Blog 24 | Last Presentation Reflection

1) Positive Statement

What are you most proud of in your block presentation and/or your senior project? Why?

• Im proud of completing my senior project. Mostly because the stress is now gone and I can finally sleep at night. But I was also gald to have been able to pass on my research although it did not come out to what I had hoped for I was able to finish this year off with a bang.

2) Questions to Consider

What assessment would you give yourself on your block presentation?  Use the component contract to defend that assessment.

• AP, why? Because I'm not optimistic to go for the AE. Mostly for the time and lack of creativity. Also I rushed my presentation a bit too much, I had so much to talk about yet I had to be nervous and rush what I had. I did not have my EQ posted in a creative way, so I believe I deserve an AP, although I did not show the required creative steps I did show information, useful, if not, then interesting information.

What assessment would you give yourself on your overall senior project? Use the component contract to defend that assessment.

• Overall, I would give myself an P, because I did a lot f research for my project, from Rosalilia Gradilla, to the staff at Uncommon Good. I was able to speak to a few other people at local mentorship programs as well and got my research based off them.

3) What worked for your senior project

• My mentorship. Access to mentor ship programs, and the helpful staff at Uncommon Good being able to provide me sources.

4)  (What didn't work) If you had a time machine, what would you have done differently to improve your senior project?

• What didnt work was the working bibliography, at one point I wasnt able to find anymore sources, If I were to change something to improve senior project, it would be my second independent component. I was unable to get my interview from the public speaker, I wish I was more persistent, and I wish I was able to keep my teachers updated on what was happening

5) How has the senior project been helpful to you in your future endeavors?   Be specific and use examples.

• It helped me realize what was out there. In the way of a support system. Through my mentorship I found how helpful a Youth Mentorship program can be both educationally and socially. I plan to go back to Uncommon Good a create a future career based on them.

Blog 23 | Exit Interview Prep

What is your essential question, and what are your answers?  What is your best answer and why?

• How can youth mentor ship programs level the playing field for under represented students?
• Accessible
• Mentor ship programs, are either distant, unavailable to students who struggle financially or they do not exist to students in poor communities. Solving this issue helps mentoring programs level the playing field for the under represented.
• Mentoring
• Mentor ship programs provide mentors, these are important for the students, exposing them to college. This answer is to be worded differently,  this focuses on how mentoring relationships are beneficial to students socially and academically. A mentoring focused program is able to provide students with experience.
• Activities
• Many students, do not get mentors and do not get the opportunity for a head start in life, or college. Being able to have a mentor should be key. Mentor ship programs should provide other sets of "activities" that strengthen the students social and academic capabilities, like group based mentoring like the Hubs of I-Poly, or providing workshops, proving to be useful such as scholarship and college application workshops.
• Best Answer: Youth mentor ship programs can level the playing field for the under represented by being more accessible to students.

What process did you take to arrive at this answer?

• Having volunteered at Uncommon Good, I was able to see how accessible this place is. It is located in a safer non "ghetto" area, Claremont. This program is also a Non-Profit, meaning students aren't meant to pay a single penny for their mentoring/tutor sources.

What problems did you face?  How did you resolve them?

• Finding the essential question was one of my main problems, but once I was able to get a hold of this question I was able to find the key issues that my topic faces and how it can resolve them. Many of the issues that I found was that there aren't a lot of mentoring programs that can help every single student, another issue is that many under represented students don't have the motivation to get into a college finding a successful role model.

What are the two most significant sources you used to answer your essential question and why?

• The most significant source for me was my 3rd interview and a journal/literature review called "Effectiveness of programs to improve post secondary education enrollment and success of underrepresented youth"

Blog 22 | Independent Component 2

This is where one of the mentor groups meet up at

Literal

• I, Jonathan Alvarado, affirm that I completed my independent component which represents 32.5 hours of work.
• My sources are:
• Jesus Sanchez | Uncommon Good | Volunteer and Youth Coordinator
• Rosalilia Gradilla | Univeristy of La Verne | Coordinator of the Co-Curricular Community Engagement Program
• Dr. Gabe Veas | University of La Verne | Public Speaker
• Tori Weiston | Director | Youth Mentoring action Network | 
• Dr. Daniel Loera & Nancy Reyes | Director & Assistant Director | First Generation Student Success Program (FGSSP) at the University of La Verne
• Updated
• I completed a chart that compares 3 different types of mentoring programs. How? I went up to these mentoring programs and observed how they all worked. The chart remains unfinished and will be updated by 4/30/2016. There is still a few things missing in the chart such as the rate at which students are able to succeed better, which will come with an interview with Dr. Gabe Veas (Hopefully)
• What I did in this Independent Component was going out to different types of mentoring programs and observing what they offered to students. I took notes and made them neater to here (Click on the "here"). I was also able to find out what the differences in each mentoring program was. With this information I was able to find out how they helped underrepresented students. Such as the sub group of Uncommon Good which can be seen here, and the group of the Youth Mentoring Network in Claremont, where I was able to see what they did to help students

