Introducing Technology Club!

Thank you to John Andrus, Technology Club leader and Res Life Faculty, for writing today's blog.

I hope everyone is having a great summer.  I can’t believe that the students will start coming back in less than two weeks from today!  WOW!  We finished up another awesome year here at Shepherds on June 13^th, and the new school year starts August 10^th.  We have witnessed a huge amount of growth in students this year, both in classes and in residential life.  But along with all that growth, we also love to have fun!

Clubs are a big part of campus life fun here at Shepherds.  In my time at Shepherds we have offered scrapbooking, guitar lessons, ukulele club, recycling club, and more.    Our biggest club has always been choir.  (As an aside, the Jensens have faithfully volunteered to lead the choir here at Shepherds College for many years.  However, this past school year was their last, and they were honored at graduation for their service.) 

Former Choir Directors, Sandy & Steve Jensen, with Angela Houk

For many years, we have investigated adding a technology major here at Shepherds, but so far, various things beyond our control have hampered that coming to fruition.  Currently, we are in a holding pattern with regards to adding curriculum due to our ongoing accreditation process.  Because of this hold, we are adding new ways to give the students who are tech savvy an outlet to explore their “inner-geek”, as I like to call it.

Some of us are just born "geeky."

The major way we helped our “Geeks” scratch that itch in the 2014-2015 school year was Tech Club.  Technology Club met once a week on Monday, right after school, and the guys who decided to join had no idea how far we would stretch them.

They look so trusting!

We started Tech Club in October of 2014, and the guys were excited.  The first thing we did was completely tear apart a computer and discuss each part and the function it serves within the computer system.  Once the guys thoroughly understood what each internal part of a computer did, we started shopping!  Using some tools on the internet, and a whiteboard covered in part numbers and prices, we determined how to build a computer from scratch, and, most important to Mr. Terrill, cheaper than what we were buying computers for wholesale.  That first computer ended up costing right at $300, shipped to our door in pieces.  Then, as a group, we put it together and fired it up.

Not too shabby!

Our computer is now the fastest computer in the computer lab, and everyone in tech club fights over who gets to use “Computer 13”.

After we finished our computer, we spent an entire club meeting discussing and debating what to do next.  After we ravaged yet another whiteboard with ideas, we decided that we wanted to build a website For Shepherds College students, By Shepherds College students.

ShepherdsEagles.com was born.

From there, we split into teams.  Two people were on the design and layout of our new student newsletter (Coming Labor Day 2015!)  Two people were in charge of finding or taking photos of students, campus, and student life.  Two others were in charge of design and layout of the website, and one was in charge of editing.

Our site is very new, so be patient with us.  However, it’s a great source of pride for the seven individuals who created and maintained it.

As we enter a new school year, and a new group of students in Tech Club, we commit to bringing you an insider perspective of student life here at Shepherds, one that you won’t see anywhere else.

If you are a current or incoming student who wants to learn how to run the sound board at church, wants to build computers, take pictures, utilize your graphic design skills, or build a website,  Tech Club might be for you.  

We will see you in a couple of weeks.  

Happy Geeking!

Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

Home B's Plan B

Thank you to Mr. Andrus, Computer Skills Instructor, for writing today's blog.

It’s funny how plans can change so quickly.  And for whatever reason, the world doesn’t stop to let me catch up.  Anyone else ever experienced that feeling?  The faculty of Shepherds College are going to be joining Mrs. Griffis in the fun of writing blogs for the next few months, and I’m up.  

So I have the blog all planned out.  It’s going to be amazing.  The students and I are involved, and we’re planning the event that I’m going to document.  I just have to pick up a few things, drop in the photos of the event, and boom, I’m done.  

Except…

Sometimes, things don’t go as planned.  Sometimes, you forget something.  Sometimes you lose an important item.  Sometimes the weather changes.  These unforeseen changes, that God graciously puts in our lives to teach us the subtle art of flexibility, are not always received by us with as much love as they are given.

