I'd just like to extend a big, warm welcome to the new Honors class! When you come for New Student Orientation you'll stop by the Senate Booth and probably come talk to me, I'm the blonde goofy one. Well, I'd just like to introduce myself, because I'm figuring some people will check out the Alpha sites due to a mixture of boredom and curiosity, (which just so happen to be two of my main ingredients). I am a Junior majoring in Communications (for now) and minoring in History (and possibly all the other things that I used to major in). I am a PK, so I've moved a bit but I claim the general Midwest as my home (more specifically the Chicago area and St. Paul). I love being involved in things and I especially enjoy sports, music, movies, and Ghana. I am one of the Vice Presidents of Student Senate (so is the wonderful Mr. Carl Wendorff), I sing for FISH (our contemporary Wed. night service), I'm part of the Math club, Science club, Prisms, History club, football team manager, STAGE (theatre club), I was on our Concordia Activities Board, and I occasionally play Ultimate Frisbee. I love watching The Office and Flight of the Conchords. Laughing is one of my favorite hobbies and I do so often. I have an amazing and very entertaining family and a fish named Quark that I bought for an Honors project. I'm really excited for all of you to come to Concordia and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. I encourage you to get involved in campus activities because they really help make the college experience full of fun and excitement, plus you can meet a lot of friends that way, try not to sign up for every club though, I learned that lesson by giving it a try. If you have any questions about CSP, Honors, campus life, or Conan O'Brien, feel free to ask, sometimes it can be nice to get the inside scoop :) My school e-mail is benkek@csp.edu and I'm also on Facebook, just let me know you're an Honors student and not some random creeper. Have a fantabulous summer!
In Christ,
Katie Benke
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
These weeks I finished my internship at the Children's Law Center. I also got to observe a lot of cases at the Hennepin County Juvenile Court, which was much different than my experience in Ramsey. The judge in Hennepin took a serious interest in each child and remembered details about the ones he had met before. That was one of the greatest single-day learning experiences I have ever had and will probably be the most valuable experience I take away from my internship. It was amazing to see the children that the CLC represents and the dedication of the workers and judge. At lunch I got to talk to our social worker about foster kids, faith, and life. I also wrote chapters 3-7 and with that I conducted my primary research.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I learned that the decisions made about the children really depend on the effort put in by all of the lawyers, judges, social workers, and guardians ad litem. I learned that doing research is hard, and time consuming. I learned that I really want to make a difference with kids some day.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would give myself an A because I learned so much by watching and listening instead of by actually doing work in court, and then I worked like crazy on chapters 3-7. I feel as if I have accomplished all of the objectives of my project now.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
I didn't do very much this week; I just got a few hours in organizing the office and finishing the donors list. I will hopefully be able to get more hours in next week, but I think that I'm at an okay place as far as numbers adding up.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I learned a bit more about organization and I got to see an updated version of the newsletter, so I learned that the hard work pays off. I learned that the director has to check the trash every night for legally sensitive material, which was interesting. I also learned that Development Managers have a lot of paperwork that they have to keep after receiving donations and applying for grants. I learned that I am better at organizing other people's work spaces than I am at cleaning my own.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would give myself an A because I worked hard at what I did and I accomplished a lot in a short amount of time. I am accomplishing my objectives.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
This week I returned to internship after having been sick for a long time. I started getting back to compiling the totals for a list of donors for the newsletter. I also organized the office a bit and the cabinets.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I learned that they really care about me at the Children's Law Center. I also learned that there is a lot of grunt work that goes into a newsletter. I learned that my project is really flexible. I learned a bit more about what it takes to run a non-profit for children's rights, including how to have a more functional, clean office. I learned that I really enjoy working with the CLC, I had forgotten how much I missed them while I was gone.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would give myself a B for the week because my energy was still low so I didn't give an A effort because I still can't. I think I am accomplishing my objectives week by week.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
This is the same as last week...
