
2. Think about and type the name of a career field you would like to do in the Search the Handbook text field on the top right part of the page.
3. Choose a link that matches your career interests from the list of results. (If you don't see your preferred career in this list, modify your search to one or two words, or try to look up the profession in the A to Z listing.)
4. When you have found careers that you are interested in, print out PDF files regarding the careers.
5. Read over the following sections from the careers you chose: (A) Nature of the Work; (B) Training, Other Qualifications, and Advancement; (C) Job Outlook; and (D) Earnings.
6. Lastly answer in your blog the questions below for each of the three careers you have chosen.

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Questions

1. Before you did this exercise, did you already know all the information in the Nature of the Work section, or were there some things that surprised you? If there were some things you didn't know, what are some examples?
2. How many years of training did you expect to have to complete for the career before you read the file in the OOH? How many years of training is suggested in the OOH?
3. What is the job outlook for the career you have chosen? Is this promising or forboding?
4. How are the earnings for the career you have chosen? Will this be enough to live on your own? (Consider that a salary of about $35,000 is needed to live comfortably in any of the outside boroughs paying the market rate for rent these days.
   
   When you have finished the above questions for each of your three career options, please answer question 5.
   
5. Of the three career options you have listed above, which seems the most feasible for you personally? Why? Do you think that this career will be rewarding? How old will you be when you have completed the training necessary to qualify for the position you choose? How will you support yourself until then?

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(Workshop) Career Exploration Learning Styles and Career Options

OBJECTIVE
By the end of class today in Career Exploration, you should be able to:

1. Determine which of the four learning styles apply most to you
2. Have a sense of how your preferred learning style can help indicate your career preferences or your suitability for certain careers

THE WORKSHOP
When you begin career exploration today, listen to the descriptions of today's four focus characters (Melissa, Umberto, Irene, and Sebastian). Once you have listened to the characters' introductions, decide which character sounds most like you and which character sounds least like you.

After you have decided on your characters, familiarize yourself with who you chose.

What kind of activities would they like to do? What kinds of personality traits do you think they would have? Discuss your characters for a minute with someone else, then, when you think you have gotten a good handle on them, go through the career paths that we finished last month in workshop--but as your characters would.

(Career Path Worksheet for Today's Activity)

In this warmup, answer each of the questions on the Career Path as the characters you picked as you make your way to their "suggested careers." Jot down the information on the worksheet, which you may download above as a jpeg file.

When you gone through the career paths and have your six or seven suggested careers for each character, answer the following questions.

QUESTIONS (PART 1)

1. Which career(s) can you see your characters doing most easily? Why?
2. Which career(s) would they have the most difficulty doing? Why?
3. In general how well do you think your characters were matched? Do you think they could have been matched better using a different considerations/questions? If so, how could you match your characters to more appropriate careers?

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DEVELOPMENT

Now that you have a sense of your characters, now is the time to reveal who--or should I say what they represent.

Everyone has his or her own preferred learning styles. A preferred learning style refers to the type of activities that a certain person can learn most easily from.

Each of the characters represents a person with one of four pronounced learning styles. Melissa's learning style is known as the Mastery style. Umberto's is the Understanding style, Sebastian's is the Self-Expressive style, and Irene's is the Interpersonal style. These titles are just names; and while no learning style is more superior than another, we use elements of all learning styles for different tasks in our daily lives. We are capable of learning in all the learning styles, some, however are much more suited to us than others.

Typically, there is usually one or two of the four learning styles that dominates the way we like to learn best, and the reason that we bring this subject up today in Career Exploration is because we can use an understanding of the way we like to learn in choosing a career that we'd love to do. For example, a person who has a strong Interpersonal learning style preference should perhaps reconsider doing work with little human contact. And a person who has a dominent preference for the Mastery style may not be the best person for a counseling position.

As you do the remainder of the activity today, ask yourself the question: How does the career I plan on making for myself meet my learning-style needs?

QUESTIONS (PART 2)

1. What learning style do you think is your dominant style? (Feel free to change your answer from before.)
2. Why do you think this is your dominant learning style?
3. Are there any styles that you feel rarely speaks to your preferred style of learning? Which ones?

ACTIVITY
Once you think you have your dominant learning styles figured out, let's put your guesses to the test.

Go into the Shared folder in the \server1\FWork\Students network folder. Click on the "Learning Styles Profiler.xls" file and follow the directions. When you have finished inputting your values in the table, you should print out a copy of your learning styles profile summary by clicking on the "My Profiles" tab and going to FILE > PRINT.

QUESTIONS (PART 3)

1. How on-target was your guess? (Did the learning styles you thought would be your dominant styles end up being your dominant styles?)
2. Taking into consideration the work you did with your characters, what careers or career fields do you think you are best suited for?
   
