Some final thoughts on Project Search

Project Search graduation is in a little under 4 hours. Some parting reflections.

Last August when I started I really had no idea what to expect out of Project Search. One thing I was hoping for was to get an internship that would give me more public relations experience and that was really my only main disappointment overall. In general it was a great experience and I really gained a lot of new knowledge I had never had before. There were some days when I felt I had a lot of down time and I feel that there should be certain sites next year that shouldn't be options for internships. I wouldn't say there was no work to do but there were days where there could have been more work to do then there was. IT and Cardiac Rehab are examples of that. On the positive side when it comes to Cardiac Rehab I did learn a lot of stuff I didn't know before about heart attacks and heart falure and how they can both be prevented. I will touch a little more on this in the speech I am to give at gradaution tonight.

Our of the three internships I would say the Front Desk was my favorite one because of all the people interaction that I got and also how I learned my way around the hospital ... by the end
I was pretty much a pro. I enjoyed delivering the mail and the flower arrangements to the patients the best of all.

The first three weeks of my job at the YMCA has gone very well so far. I look very foward to incoporating the skills I learned from Project Search into my job at the Welcome Center.

Congrats to my fellow classmates and thanks to all my coworkers at my internship sites for all your help and guidance.

New Beginning

Yesterday was my first day at the Y. It was pretty crazy but time flew by because of the fast pase. I am looking foward to what this job will hold for me.

Housecleaning

As of June 15th this blog will be imported in to my Life As We Know It blog and the subsequent facebook page will be taken down. Since I have completed my time in Project Search and have found a job I find not a lot of reason to keep this blog open anymore. Official start date at the Y is Tuesday 5/31. I will be working four days a week & on Saturdays. I will be starting off in the Welcome Center greeting people and then will eventually move into helping out with the newsletter and being an assitant counselor to the theatre and creative writing camps. During the school year I will work as a tutor in the after school program.


I would like to thank all wh0 followed me in my blogging journey through Project Search, my classmates for your friendship, my co-workers for your guidance and teaching and my parents for their endless support throughout the program.. I have learned so much from everyone at St Joe's and I will miss you all.

Onward!

Results are in!

After a weekend and two days of waiting I finally heard about the job at the Y at 11:45 this morning. Succes!! I got the position. Exact starting date has not been determined yet but it will be sometime next week or the week following Memorial Day. So estatic. It's been a long tiring road of job searching for me and I'm so happy that the next chapter of my life can fully begin. Once I get this job established and have been there for at least three or four months I plan on looking into getting an apartment in downtown Nashua!

On cloud nine!

Interview update!

Yesterday at noontime I had an interview at the YMCA in Nashua which is set to open on 5/21. The interview went very well and I think I get the position I will absolutley love working there. The club is gorgeous! We got a nice tour and there is so much to do there. I hope that I can get involved with the theatre program there and possibly the creative writing program. I am really anxious about Monday when I find out if I get the position. Keep your fingers crossed everyone!

Another non PS related update

Another non=PS related annoucement

I have an interview on Thursday at noontime for a front desk position at the new Nashua YMCA that is opening up. Potentially a full time job!!

Please send me good vibes!

Fast Track To The Real World

Project Search is nearing its end. Only one month and 13 days til Graduation. Can't believe how quickly time has flown. At this stage in game we are preparing for what will happen after we graduate. The job trainers are looking for possible places we can apply to. I have also been doing some research outside of work and have applied to three clerical positions one at the Roger Dionne Senior Center at St Joe's, one at Southern NH Medical Center and one at New Hampshire Orthopedics which is in Nashua. We will see what kind of results these applications will yield. There is also a reverse job fair coming up on the 23rd. What this entails is prospective employers from different hospitals and medical centers in the area come in to the Carl Amelio Room and ask us questions about what position we hope to get and what kind of things we have been learning throughout the course of the program. Looking foward to this to see what kind of people will be there but also a tad nervous.





Wish me luck folks! :)

Send good vibes

Reverse Job Fair May 23rd

Send good vibes my way that employment results.

Another Unrelated PS Announcemnt

Another unrelated Project Search Annoucment Got a notification from Indded last weekend that the hospital is looking for a clerical assitant in the Roger Dionne Senior Ctr. Submitting my application on Monday or Tuesday. We'll see how things go, Additionally I am looking forward to the revese job fair on May 23rd. I am hoping something good comes out of that job fair if the job at the Senior Center doesn't pan out.

Week 1 Front Desk

Transition between Cardiac Rehab and Front Desk successfully made! While I miss Cardiac Rehab I must say I saved the best internship site for last. I am enjoying every minute of the Front Desk. My job mainly consists of transporting patients back and forth to their various appointments and answering phones. I am learning my way around the hospital a whole lot better then I did at the beginning of the year. Additionally I deliver flower arrangements, gift baskets and mail to the paitent rooms. That's my favorite part because I love seeing people's faces light up when they get something delivered to them. It gives me a wonderful feeling inside. This is definitley the kind of job I hope to get once this program is over. Let's hope for the best!

Results

0Interview for Front Desk internship today

Result: Nailed it. As much as I will miss Cardiac Rehab I am so excited to start because it will be a great experience. There may be a possibility that I will get to try out stuff in Paitent Registarion but that is not set in stone yet.

Project Search will go out with a bang! Hopefully this internship will result in a paying job. :)

In short

My interview went well this morning. I didn't get the job though. I am not going to get to discouraged about it and hope I get the Front Desk job. The interview for that is sometime during the week after break.. it has not been scheduled yet though.