Flexibility

So here’s plan B!  

As many of you know, not only am I the computer skills instructor, but I am the head of the res life area of Home B.  This is the area for our 2nd year men that have shown enough skill to be moved up from the dorm.  (Second year women go to Home A)  During first year, our students are getting used to not living at home.  They are learning basic skills and basic chores.  A few days a week they are on clean up or meal prep duty.  They are getting used to college and getting a taste of independence.

In 2nd year, there is a dramatic leap forward in responsibility and independence.  Our 2nd years have to now learn to meal plan, organize their kitchens, clean their bathrooms and bedrooms every day, and do their laundry in a regular non-commercial washer and dryer using their own laundry detergent.  Every single day they have to help with meal prep and clean up.  Just like in “real life”, there are no days off.  If you don’t clean up or cook, then who will do it?  Our 2nd years are currently learning that life lesson.

However, they are also learning that if you work diligently to complete the task at hand, it will be done a lot quicker than you think.  We always work on our inventory and meal planning on Monday night for our Daily Living Skills lab.  We see what ingredients we have, and then meal plan based on what items are in our cupboards and fridges.  This way we will keep tabs on expiration dates and what cans are lurking in the darkness of the back of the cupboard.  At the beginning of the year, the process of organizing our cupboards and taking inventory overwhelmed the guys.  In the middle of August they would complain, “Mr. Andrus, can we please just not do this this week.  Pleeeease!”

Well, something amazing has happened with the guys.  They have become responsible.  Every single Monday since late August, including this week, the guys have come home from school, taken their stuff to their rooms, and then immediately started inventory and meal planning on their own.  I don’t even have to mention it anymore.  Two groups of four guys working together as teams.  And, where in August it would take them almost 2 hours, this week they were done in 20 minutes. No complaining.  Just learning to work diligently together for the goal of free time.

One of the things my guys love to do with free time is make a bonfire.  We have a fire pit out back, and so far this year we have had 2 or 3 bonfires a week.

 

One of our many bonfires

That being said, this week, God had different plans about how we would be spending our free time.

This picture is from today.  They asked me if we could make a bonfire last night.  “Nope!”

I think it’s safe to say that we could use some prayer on how to fill our free time, because you aren’t going to catch me sitting on one of those logs until about mid-April.



Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

Looking Forward to Monday

Thank you to Micah Thomas Muma, a first-year student, for writing today's blog.

Growing up with a family big on computers and a father who sold software for computers for a very long time, I’d say I fell in love with technology early in life. All the technology in the world is amazing, and a computer is one of my favorites.

Mr. Andrus teaches computer class on Monday.  Most people would be down on a Monday because it’s just the end of the weekend and they’re tired, but when I know it’s Monday and Mr. Andrus is teaching us, I’m ready for Monday. 

Right now, we are learning how to make a computer piece by piece. It’s not that bad at all, but we all have a little trouble. We have to make a PowerPoint of the computers we want, and then we have to email our parents and try to explain why that computer is great. I’m thinking if I told my parents why it was a great computer, they’d say “What’s wrong with your computer?” 

Well, at the moment, nothing’s wrong with my computer and hopefully never will be wrong again. All that I’m saying is, out of all the projects we are doing and have done, all the projects are great and fun, but at the same time, Mr. Andrus is training us to be professionals in the near future of our lives. 

I didn’t know some things, such as PowerPoints and how computers work, quite as well as I do now. And the short cuts to a computer… can you believe you have short cuts for a computer?  Well, I’m happy to say to all who might be scared to take that test - it’s not that hard, and you will learn quickly. 

The other huge part of Computer Skills is typing without looking down at your keyboard. It took me some time, and it did for some of my friends here at Shepherds College as well. But then you practice, and you type so many words in your computer, and you look at yourself and ask, “How did I just do that?!”

 

I’ll tell you how! 

“With great practice makes perfection!”

 

I wouldn’t say perfection always comes right away, but I’d say it’s better than not trying at all. 