   IF TIME PERMITS
3. Go online to the College Toolkit Website and logon as MelissaMelissa, SebstianSebast, UmbertoUmberto, or IreneIrene. (The password is the same as the default Blogger password.) Then scroll down and click on the link for "Career Interest Profiler." Were your answers correct for question 2? Were there any jobs/careers listed here that surprised you? Which ones?
4. What is the general educational/training requirements for the careers that suit your dominant learning style? (Do most of the suggested careers require much training or experience? HINT: What "Job Zones" are most of your suggested careers in?

(Results) Make It Your Business Projects 1-3

Make It Your Business Results (Projects 1-3)

Group 1 Members
Jonathan A.
Millie
Amyra
William
Sandra
Chalin

Group 2 Members
Atenas
Stephanie
Edith
Miriam
Peggy
Yohana

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Project 1 (Mapping) Winners
Group 1 and Group 2 ($30 in Clothing Bucks to each group pot)

Project 2 (Modeling) Winners
Group 1 and Group 2 ($80 in CB to each group pot)

Project 3 (Budgeting) Winners
Group 2 ($80 in CB to the group pot)

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Summary
Group 2 Pot ($190)
Group 1 Pot ($110)

(Reflection) MIYB Projects1-3

Over the past few Fridays at First Work, you have participated in projects that have tested your ability to create, explain, convince, ask, and express. In a nutshell, you have created plans for hypothetical businesses, designed a three-dimensional spatial representation of your hypothetical businesses, and come up with a startup budget that takes into account all the expenses that you will incurr in the course of starting your business.

Today, we are asking that you take time out of the Make it Your Business Project Series and reflect on your participation in the projects until now. We want you to consider:

• What you have learned about yourself in the process of participating in the projects,

What you have learned in terms of business know-how, and

What you have learned about other people or working with other people.

Assignment

Using the questions below as a guideline, write a narrative-style reflection of your work in the MIYB projects. You may write a hard copy first, but eventually, you will log onto your Blogger accounts and post your comments regarding the projects you have completed on your FirstWorkStudent blogs .

Personal Reflection

1. How would you characterize your participation in the projects? (Were you a leader? A team-player? A sleeper? A good organizer?)
2. Was there anything that really upset you in the project? Was was it? How did you react?
3. If you could change any one thing about your participation in the projects until now, what would it be?

Content Reflection

1. Were there any projects that appealed to you more than others? Which ones? Why do you think they appealed to you over the others? (If no projects appealed to you in particular, what would have appealed to you?)
2. What was the least appealing thing that you did in the projects? Why did you find this the least appealing thing?
3. If you had to do a career that centered around the work you did in any one of the projects, which project would you pick? (If no projects appealed to you, pick the project you would mind doing as a career the least.)

Team Reflection

1. How would you rate your team participation? (Did you go above and beyond the call of duty to help your team out? Were you very dedicated to the group and the project? What percentage of the group work did you do?)
2. What do you think your group members would say about you if they were asked to rate your participation in the group?
3. Who was the best person in your group? Why? (It's okay if you think that you're the best member of your group, but be sure to explain why.)

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Once you have finished typing up the answers to your questions, logon to your First Work Blogs and blog your answers in a post called "Make It Your Business Reflection."

At the end of the day, you will have the opportunity to meet with your fellow group members and, after awarding everyone 10 FWB, divide the remaining group rewards pot between yourselves. The amount that you allow yourselves will be the amount that will be paid on your behalf for the purchase of work attire sometime in the upcoming weeks.

We stress that it is important to consider the seriousness of the decision you will be making. Take into account that not everyone will necessarily be in attendance in your group today, and a fair consideration of their work will be necessary to ensure that all parties find the decision fair and agreeable.

(Report) The First Annual First Work Picnic and Pool Party

07.27.2006



The heat was on in Central Park last Thursday when students and staff of the First Work Program enjoyed their First Annual Picnic and Pool Party together. At 2:00, First Workaholics kicked off the day's events with a Subway sandwich-feast with a side of some fresh air in New York's "green lung."



The highlights of the day, however, began after lunch. Having satisfied their appetites for food, First Workaholics fed their appetite for sports with a bit of free volleyball, soccer, and frisbee. Then, after with full bellies and tired limbs, First Workers joined together to participate in trust-building activities and exercises that asked the question: Who do you trust, and why?

Things to Consider for MIYB Project 3

Helpful Facts and Hints

Flooring: The original flooring of the business space is hardwood everywhere except for the bathroom, which is tiled.


Licensing: List of Licenses that You Must Apply for in New York (if they pertain to your business, that is.)


Inventory: For finding prices of things that you might need for your store, you may want to look up the items in Froogle, Google's comparison shopping search engine.

Contractors: You're probably going to have to call a contracting agency up to get an estimate on the work you need done. (Example: "Hi, yes, I'd like to get a quote on having a wall knocked out. The measurements for the wall are 12' by 12' by 1' thick.")