Last night I got my team assignment: I'm officially part of Blue Unit Team 3. My team leader, Melissa, hails from New Jersey and has her master's degree in social work. She's quiet, laid back, and very friendly; I'm very excited she's my team leader. The rest of the team seems pretty cool too, although I'm still learning what everyone is like. Today's training helped me get to know my team, it was called something like "hands of peace", although I kept referring to it as friendship training because I could never seem to remember the name. For the most part it was pretty basic communication skills training, total rehash for me, but the community building activities and the development of a set of team guidelines and mission statement helped me get a good sense of the people I'm going to be working with. Tomorrow we'll be shipping out to Mendocino together and won't be back until Saturday, so I'll be completely out of touch from now until then. Unfortunately, I'm not permitted to drive the van due to my driving record, but once I get an updated record with my defensive driving credit on it I should be okay. I'm a little disappointed I can't help, we currently only have three drivers. Oh well.
Oh, and just for reference, my assignment to my team makes my new address here:
Adam Bosen, Class 16, Blue Unit, Team 3
Americorps NCCC
3427 Laurel Street
McClellan, CA
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Saturday, October 24, 2009
The Homeless in Sacramento
Today was our second day of service. Our entire campus met up in downtown Sacramento in the theater district for a presentation by the mayor, a member of his cabinet, and a few regional experts on homelessness, including one man that had been homeless and addicted to drugs for twelve years. It was a very enlightening experience; I hadn't really contemplated the issue of homelessness before. Also, it was very inspiring to hear the presenters repeatedly state how much they felt motivated by seeing all of us eager to do some good, it made me really want to live up to their expectations. After that we went to Loaves and Fishes, a nonprofit that specialized in providing food, shelter, and counseling/job resources to the homeless population here. We got a comprehensive tour of the complex and got to talk to a few members of the homeless community. One man in particular was very well spoken despite the raggedy beard and slight odor and gave us a lot of information about his community. Apparently there are a total of about 1200 homeless in Sacramento, although they aren't immediately apparent to the public eye because of well enforced no camping/blocking the sidewalk laws, so they end up continually wandering the city in a very transient lifestyle. They're working on developing a center with shower and basic housing facilities to give them a large space to gather in, but that project sounds like it's still in early development. Additionally, the vast majority of them are addicted to either drugs, alcohol, or both, and a large number have mental disorders. I think the most disturbing statistic I heard today though was that about one in six are former veterans. I think it's a great disservice to the men and women that helped protect our country that so many of them have no access to counseling or any real support and are forced to live that kind of lifestyle. The work we ended up actually doing today was the sanitization of shower, kitchen, and living facilities for a part of the complex that housed 13 homeless mentally handicapped women. It was very rewarding, I definitely plan on going back when I get the chance.
Oh, and family, this is your warning: I'm dragging you along for community service work when I come home for break. Not sure what or where, but we're doing it.
On a minor side note, some point next week we'll be going to camp Mendocino for four days, although I don't know exactly when I'll be leaving or returning, so I'll be out of touch for a while.
Oh, and family, this is your warning: I'm dragging you along for community service work when I come home for break. Not sure what or where, but we're doing it.
On a minor side note, some point next week we'll be going to camp Mendocino for four days, although I don't know exactly when I'll be leaving or returning, so I'll be out of touch for a while.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Training and whatnot
The past three days have been kind of intense, long training days in various topics. Monday we had a lot of little courses, yesterday was first aid and CPR training, and today was disaster relief training. The first aid course was good, I really learned a lot, but the woman teaching it was very strange. At one point while pretending to be unconscious victims she wandered about checking shoe size, so, you know, if we died she could have a new pair. Other than that the material was good, I'm actually a little surprised I never had the chance to receive CPR training previously. Today's presenters were better, although the overview of the Red Cross seemed to go a little longer than necessary. The rest of the session focused on mass relief and shelter setup, which was good information. It's strange to think that we're going to be likely to need this information; it wasn't something that popped up in everyday thought for me before.
Backing up a bit, on Sunday most of the people in my pod (temporary teams, I'm on pod 2) and a few of our other friends went to Sacramento to explore. We wandered around midtown, went to this great mall outside of the city, and went to Old Sacramento for a little bit. We walked for miles and miles and got on the wrong light rail train twice, but it was a good way to learn the city and figure out what's around to see. I highly recommend Old Sacramento, it's cool old fashioned touristy stuff, I wanna go back there to explore some more. It's only $6 for an all day rail/bus pass, which isn't bad for public transportation.