Score!

Interview #1 for Rotation 3 set

Surgical Day 9am on Friday

Details to come on Friday afternoon

Updated List of possible Roation Three Internship Sites

Rotation 3 Internship Sites

Options not available: Paitent Registration, Endoscopy

Options (Updated 2/25)

Choice 1 Surgical Day See above post in brief

Choice 2 Front Desk Interview still in the process of being set up

Choice 3 Mail (already taken- Congats Allie)

Choice 3 A 4 North

Options that have not been completly ruled out but the job trainers haven't heard back from departments yet

• 
  
  Dictation


• 
  
  Surgical Day I don't even know what this job would entail at this point. At first I heard data entry but availabilty and tasks have not yet been finalized

The shadowing process has begun. I have shadowed three departments in the past two days Paitent Registration, Endoscopy and 4 North. Endoscopy and Paitent Registration did not have internship rotations open for this final rotation of Project Search but I figured that it might be a good idea to shadow different departments to see where I would best fit for a position at the end of the program. Paitent Registration involves a lot of customer service something I am good at.Tasks would include entering paitent info into the computer, directing people to where their appointment sites and in some cases transporting them and answering phones and transferring calls to various departments or paitent rooms. Other tasks include delivering the mail and delivering flowers to paitent rooms. Endoscopy involves cleaning the mircoscopes that are used in colonoscopy proceadures and rehooking them up to the machinery in the proceadure room once they are done being cleaned. The job also involves collecting dirty laundry and changing the sheets on the beds in the recovery ward. The job seemed interesting but it didn't seem like something that would be a great fit for me in the big scheme of things. I like the floor. It would keep me busy with restocking closests and emptying the dirty laundry in all the paitent rooms. The nurses on the floor seem really nice too.

The interview process is the next step...more on that next week

An announcement unrelated to Project Search

Something very excited to annouce.

Yesterday I was talking to Laurie Corbett from Plus Company during my half hour break after I got done with work at Cardiac Rehab. She told me about a breakfast she had gone to in the morning with graduates from the program from last year. She handed out resume cards for this year's interns and said that a medical center is interested in a few of this year's interns... including ME for a data entry job that is opening in April. I do not have any info yet on the when the interview will be but I am very excited. Perhaps I may even have a job before Project Search ends. That would be absolutely FABULOUS!!


Furthur updates to follow when I get more info.

Halfway Point

We are at the halfway point of Project Search. Time has flown and we are already stating to discuss what we want to do for the third and final rotation. Overall I have had a good expreience in Project Search though I wish there had been more internships to accomodate my strength which is data entry. I do some data entry in Cardiac Rehab but not enough to really showcase how good I am at it which is kind of disappointing. Today I had a meeting with my mom, my insturctor, Laurie Corbett from Plus Company and my case manager from Gateways. The main thing we talked about was the placement for next rotation and finding out where I fit best for an internship but more importantly what kind of job Iwill get after the program ends in June. My top priority is to try to get an internship at the Front Desk since I think I would do really well in that position. That position doesn't have a lot of data entry but I am a very social person so that job is great for me because it involves a lot of paitent interaction because I transport people back and forth to their appointments. Dictation may be another option. This mostly would involve taking notes at meeting and transcribing them into the computer. I am not definitely sure if this is even a position yet because they are still looking into it but I am crossing my fingers and hoping it will be a possibility.

Here is my list of options for 3rd Rotation
1. Mail Delivery (I shadowed my friend Eric today and really enjoyed it. It really got me to seeing departments I hadn't seen before)
2. Front Desk
3. Dictation (if it's an option)

Back Ups 3North, Endoscopy, Surgical Day

The intereview process starts up again in two weeks. Let the insantiy begin.

Stepping up my game

Happy 2011

Snow days have thrown me off my groove a bit. So far we have had four of them and supposedly there is another stom coming on Tuesday night into Wednesday. As you would imagine last week was a pretty short week. Monday was Martin Luther King Day then Monday night into Tuesday we got a storm snow day 3. 1 and 2 occured Wednesday and Thursday of the previous week. Friday was snow day #4.

Enough about the weather which is getting tedious instead of delightful.

The second rotation got slightly extended while the job trainers start doing research for departments that are hiring for the third and final rotation cycle of the year. I want to get a jump start with the job shadowing process so I can get an idea of what departments I want to interview for. Based on my experiences in the past two interview cycles I know what places would work well for me for an internship and which places would not. However, now that we are nearing the third and final rotation we need to start thinking about which department would best fit us for a job. My data entry skills are the primary skil set I want to focus on. I am also really good on the phone too. I am gaining a lot more phone skills in Cardiac Rehab Center then I did when I was in the Oncology Center.

Speaking of Cardiac Rehab everything has been going splendidly there. I am really enjoying it a lot and will miss it when I leave at the beginning of March. The most interesting thing I have been leaning is about the diffrent kinds of heart disease and the diffrent ways they are treated. I have learned this by filling out the patient discharge forms. I am also learning about where different areas of the hospital are where I never knew about. I run errands a lot of the time when there is not a lot of data entry to do and also label new patient charts.

As far as next rotation goes I have thought about where I want to work and my top two choices are patient registration and the front desk. Other than that I am not really sure which other deparments will have open positions that will best fit my skill set. We shall see.