Essential Question

My essential question:
   
      How does learning to play a musical instrument facilitate other aspects of learning?

I chose this as my essential question because most kids wouldn't think that learning an instrument has a real impact outside the band room. I knew I had to look further into that idea when I realized how much more interest kids have in a subject when they are told they can apply it in their everyday life. This question does reflect my interest in the topic because its something that neither I, nor most people (as far as I know), have ever thought about. And who doesn't like to learn weird things like that?

Background Experience

     Over the past month, I have been working as almost a second Mr. Dugan with the bands at North Hall Middle School. I have worked on building the students as individual players by working with them one-on-one, as well as working with them as entire bands. During our off time, me and Mr. Dugan talk about what he does when he's not working with a band (i.e.. choosing music, lesson plans, grades, etc.). We have discussed giving me opportunities to work on conducting with the older bands.
     I have applied what I have learned in my Symphonic Band class to my work at the middle school. Watching Mr. Carwile (director of bands at NHHS) work has showed me how a rehearsal should be run. I have been in Symphonic Band, which is the advanced band class, for all 4 years of high school and I have seen the growth my friends and I have made and I hope I can make that growth happen in one year at the middle school.

Profile

About me: My name is Gage, and music isn't just what I do, its who I am. I take pride in my abilities as a performer and as a private instructor. I have played in many bands, but right now I am pursuing jazz as a drummer. Jazz is a very big deal to me because it is the most diverse kind of music and is filled with the most talented musicians on Earth.
I wasn't always terribly interested in teaching music until I was the low brass section leader this year. I got to see incredible growth in the rookies of the low brass and it made me realize that I could see that kind of inspiring improvement all the time if I was a band director, so thats what I decided to strive for.
My Mentorship: I found my mentorship later in the year than I should've. I started at a law office but quickly realized that wasn't my gig. If I'm not working with music, I'm not working at all. So I got transferred to North Hall Middle School to work with director of bands Rob Dugan and from the beginning it just felt right. I love working with the kids because I remember being their age and being excited to be learning an instrument. I get to see that same excitement on their faces every day and wouldn't trade that opportunity for the world.
My Future: I plan to go to Georgia State to get my masters in Music Education, then go to graduate school and get my doctorate in Conducting at the University of Georgia. From there I'll be directing either middle school or, preferably, high school band.

Social Intelligence and the Modern Youth

http://growingleaders.com/blog/first-soft-skill-develop-students/

     After reading this article, I felt a little disappointed in my generation. While the article may have exaggerated a bit, I do see definite decline in etiquette between this generation and the last. The newest generation appears over-entitled and very self-absorbed, as the article says, and this is very true (coming from someone who is a part of it). There is a pretty drastic lack of formality in the way young people act in the workplace. I believe this comes from the media's push to destroy the sense of self worth in young people in recent years. Every commercial is aimed at making youth feel like if they have this one thing or are a part of this group, you will be thought highly of in society. Therefore, people believe that if they follow these trends, they can put themselves on the same level as their boss because they are "popular" in their group of friends or school or whatever they are a part of.
     This doesn't have to be a problem. I believe that all we have to do is just be our own people and make a stand against being slave to social media if we want to be looked at as professional. I see all too often on social networking parents or other adults ranting about how youth have no respect. One little fact they seem to have forgotten is that THEY raised this generation. Just a thought…

A Fresh Start

     Ok guys, I've made a change in my mentorship as well as my life. I realized over these past couple months that I can't put all I've got  into my mentorship or my career if I can't follow my real passion: music. I have changed my profession as well as my place of work. I am now working with director Rob Dugan at North Hall Middle School to pursue a career in music education. All of my following posts will come from my experiences in my new position. Wish me luck!