 
Thanks, Mr. Andrus, for teaching us here at Shepherds College. I sincerely appreciate every Monday. 

Mr. John Andrus

Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.

Shepherds College Character Trait #1: Diligence

Definition of Diligence – constant and earnest effort to accomplish what is undertaken; persistent exertion of body or mind.

As I wrote in the blog, A College with Character, Shepherds College emphasizes six character traits to equip students for internships and life after college.  Over the next few weeks, I’ll be showing you what each trait looks like in our program.

After reading the above definition for diligence, I had this thought, “Wow. I am so not the person who should be writing about this topic.”  

I am the woman who purchased birthday cards for every friend and family member at the beginning of the year – in 2005. They are still sitting in pristine, unsigned condition at the bottom of my sock drawer.  They’re Hallmarks, so I figure in 93 more years my descendants can sell them at an antique fair and feel the love at that time. 

I’m the woman who began writing a journal when I was nine or ten years old. I told everyone that I would daily document my life’s journey with the written word. I kept at it diligently for about… about… well, hmmm, the last entry I remember making went something like this, “My goldfish Killer died. I forgot to clean his stupid tank and my stupid sister didn’t remind me. Good thing Jaws and Orca are still alive, but they look funny. It was a bad day.” Jaws and Orca died that night and my last memory of those poor fish is wrapping them up in a paper towel and putting them at the bottom of my sock drawer to await burial in the spring.

I’m the woman who made the resolution to become the oldest power walker in the 2016 Summer Olympics after hearing that these athletes have the lowest percentage of body fat compared with the other Olympic athletes. I trained a total of about 5 minutes then realized I was too sinfully proud to waddle around the neighborhood in Spandex. My cute, new athletic socks ended up at the bottom of… um, my sock drawer.

I’m also the woman who intends to clean out her sock drawer every weekend, but always finds something else more pressing – like sorting magazine recipes by dominant vegetable used, or color-coordinating my hangers to match my shirts. To be truthful though, I’m also a little bit scared to find out what other guilt/shame/horror-inducing items lay at the bottom of my sock drawer. I think I’ll leave that for my descendants to discover too.

So now that I’ve come to the realization that sock drawers = the death of diligence, I’ve decided to go with my original instinct - I really shouldn’t be the one writing about this. I’m going to let the Shepherds College staff tell you about it themselves:

Angela Houk, Dean of Shepherds College, said, “At Shepherds College, diligence means investing my time and energy to complete each task assigned to me. Students learn this character trait by completing class assignments, chores and service projects. When students invest time completing assignments, their grades reflect their efforts. When students complete chores, the students and those living in their residential area all benefit from a clean community. 

It may be easier to take the quick way out, but when we invest time to complete tasks, we receive the satisfaction of a job well done.”

Miss Luchterhand is one instructor who teaches diligence in her classroom. She is having the students do research projects in Language Arts. The students have to find information about a state using books and the internet. They wanted to give up when she told them that they can’t use Wikipedia, but that gave her the opportunity to talk about the importance of diligence.

In Study Skills, the students show diligence by keeping their lockers clean. Miss Luchterhand randomly performs locker checks. Usually there will be at least one messy locker which gives her another opportunity to discuss diligence with the students.

Mr. Andrus supports the teaching of diligence through his use of repetition in the classroom. He asks his students to repeatedly perform tasks on the computer until they learn the skill – a great example of diligence in action!

Mr. Gaschke, Residential Life Faculty, teaches diligence through the use of tools such as check lists, instruction notebooks and chore charts. These tools keep the students accountable for their tasks and also serve as reminders until the jobs get done.

The character trait of diligence is a vital one in the work force so we teach and support it in multiple ways throughout our program. The students learn to give 100% of their time and energy to important tasks. 

At Shepherds College, the students will learn to diligently follow their dreams of Appropriate Independence - as long as they stay out of my sock drawer.

Shepherds College - Guiding Your Transition to Appropriate Independence. Please visit us at www.shepherdscollege.edu.