Blog 21 | Fourth Interview Reflection

Uncommon Good.

Note: I was unable to interview Dr. Gabe Veas and will hopefully interview him as a part of my IC #2. I interviewed Jesus Sanchez, he has shown the experience needed to share out his own personal story about mentoring programs and how well they effect students.

What is the most important thing I learned from the interview?

• The most important thing I learned from this interview was the ability of mentoring, and how well it impacts students. I also learned how under represented students receive a harder time to obtain help from resources such as Uncommon Good.

How will what I learned affect my final lesson?

• I will be using a lot of information from this and previous interviews where I will be hopefully citing them through out my presentation. I am also able to elaborate more on my answers with this specific interview which focuses primarily on my answers.

Interview

Interview 4 Prep

Who do you plan to interview?  What is this person's area of expertise?

• I plan to interview Dr. Gabe Veas, He did his dissertation on Mentoring is a current professor at the University of La Verne. He also is a Youth Speaker, in which he helps youth who are exposed to negative influences, he speaks out to these communities to give a sense of hope. I plan to interview him in the following weeks.

Post 20 open-ended questions you want to ask an expert in the field concerning your senior project. Your focus should be finding answers to your EQ.

• No Questions at the moment.
• I will be asking about what the youth face today when entering college. Or when developing to an adult. With his expertise I will hope to find out more of what Mentoring can do, and how students are impacted by individuals like himself.

Blog 19 | Third Answer

1) What is your EQ?

• How can youth mentor-ship programs level the playing field for under represented students?

2) What is your third answer?

• By creating a warm and welcoming environment, students will be able to perform better and ultimately enjoy their experience in the program, resulting in better focus for the student

3) List three reasons your answer is true with a real-world application?

• Creating a warm and welcoming environment has proven to show improvement among youth, they focus more in the program and classes.
• Youth tend to fall behind and lose focus at times, and now its even more easier to lose track of where you are at, and because of this students can stress out, by creating an environment where youth can feel comfortable students show better focus.
• This environment works out for students because it is a stress free "Chill" environment. Although some students tend to act a lil bit off, and do not entirely focus themselves on their education

4) Research Sources?

• Shown in my WB as well, it was mentioned for my first answer, Source #46/47/48

5) Concluding Sentence.

• Students need a stress free environment and creating this environment can help students, focus on what they need. Why does it help level the playing field? This helps students be able to work better in a stress free zone where they can focus all their attention to their school related work.

Blog 18 | Answer 2

Finding a needle in a haystack is pretty much finding another answer for my EQ

1.  What is your EQ?

• How can youth mentor-ship programs level the playing field for under represented students

2.  What is your first answer? (In complete thesis statement format)

• By being able to be accessible, affordable, and resourceful; youth mentor-ship programs can help level the playing field for under represented students, by providing them a place they can reach, be able to pay for these resources (If need be)

3.  What is your second answer? (In complete thesis statement format)

• The community is changing, families go into struggles that their kids do not get the chance to be able to give back to the environment. By providing a student with a mentor, the mentor can be the role model to the student, they will be able to giveback to their community and prove to be better academically and socially.

4.  List three reasons your answer is true with a real-world application for each.

• First Answer:
• Why does being accessible, affordable, and resourceful for a youth mentor ship program help level the playing field for under represented students?
1. By being accessible, students are able to reach the program by any means necessary, whether it'd be by bus or if they can get a carpool to the program. Another reason why being accessible is a key answer to my EQ, without a program being local or reachable, a student will never be able to go to the program or the student may not be willing to travel a lot.
2. By being affordable, the program either asks for a small price to be able to accept enough students, being affordable does not mean it has to have a tuition of sorts. The program can be free as well, just as Uncommon Good is, by being a non profit, although yes sometimes they have fundraisers but these are merely for the resources they provide students with.
3. If a program does not provide useful resources such as volunteer opportunities or different set of programs to expand a students knowledge, these opportunities are lost. Another resource for these programs are to provide Mentors, without these mentors students don't get a role model or help they deserve through high school
• Second Answer
• Why is a Mentor so important?
1. Provides a caring adult to a student
2. Student results in a better person and strives to do better academically
3. Mentoring brings the community back together, by providing others with "Care and Guidance"