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
I didn't do anything this week because I am still on bed rest and I have to lay off of activities, so I'm not sure when I can go back in to internship.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I didn't learn anything this week.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would have to give myself an I (incomplete) for the week because I was unable to do anything due to uncontrollable circumstances, but I'll make up for it later.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
I didn't do anything this week because I am still on bed rest and I have to lay off of activities, so I'm not sure when I can go back in to internship.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I didn't learn anything this week.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would have to give myself an I (incomplete) for the week because I was unable to do anything due to uncontrollable circumstances, but I'll make up for it later.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
Weekly Project Journal
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
I didn't do anything this week because I was put on bed rest for being sick and in pain. I have a swollen spleen, it is not very fun.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I didn't learn anything this week.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would have to give myself an I (incomplete) for the week because I was unable to do anything due to uncontrollable circumstances, but I'll make up for it later.
Students must submit one journal each week for each of the fourteen weeks in the project beginning Nov 5. Upload the journal to the Project Assignments section of WebCT. You must also cut and paste a portion of your journal into your blog.
Each week of the project, student must submit a project journal entry. The journal entry consists of three parts:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
This week I felt sick and had to cut back on my hours at the CLC. I went in for some hours, but I felt awful and my work was lagging. They really needed me to finish the brochure that they were going to send out for a lawyer training session that recruits and then trains new lawyers for the CLC. I was able to finish the project in bed at home and I e-mailed it to the Children's Law Center so they could finish entering the dates and then send it to the printer.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I learned a lot about adapting in difficult situations. It was hard to get things done without having as much structure, but it was important to meet the deadline, so I pressed on and got things done from home. I learned that I have a real affect on the CLC through my project. The brochure that I made will recruit lawyers to be trained to represent children. I learned that I can work from home when I am unable to work in the office.
I haven't written in here since I got sick, but I'll do a HUGE catch up posting later, for now here's the update for this week:
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
This week I got to attend the lawyer training day for the lawyers that are new to the Children's Law Center (CLC). The day included a speaker, a panel of current CLC lawyers, a video by the American Bar Association (ABA) about how to represent children, and a panel of former clients of the CLC. I also spent some time in the office working on filing and preparing the next newsletter for print. In addition to that I helped hand deliver a grant application. I wish I could go into further detail about the seminar, but I really am not legally able to. All I can say is that they gave examples of real foster care cases that were difficult and explained how they resolved them. It's really not an easy job, many of the lawyers come under fire for the work they do with the CLC.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I definitely learned a lot about how to properly represent children as a lawyer, including that the CLC lawyer's job is to advocate for what the child wants even if it is not necessarily in the child's best interest. I learned more about the shortcomings of the foster care system. For instance, 90% of siblings in foster care are separated. I learned that I would probably be better suited as a social worker instead of a lawyer because I don't know if I could really represent a child that wanted something that wasn't good for them.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would give myself a good grade for the week. I feel like I've learned a lot about the project as a whole. Getting outside of the office and being able to see and hear more of what is happening in the legal workings of the foster system was really helpful and I think it will really enhance my project and what I take away from the experience as a whole. I am accomplishing the objectives, now more than ever, in my opinion.
1. Description. What happened in your project this week? What did you do? Experience?
This week in Honors I researched and wrote Chapter 2. I read a lot of stories about other Children's Law Centers around the country. I also read a lot of sad stories about foster kids in need of legal aide, which was hard but encouraging because it made me feel as if I have something to work for.
2. Interpretation. What did you learn from your project this week? About the project? About the issue? About yourself?
I learned that this project is going to be a lot more emotionally difficult than I might like, but I think that will help me to learn and grow. I learned a lot about the foster care system and how much of a say children have in their lives, which is not a lot unless organizations like the CLC step in.
3. Evaluation. How would you evaluate your work on the project this week? What grade would you give yourself? Are you accomplishing the objectives of the project? Your personal objectives?
I would give myself an A- because I worked very hard, but I fell asleep once when I should have been doing research. I am accomplishing my objectives and much more.
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