Our physical fitness baselines were this morning, which made today really exhausting. I had to get up at 5:20 and do two minutes of pushups, situps, a 1.5 mile run, and a sit and reach test. I got 45 pushups, 50 situps, 11 minutes 44 seconds for the run, and 12.5 inches for the sit and reach. I'm really happy about all of those aside from the flexibility, which is kind of crap. The only way I got the running time I did is because I was following Mae. I decided to just keep pace with her, and we both ended up tying for the top time in our pod. However, one guy got 9 minutes 2 seconds for the run, which I think is a little ridiculous. Not sure that I could ever do that, but it's a nice goal to reach for. I'm a little annoyed that they made us do warmups and the first two tests in the grass, it was very wet and my pants got covered in dirt. Ah well, I'll get used to it, and it's not like I'll need them for Aikido any time soon.
Backing up a bit, on Sunday most of the people in my pod (temporary teams, I'm on pod 2) and a few of our other friends went to Sacramento to explore. We wandered around midtown, went to this great mall outside of the city, and went to Old Sacramento for a little bit. We walked for miles and miles and got on the wrong light rail train twice, but it was a good way to learn the city and figure out what's around to see. I highly recommend Old Sacramento, it's cool old fashioned touristy stuff, I wanna go back there to explore some more. It's only $6 for an all day rail/bus pass, which isn't bad for public transportation.
Our physical fitness baselines were this morning, which made today really exhausting. I had to get up at 5:20 and do two minutes of pushups, situps, a 1.5 mile run, and a sit and reach test. I got 45 pushups, 50 situps, 11 minutes 44 seconds for the run, and 12.5 inches for the sit and reach. I'm really happy about all of those aside from the flexibility, which is kind of crap. The only way I got the running time I did is because I was following Mae. I decided to just keep pace with her, and we both ended up tying for the top time in our pod. However, one guy got 9 minutes 2 seconds for the run, which I think is a little ridiculous. Not sure that I could ever do that, but it's a nice goal to reach for. I'm a little annoyed that they made us do warmups and the first two tests in the grass, it was very wet and my pants got covered in dirt. Ah well, I'll get used to it, and it's not like I'll need them for Aikido any time soon.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
I am rather dirty
I'm still having so much fun here, I'm really glad there are so many awesome people on campus. Yesterday was pretty slow, all we had were physicals and one meeting. All my bits seem to be in order, although the Tetanus shot they gave me is starting to sting. Last night me, Ross (one of my roommates), Mae, and my pod leader Nelson all went grocery shopping for meals for us and the pod we're sharing a kitchen with. I volunteered to cook one night, I'm gonna make that simple chicken, spinach, mushroom, feta sautee I like with some rice pilaf. It was rather daunting trying to shop for 26 people; I ended up buying five packages of mushrooms and spinach and about ten pounds of chicken. Our total grocery bill for both pods came to about $900, which was kinda crazy. I was planning on going to check out the local dive, Harvey's, but since shopping took us so long I ended up just turning in early, which turned out to be a pretty good idea since we had a pretty intense day today.
Our first community service project was today, working outside the California state agriculture building on the development of a demonstration garden. Yesterday another Americorps team went through and cleared most of the ivy growing on the land they wanted, so today we dug moats to control water flow, removed the last few patches of ivy, and started aerating and planting various edible crops. I mostly did digging and root removal. At one point got a little overzealous with a shovel and ended up cracking one of the buried sprinkler heads, which resulted in the sidewalk flooding when they turned on the sprinkler system for the new plants. Oops. I helped them dig up and clear out the pipe though, and they'll replace the head soon. It was good hard work, and I'm considering doing some of my individual service project hours working on finishing that garden. Afterward we went and toured the Capitol building, which was pretty cool. Nice summaries of each area of California (apparently there's a place just called "Lake") and artwork, including this huge bronze bear that Schwarzenegger recently bought. It was a cool way to see downtown Sacramento, which was actually really quiet all day. Tomorrow we have the day off aside from TB test results, so I think I'm going to go exploring the city a little more, see what's around. I gotta go shower now, I'm covered in dirt from digging all day.
Our first community service project was today, working outside the California state agriculture building on the development of a demonstration garden. Yesterday another Americorps team went through and cleared most of the ivy growing on the land they wanted, so today we dug moats to control water flow, removed the last few patches of ivy, and started aerating and planting various edible crops. I mostly did digging and root removal. At one point got a little overzealous with a shovel and ended up cracking one of the buried sprinkler heads, which resulted in the sidewalk flooding when they turned on the sprinkler system for the new plants. Oops. I helped them dig up and clear out the pipe though, and they'll replace the head soon. It was good hard work, and I'm considering doing some of my individual service project hours working on finishing that garden. Afterward we went and toured the Capitol building, which was pretty cool. Nice summaries of each area of California (apparently there's a place just called "Lake") and artwork, including this huge bronze bear that Schwarzenegger recently bought. It was a cool way to see downtown Sacramento, which was actually really quiet all day. Tomorrow we have the day off aside from TB test results, so I think I'm going to go exploring the city a little more, see what's around. I gotta go shower now, I'm covered in dirt from digging all day.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Day One
Today was a very long travel day, followed by a longer orientation process. Things are going well though, and I'm quite happy here.