Perception

     Before I started my internship in law, I thought of law as a challenge that would grab my interest. Now that I've been in it for a couple months, I've lost some that fiery interest. My brain is wired to come up with weird ideas and just be creative. What I have done so far has not at all allowed me to use any of my brain. I have just been sitting alone in my office researching various projects and programs to start at the CLC. While I have some mild control over how to develop the projects, I feel very confined to what I've been told to do and I don't have any room to branch out. The most surprising thing thus far has been that I am starting to feel like maybe I should look into a field that I can really use my creativity in such as marketing.
     The "boring parts" of my mentorship up to this point have actually been doing my real job at the office. Research to me is like grinding a cheese grader against my head. My breaks are getting to document and scan closed cases. Doing this helps out the office a lot because its work that tends to pile up because its generally deemed unimportant. It does feel good to know I've helped out in that respect at least.

Partners in Education

     As far as my education goes, working at the CLC has given me more valuable "real life" lessons than what I have learned in years of public education. Instead of standard school lessons about measurements, language skills, or how to mix chemicals, I've learned how the real legal system works. Granted I've not yet acquired the ability to defend someone in court, but I have the best "intro-to-law" teacher anyone could have.
     Arturo has given me the task of developing his "inner-CLC small businesses" if you will. I have finished development on a system of administering the GED exam to non-citizens. At the moment, because October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, I'm working on creating a program to provide consultations and legal help to victims of domestic violence. I've a laundry list of other projects, but I've thoroughly looked into those two so far.
     Now all that being said, I have had spoke mixed feelings about the field of law. I find contracts fascinating and I believe I would make a good litigator, but at the same time, I feel very constricted in the way of creativity. My mind is always thinking up goofy ideas, some of them good, some of them bad, but I don't see how i could use those ideas in law. I'll see what I think as I learn more about the field but right now, I'm thinking that this could possibly not be the field of study for me.

Getting into the "Swing of Things"

     In my brief time working at Corso Law Center (CLC), there are some interesting office politics. I didn't have to be working there very long to figure things out. The office politics is very simple and easy to grasp at a company where I work with a total of four different people.
     The first thing that was apparent to me was who the people in charge were. obviously, everyone is in charge of me, but it was very clear that, even though he is an attorney like most of the people there, Arturo Corso himself was the "top dog" if you will. Then you have the few other attorneys that work there, and a couple paralegals. Communication between me and the rest of the "team" at CLC is usually minimal because we usually work alone in our offices. This is not a bad thing to me because I know that what I am working on as well as what the others are working on is vital to the firm's success.
     There isn't much "gossip" around the office.. Occasionally we will all eat lunch together and talk. We are a pretty tight-nit group. There isn't anyone at the office that is often gossiped about in a negative way. At lunch, theres usually an entertaining story, but other than that, there is very little interaction between those of us that are at the office. I say those of us that are at the office because many times, a couple of them are gone in the short hour and a half that I am there. Every day has a different agenda, and therefore there is a different day-to-day schedule.
     The dress code at CLC is pretty relaxed compared to what I expected. I show up every day in a button-down shirt, jeans, and boots. Jeans are apparently not the norm because they aren't considered formal in all settings, but because I come from school and usually work alone in my office, I was told what I wear is suitable. The only exception is if I went to court to see Arturo work I would have to be in a full suit because a courtroom is a very formal place. Arturo will wear business-casual type clothing if he is working at the office all day, but occasionally he will come from court in a suit. Being a big guy, he is pretty intimidating, but when he is in the suit he seems less approachable because I don't know what kind of mood the time in court has out him in.  Don't get me wrong, Arturo is very easy-going and easy to talk to, but I'd rather not take my chances on court days.
     My research skills that i have picked up from years of school has been a great asset to my work here. I spend most of my time researching information on the various projects Arturo has assigned to me. The first thing I learned about project research at CLC is that in the field of law, no detail can be overlooked. I have to gather as much detail as I can about every little aspect of the project. Without all those years of writing research papers, I wouldn't be as confident in my ability to find the correct information. Based on my experience thus far at CLC, I can see my ability to gather information as being essential to my success at the firm.