5.  What printed source best supports your answer?

• Answer 1: Shown in my WB, Source# 46
• Answer 2: http://www2.ed.gov/PDFDocs/yyc.pdf 

6.  What other source supports your answer?

• Shown in source 47,48

7.  Tie this together with a  concluding thought.

• Both these answers has shown a unique view. my first answer focuses on how it will reach these students and how they can help them. My second answer focuses on only mentoring, and how well it can help students, although this answer is technically apart of my first answer but this primarily focuses on the students success. 

Blog 17 | Interview 3 Reflection

This picture was taken a week before the interview, this is where my interview took place.

What is the most important thing I learned from the interview?

• One of the biggest thing that I have learned from this is, you have to be very dedicated to be in a youth mentor ship program, at least working in one. Uncommon Good was a really great place to do my mentor ship for the past few month; although I am not done volunteering here I really would like to explain what I learned from this and how much of an impact this program has done to help youth and mentors From my interview I learned a lot about what a mentor was/is capable of doing, this helps out a lot with my answer in seeing that by being "Accessible, Affordable, and Resourceful," Mentoring is another answer, just plain mentoring. By focusing on just mentoring itself you can have many possibilities in pairing a student and many different outcomes. These outcomes are what is to benefit the student, and this mentor is also helping in creating this student a better person. So in a way what I learned from this interview, was a few more answers to my question,
• Access "Interview 3" Here

How has your approach to interviewing changed over the course of your senior project?

• A lot of things have changed throughout the course of my senior project, first off I found my self asking a few more follow up questions than I usually do, meaning I have shown way more interest to this topic. I have also found that I have "Up'd" my game in audio recording and a better place to set up.

Blog 16 | Independent Component 2 Approval

I will start to focus on the practices of Mentoring Programs

1.  Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

• What I plan to do this time around (And not go off into something completely different) is, I plan to explore the different types of Mentoring Programs around the area. I also plan to talk to a few people who have done their dissertations on mentoring. I have already started talking to Rosalilia Gradilla, she is currently the Coordinator of the Co-Curricular Community Engagement Program. Here they help students reach out to programs such as Uncommon Good and help be a mentor to fellow students.

2.  Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

• I plan to record (Audio) my discussions I have with the Professors concerning their dissertations. As for the visits with the local Mentoring Programs I plan to (hopefully) take pictures of what they do.

3.  Explain how this component will help you explore your topic in more depth.

• Not only will I get to see the different programs I get to talk to Professors who have done research on mentoring.  The point of this is to see what other programs have to offer, in what ways do these mentor ship programs reach out to students, and do they help out the underrepresented, if so how?

4.  Post a log in your Senior Project Hours link and label it "Independent Component 2" log.

• Click here to see updated Independent Component 1 Hours and Independent Component 2 Format
• Scroll down until you reach the blue area

Independent Component 1

This is Jesus Sanchez, You may not be able to see it but that's the match we made in the folder

Literal

• I, Jonathan Alvarado, affirm that I completed my independent component which represents 31.5 hours of work
• My sources are:
• Carlos D. Carrillo, Educational Program Director, Uncommon Good.
• Nancy Dufford, Educational Program Director, Uncommon Good.
• Jesus Sanchez, Educational Program Director, Uncommon Good.
• Updated
• I completed, a match, or in Uncommon Good terms a Mentor and Mentee match. At first I did not know what to do that would make me learn a bit more about Youth Mentor-ship Programs, until last month I decided that I would ask if I was able to match a Mentor and Mentee. Carlos D. Carrillo approved and as did Nancy Dufford. Both of who have already matched hundreds of students.