I met up with three people in the Albany airport, Paula, Kyla, and Dan, all headed the same direction as me. We ended up doing three flights, from Albany to Philly, then to Vegas, then to Sacramento. Very cool people, since the shorter two flights were way underfilled I managed to sit next to Paula, got to know her pretty well and I think she's going to be a solid friend here, Kyla as well. In the Vegas airport we played slots, one dollar each (I lost, of course). Traveling was long, but otherwise uneventful.
Once we got to the airport we waited for an Americorps van to show up and were driven to base. Once here we got fitted for all our gear, including PPE and steel toed boots. I signed up for a new Bank of America account to use while i'm out here, although I have yet to go through the details of it. It was interesting really seeing how many people are here, it's more overwhelming than I anticipated. I just wanted to make friends with everyone all at once, but I'm having trouble remembering names and details. Ah well, I'm starting to get a few people. I found out later that I'm in a room with three people, which makes me a bit unhappy, but since we don't use our rooms for much I don't think it'll be a huge issue. I did manage to get to Target and buy all the supplies I needed, so I think I'm all settled in.
After dinner I played some pool with Paula and Kyla; I think I may have been a little over the top with my heckling because apparently they've declared a prank war on me. However, they can't figure out where my room is, so I'm safe for now. They walked right past it at one point too. After that I met some more of the people living around me and figured out the showering schedule with my roommates and other little details. I think I'm gonna like it here.
It's an interesting neighborhood we're in. Across the street from our base is a sketchy run down store with a confederate flag and a Burger King mascot in the front yard with the words "Army Boot Camp Training" on the window. Seems legit to me. Also, there are several orange trees on base, but we're not allowed to eat the fruit because it's contaminated with radioactivity from an old seepage into the local water table.
Breakfast is as six tomorrow, so I gotta get to bed. I'll write more as events warrant.
I met up with three people in the Albany airport, Paula, Kyla, and Dan, all headed the same direction as me. We ended up doing three flights, from Albany to Philly, then to Vegas, then to Sacramento. Very cool people, since the shorter two flights were way underfilled I managed to sit next to Paula, got to know her pretty well and I think she's going to be a solid friend here, Kyla as well. In the Vegas airport we played slots, one dollar each (I lost, of course). Traveling was long, but otherwise uneventful.
Once we got to the airport we waited for an Americorps van to show up and were driven to base. Once here we got fitted for all our gear, including PPE and steel toed boots. I signed up for a new Bank of America account to use while i'm out here, although I have yet to go through the details of it. It was interesting really seeing how many people are here, it's more overwhelming than I anticipated. I just wanted to make friends with everyone all at once, but I'm having trouble remembering names and details. Ah well, I'm starting to get a few people. I found out later that I'm in a room with three people, which makes me a bit unhappy, but since we don't use our rooms for much I don't think it'll be a huge issue. I did manage to get to Target and buy all the supplies I needed, so I think I'm all settled in.
After dinner I played some pool with Paula and Kyla; I think I may have been a little over the top with my heckling because apparently they've declared a prank war on me. However, they can't figure out where my room is, so I'm safe for now. They walked right past it at one point too. After that I met some more of the people living around me and figured out the showering schedule with my roommates and other little details. I think I'm gonna like it here.
It's an interesting neighborhood we're in. Across the street from our base is a sketchy run down store with a confederate flag and a Burger King mascot in the front yard with the words "Army Boot Camp Training" on the window. Seems legit to me. Also, there are several orange trees on base, but we're not allowed to eat the fruit because it's contaminated with radioactivity from an old seepage into the local water table.
Breakfast is as six tomorrow, so I gotta get to bed. I'll write more as events warrant.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
I'll see y'all later
Today we had a going away brunch at my house. My brother Eric and his girlfriend Christina, my girlfriend Courtney, and several of our good friends came over today to enjoy a meal that mom and I (well, mostly mom) spent all day yesterday preparing. It was a great time, we spent hours sitting around the table laughing. After most of our friends left Eric, mom, Courtney, Christina, and I spent the afternoon playing games (Christina managed one of the best Scrabble plays I've ever seen, 70 something points due to a Q being counted for triple letter and double word) and just hanging out. It was exactly what I was hoping for as a last hurrah before I leave, thanks to everyone that came. It was sad to realize I'm leaving everyone behind, but I know I'll only be gone for a while. The hardest part was saying goodbye to Eric and Courtney, I really love both of them and I'm going to miss having them less than an hour away.