College Law Program Research

        After we graduate, we will be tossed into the college circuit. With the Honors Mentorship Program on my resume, colleges will view me as someone who is ready to get involved in their job and already has experience in my field of study. I am lucky enough to be interested in a subject that the best colleges in the southeast offer. These are the schools that caught my eye (formatted to the weekly assignment posted on 9/22).

1.         The University of Georgia

                Athens, Georgia

                http://www.uga.edu

Florida State University

    Tallahassee, Florida

     https://www.fsu.edu

The University of Alabama

    Tuscaloosa, Alabama

    http://www.ua.edu

2. Business/Law, General Studies

3. The universities that caught my eye were the ones listed under step 1, but others include Clemson, Auburn, Ole Miss, and The University of Tennessee.

4. To get into law you must pass the LSAT exam.

5. -Must look at SAT/ACT scores

-Type of School: Public, Large, 4 Year, and Coed

-Location: South, Georgia

-Campus & Housing; Residential campus, freshmen can drive
-Activities: Must have a Marching Band

-Academic Credit: Must take Advance Placement credit

6. UGA Law School (my ideal law school): Ranked 29^th of 204 of American Bar Association approved law schools.

7. -HOPE Scholarship

    - Zell-Miller Scholarship

    -David (DJ) Wright Davenport Scholarship

    - Tommy Aaron/Charlie Aaron Foundation Scholarship

Weekly Assignment 3

In Tim Elmore’s post on his blog Growing Leaders, http://growingleaders.com/, he gives an interesting perspective on how we interns view our internship. He refers to an internship as a “12 week interview.” I had never thought of it that way, but the more I think about it, the more it makes sense. An internship isn’t so much an interview for the one particular office you work at, but an interview into the world of the job of your interest. Though the class is called “Honors Mentorship,” its really, as Elmore says, “a simulation of the job you’ll have one day.” I have been given specific tasks at the law office i am working at, so it feels like I am really a working lawyer (except for the whole defending someone in court part of course). Elmore also gives us these 4 “ingredients” as he calls them, to help us be successful interns:
1. Teachability
2. Initiative
3. Responsibility
4. Energy
If we take these points, which I have taken to calling TIRE, we can guarantee a successful “mini-career” at our places of mentorship. 

HMP SLO #2

I chose to intern with a lawyer because it interested me for 2 reasons:
1- I thought it would be a challenge, and I never turn down a chance to "strain my brain."
2- Everyone said I "have the head to be a lawyer.'' I never knew what they meant until I really started to do serious research into the field of law.
Through this program, i hope to gain the knowledge and experience necessary to prepare myself for law school and the real world of law. I plan to work as hard as I can in and out of court so I can be confident in my knowledge of the legal system ( and to make a good, lasting impression on my mentor Mr. Arturo Corso). Once I'm in law school, hopefully I will blow the professors out of the water with the amount of knowledge and experience I will have gained from my time in the mentorship program.

HMP SLO Blog # 1

Podcast on First Impressions:
   The information presented in this podcast was very similar to what was taught in our class at DaVinci. I was fascinated by the fact that a first impression is usually made in the first 10 seconds after meeting someone. The big points that were covered were:
Have a good attitude
Dress professionally
Speak to everyone equally and remember their names
Ask questions to learn how everything operates in the office
Take initiative
Work as much as possible and be on time or early (to me early is on time, on time is late)
Get into the "office politics" meaning: hang around the right people, and talk 20%, listen 80%


Getting to Know Your Mentor
   As always, make a good first impression. This seems like it can't be stressed enough. Its best to start friendly conversation with your mentor before you work with them intimately. You have to "break the ice" per say. Its best to ask about them first: What made them choose their career? What can I do during my time here to be productive in the office? Things like that. You should be prepared to answer questions like: What are your goals in this program? What do you plan to do after college? Why should i take time out of my day to work with you?
All of these things should be taken into consideration when meeting your mentor.