Interpretive

• My work that I have demonstrated here is what I would like to call, a really great experience. At first I was planning to help 8th graders learn about how to choose classes in high school, but because of my availability I was not able to do so. Click Here for the cards that I made. But this all did not work out, I was able to talk to my mentors and tell them what I can do, they offered to give me a chance at pairing a Mentor and Men-tee. With a couple days of planning me and Jesus, Click Here to see us discussing about our plans, Nancy took the picture, had decided for me to interview a college student coming from the Claremont Colleges. I wasnt able to take a picture of him, but I was able to take a picture of the picture that capture both the men-tee and the mentor. (As you can see above) Both me and Jesus managed to pair 'Josh' with Alejandro, me and Carlos however made the interview happen. I was not able to take as many pictures as I'd thought I would. For my next IC I plan to hopefully record or take pictures more frequently, or have the items that I have done in more of a log-like blog.

Applied

• This component really helped me see how things are done for Youth Mentorship Programs I also see how well and how not so well things can work out. There are a lot of Mentors who do not see how important mentoring can be. In one of my recent Interviews with Nancy Dufford, she tells me how much she would really love to match these students, but most mentors just somehow disappear off of the face of this earth. (Meaning most dont tell her where they're at)

Lesson 2 Reflection

1. What are you most proud of in your Lesson 2 Presentation and why?

• I am most proud of getting this over with, and the way I was able to present with somewhat confidence

2.a. What assessment would you give yourself on your Lesson 2 Presentation (self-assessment)?

• Low P or AP

   b. Why?

• I deserve either a low P or AP because I did not really explain who my mentors were, and I didn't really show much evidence or refer to sources as much. I did but it was only 1 source.

3. What worked for you in your lesson 2?

• What worked most was the activity, on how everybody was able to follow instructions.

4. What didn't work? If you had a time machine, what would you have done differently to improve your Lesson 2?

• What didn't work was my time, I needed to practice a bit more just so I could hit the 20 min mark. Even though I did manage to do so, but I felt a bit more nervous for the ending portion.

5. What do you think your answer #2 is going to be?

• I do not currently have another answer.

Blog 14 | Interview 3 Prep

Who do you plan to interview? What is this person's area of expertise?

• I plan to interview Nancy Dufford. She is one of the program coordinators of Uncommon Good, she helps recruit mentors by interviewing them and pairing them up with another student.

Verify that you have called your interviewee to schedule an interview. What is the date and time of the interview?

• There is no verified day yet, Nancy has not confirmed whether or not she will be able to have the interview by next week.

Phrase an open-ended question that will help you find research sources that would help to answer EQ.

• What have you done to find out more about Mentor ship Programs. (Will be WAY less vague than this, but this is the idea of the question just do not have it worded properly yet)

Phrase an open-ended question that will help you think about other useful activities you might do to help you answer the EQ.

• In progress. 

Phrase two open-ended questions that help you to understand your interviewee's perspective on an aspect of your EQ. 

• In your opinion what are the downfalls in mentor ship programs, and what do mentor ship programs do to make up for these certain down falls.
• What other mentor ship programs do you know of. What do they do that is different from Uncommon Good.

Blog 13 | 10 Hour Mentorship Check-In

Where are you doing your Mentorship?

• I am currently doing my Mentorship at Uncommon Good.

Who is your contact? What makes this person an expert?

• My contact is Carlos Carrillo, what makes this person an expert is how long he has spent working at Uncommon Good (10 years).

How many hours have you done over the school year?

• I have done more than 10 hours through my Mentorship but I plan to record the necessary hours into the hours sheet.

Succinctly summarize what you did, how well you and your mentor worked together, and how you plan to complete the remaining hours.

• Normally I shadow my mentor seeing what he does. At times I'm able to go to other meetings seeing him present to other students and parents. I plan to complete my hours with my independent component

Blog 12 | Holiday Research Update

It is important to consistently work on your senior project, whether it is break or we are in school. What did you do over the break with your senior project?

• I was not able to continue mentoring over the break because my mentor was out of town and the office was closed. However, I was able to plan out a few things concerning the senior project and upcoming presentation.

What was the most important thing you learned from what you did, and why? What was the source of what you learned?

• The most important thing I learned during the break was how "Mentorship" is a key part to a lot of Youth Programs, such as Uncommon Good. There are also other Youth Programs that focus primarily on College applications (The Requirements) further benefiting students. This will hopefully lead to one of my answers in my EQ.

Your third interview will be a 10 question interview related to possible for your EQ. Who do you plan to talk to and why?

• I am planning to talk to one of counselors that help recruit new Mentors for the program. I hope to find out why she finds mentoring to be a useful tool in helping students reach their goal, "College." I also hope in finding out what she thinks about my EQ, and possible solutions to the problem.