Tomorrow I'm planning on packing, seeing my best friend Chris, and making dinner for my parents one last time. It's odd looking at the packing list, I know I should probably be a little more worried than I am, but it doesn't seem like that big of a deal to shove a few pairs of clothing and miscellaneous extras I need into a suitcase and get ready to go. I think I've got everything in order, and don't feel like I really have much left to do before I head off. I'm actually anxious to get out there and get started, I can't wait to meet everyone and start building a new set of friends and allies.
It hit me today today while talking to everyone about it what a large undertaking this is going to be. I've always tried to help people and improve the way things are around me, although nothing really, even working in Residence Life at RIT, ever gave me the chance to wholly devote myself to that goal. With Americorps I'll be able to focus and push myself to new limits, learning what I can and attempting to broaden that category every day. I've had this vision of who I want to be for a while now, this person worthy of enough trust and respect to be capable of empowering those around me and giving them the hope and energy to make things better. I think being able to treat that goal as a full time job and continually working toward it will allow me to fully realize it. It's a very large idea, and one that I'm still struggling to fully comprehend, but I'm confident I can get there.
Only two full days left before my flight out there. I can't wait to meet my fellow volunteers!
Tomorrow I'm planning on packing, seeing my best friend Chris, and making dinner for my parents one last time. It's odd looking at the packing list, I know I should probably be a little more worried than I am, but it doesn't seem like that big of a deal to shove a few pairs of clothing and miscellaneous extras I need into a suitcase and get ready to go. I think I've got everything in order, and don't feel like I really have much left to do before I head off. I'm actually anxious to get out there and get started, I can't wait to meet everyone and start building a new set of friends and allies.
It hit me today today while talking to everyone about it what a large undertaking this is going to be. I've always tried to help people and improve the way things are around me, although nothing really, even working in Residence Life at RIT, ever gave me the chance to wholly devote myself to that goal. With Americorps I'll be able to focus and push myself to new limits, learning what I can and attempting to broaden that category every day. I've had this vision of who I want to be for a while now, this person worthy of enough trust and respect to be capable of empowering those around me and giving them the hope and energy to make things better. I think being able to treat that goal as a full time job and continually working toward it will allow me to fully realize it. It's a very large idea, and one that I'm still struggling to fully comprehend, but I'm confident I can get there.
Only two full days left before my flight out there. I can't wait to meet my fellow volunteers!
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Introduction
Hello, I'm Adam Bosen, although most people I know just call me "Bosen", often at high volume. I'm currently in the process of graduating from Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) with my combined bachelors/masters degree in computer engineering and am preparing to embark on an exciting adventure on the other end of the country. I normally don't consider my life interesting enough to justify blogging about it but the program I'm joining seems like it will be sufficiently exciting to merit the occasional post. Plus, this is a decent way to keep everyone back home updated about what's going on while I'm out there (hi mom! I know you're reading this).
Now that I've hopefully piqued your curiosity, the program I'm going into is called Americorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC). It's a ten month community service program for American citizens ages 18-24. The first month is training, after which we'll spend time traveling our region of the country working on 6-8 week community service projects. I've been assigned to the Pacific campus, which is stationed in Sacramento, CA and covers California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, Alaska, Hawaii, and the pacific territories. This campus is home base for about a hundred or so of us, although for projects we're going to be split into 10-12 person teams. Projects can fall in the categories of disaster relief, education, environment, public safety, or unmet human needs, so we'll be doing all manner of work. Additionally, the pacific campus has an option for members to join a fuel reduction team, which works on fire prevention and suppression. I'm scheduled to leave for Sacramento on October 14th.
The reason I'm joining this program is for the chance to see what the rest of the country is really like and do some good on the way. I've lived in New York all my life (raised in Albany, school in Rochester) and I want to see as much of the country as I can before I settle down for graduate work. Also, I know I'm going to learn a bunch of new skills that I would never be able to gain elsewhere. I'm particularly excited for the opportunity to learn some firefighting skills. My whole life has been fairly easy so far; I grew up in a quiet suburb where I never wanted for much, so I think it's only fair that I do my part to give back to the country that allowed for the life I live.
As I mentioned before, I'm an engineer through and through. I'm just wrapping up my masters degree in computer engineering from RIT and I plan on going for my Ph.D. in biomedical engineering with a focus in Neuroengineering after I finish the Americorps program. I'm currently applying to Johns Hopkins, Georgia Tech, Duke, Purdue, University of Rochester, and University of Pittsburgh, with the hope that I'll be accepted into at least one of the first three schools. My interest lies in processing signals from the human nervous system for use in control systems, with the ultimate goal being a brain-computer interface you can use to control anything from a prosthetic limb to a car. I doubt I'll see that final goal in my lifetime, but it's definitely possible to get at least partway there. There's some really cool research going on right now in this area, and I'd love to contribute my fair share.
Outside of academics I spent most of my time at RIT working for Residence Life, and in my rare free time I usually ended up playing games or trying to write music. Music is a big part of my life; I've played cello since I was nine and have started experimenting with the free production software that comes with Ubuntu Studio. My tastes are pretty wide ranging: I listen to pop, rap, techno, and rock pretty equally, although my favorite genre is probably industrial rock, with Nine Inch Nails and KMFDM falling at the top of the list. I'm kind of hoping that I'll meet someone in Americorps with similar musical tastes to collaborate with, creativity is easier when you have someone to bounce ideas off of. I was hoping to create more material over the summer, but the time seemed to just slip away.
Only eight days until I leave! I'm excited and nervous about heading out. It'll be cool to be working with like minded people doing good for the community, although I'm not sure how I'll react to having a roommate again. I've talked with some of the other members via facebook and they all seem like nice people, so this adventure should be pretty fun. I'll probably update again before I leave about the woes of packing and I'll try to update regularly once I get there to keep everyone in the loop.
Now that I've hopefully piqued your curiosity, the program I'm going into is called Americorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC). It's a ten month community service program for American citizens ages 18-24. The first month is training, after which we'll spend time traveling our region of the country working on 6-8 week community service projects. I've been assigned to the Pacific campus, which is stationed in Sacramento, CA and covers California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, Alaska, Hawaii, and the pacific territories. This campus is home base for about a hundred or so of us, although for projects we're going to be split into 10-12 person teams. Projects can fall in the categories of disaster relief, education, environment, public safety, or unmet human needs, so we'll be doing all manner of work. Additionally, the pacific campus has an option for members to join a fuel reduction team, which works on fire prevention and suppression. I'm scheduled to leave for Sacramento on October 14th.
The reason I'm joining this program is for the chance to see what the rest of the country is really like and do some good on the way. I've lived in New York all my life (raised in Albany, school in Rochester) and I want to see as much of the country as I can before I settle down for graduate work. Also, I know I'm going to learn a bunch of new skills that I would never be able to gain elsewhere. I'm particularly excited for the opportunity to learn some firefighting skills. My whole life has been fairly easy so far; I grew up in a quiet suburb where I never wanted for much, so I think it's only fair that I do my part to give back to the country that allowed for the life I live.
As I mentioned before, I'm an engineer through and through. I'm just wrapping up my masters degree in computer engineering from RIT and I plan on going for my Ph.D. in biomedical engineering with a focus in Neuroengineering after I finish the Americorps program. I'm currently applying to Johns Hopkins, Georgia Tech, Duke, Purdue, University of Rochester, and University of Pittsburgh, with the hope that I'll be accepted into at least one of the first three schools. My interest lies in processing signals from the human nervous system for use in control systems, with the ultimate goal being a brain-computer interface you can use to control anything from a prosthetic limb to a car. I doubt I'll see that final goal in my lifetime, but it's definitely possible to get at least partway there. There's some really cool research going on right now in this area, and I'd love to contribute my fair share.
Outside of academics I spent most of my time at RIT working for Residence Life, and in my rare free time I usually ended up playing games or trying to write music. Music is a big part of my life; I've played cello since I was nine and have started experimenting with the free production software that comes with Ubuntu Studio. My tastes are pretty wide ranging: I listen to pop, rap, techno, and rock pretty equally, although my favorite genre is probably industrial rock, with Nine Inch Nails and KMFDM falling at the top of the list. I'm kind of hoping that I'll meet someone in Americorps with similar musical tastes to collaborate with, creativity is easier when you have someone to bounce ideas off of. I was hoping to create more material over the summer, but the time seemed to just slip away.
Only eight days until I leave! I'm excited and nervous about heading out. It'll be cool to be working with like minded people doing good for the community, although I'm not sure how I'll react to having a roommate again. I've talked with some of the other members via facebook and they all seem like nice people, so this adventure should be pretty fun. I'll probably update again before I leave about the woes of packing and I'll try to update regularly once I get there to keep everyone in the loop.
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