Week 10 (9/16-9/20): Planting Seeds of Peace

Brief recap of the week I was gone: the first half of the week was understandably busy (I didn’t move from my dining room table for 4- or 5-hour periods of studying at a time); I took the test on Wednesday; the last half of the week went by quickly, because time flies when you’re binge-watching TV shows on Netflix. My flight back to the Bay got in on Sunday, and I was promptly greeted by my friends who took me out to lunch. It was a great way to celebrate post-MCAT life and fully commit myself to work! 

Starting this week, I’ll be doing a full 50/50 split between Redwood City 2020 and the Gardner Center: Mondays and Wednesdays at 2020, Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Gardner Center, and alternating locations every Friday. On this first Monday at 2020, I was tasked with researching digital camcorders for an upcoming project. I spent a long time comparing specs of tens of different camcorders, weighing pros and cons against what the camcorder would be used for (creating videos for the 2020 website), and reading the very opinionated reviews of many amazon.com customers. We finally settled on a camera, and will be ordering it soon, so look out for videos on http://www.rwc2020.org/ 

I spent Tuesday working on further expanding my workplan at the Gardner Center before returning to 2020 on Wednesday for the first team meeting at the new office. It was great to see what great work is ahead of us and to have an opportunity to put faces to names of people I had only heard about. We talked specifically about the office environment and how we as a staff can support professionalism, hospitality, and comfort and what each person needs and can contribute in an office environment. I thought this was a great way to get to know the people I will be working with! I also created what Jana called a “Props Tree” by drawing a trunk and some bare branches on a big sheet of paper. People in the office can now put leaves (sticky notes) with compliments and kudos on them as a way of celebrating the big and little things we do in the office.  

I also got a chance to meet with Priscilla at the Fair Oaks Clinic about research in Redwood City. I got a tour and update on the clinic (they’re planning to move in November), and learned a lot during my visit. She promised to send along research articles I had not yet read to add to my ever-growing inventory on research in Redwood City. 

After the staff meeting and another day at the Gardner Center, I stayed on campus Thursday for an event at the Haas Center that was for prospective and current fellows. There was a free dinner, a talk about finding fellowships, and an opportunity for networking afterward (they had me at "free dinner"; it was Darbar!). It was great seeing my fellow fellows again, and getting a chance to meet current seniors. Being on campus and around undergrads made me a little sad knowing that my time as an undergraduate was over, but I was also grateful that I had found a fellowship that very well suits my interests.  

This week’s theme is “Planting Seeds of Peace” because it reminded me of the Props Tree. But it goes much deeper than that. The whole purpose of this fellowship is to create more peace in my world. Everything I did this week helped set the foundation for my future work as a fellow. It may not look particularly fruitful now, but planting these seeds and making these connections with people will soon bear fruit!

Week 9 (9/9-9/13): MCAT

I took the MCAT this past Wednesday, so I was not at work. I came out of it feeling like I had prepared adequately, so we’ll see what the results are in about a month! Thank you for your kind and positive thoughts!

Week 8 (9/3-9/6): Harmony Within Yourself

In what is quickly becoming the theme of many of my weeks, this week was very much unlike the rest. Monday was Labor Day, during which I took a much needed break at Stinson Beach with a few friends. I think it was a really good time and place to just take a break both from studying as well as working. Much like after the Annual Retreat with the Shinnyo Foundation, afterward I felt much more centered and peaceful, and I came back feeling extremely relaxed and ready to tackle the week. 

I spent the next day doing CITI (Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative) training, which is a necessary program that everyone who works with human subjects takes. I had taken this training before for another program, but it was still helpful to have a refresher course. The training essentially took all day between the modules, videos, and quizzes, but at the end, I got a certificate, so it was overall a productive day. 

Wednesday was a big day for Redwood City 2020: Packing Day! I met Jana and Janneth at the District office, and was ready to pack boxes all day. After a quick meeting with Jana about how I could best utilize my time that day, I rolled up my sleeves and started the process of splitting the shared stock of office supplies right down the middle (half to the District, half to Redwood City 2020). This was also an opportunity to inventory what we had and what we would need. I spent the rest of the day playing Office Supply Tetris, packing our supplies into boxes and labeling them for the move.

Thursday was largely uneventful, save for my fingerprinting appointment for the Gardner Center, but the next day was a very important one: Moving Day for 2020! I again met at the District Office and helped a bit with cleaning. I also sat down with Jana about fleshing out our proposed workplan. We came up with some really cool, tangible ideas that I will be sharing once we have a more concrete plan. Meanwhile, the wonderful Facilities people helped move the boxes into a truck and to the new office. Before I could help unpack, however, I attended a Community Youth Development Initiative (CYDI) meeting with Jana and the rest of the Youth Development team at the District office. We spoke about the structure of 2020 and how youth development fits into that structure looking forward.

After the meeting, we went over to the new office and began the process of unpacking. I spent the rest of the day organizing the office supplies into a functional, practical system in the Copy Room. It took a surprising amount of time to unpack only a few boxes, but I was happy to do it. I liked having work with an immediately tangible end result, and unpacking and organizing could be very easily quantified. 

The week’s theme, “Harmony within yourself,” comes as a reaction not only to the inherent disharmony of packing and moving, but to the hecticness of the week as well. Even though I spent much of the week moving or else spending my time atypically, having a harmony within myself helped me find the balance and stability that I didn’t necessarily find during the week. Being able to center myself during the holiday was a big part of this inner balance, but so too was the support of my friends, coworkers, and family. Finding this balance and harmony will be especially important next week, as I return home to San Diego in order to take the MCAT! As such, there won’t be a work blog for week 9, but I will return with updates.

Week 7 (8/26-8/31): Mapping Your Path

“Mapping your path” was this week’s theme, as I spent a lot of it involved in planning. Monday was the big strategic planning meeting at the Gardner Center. The entire staff spent the whole day focused on the strategic plan: looking back at the most recent strategic plan; looking at the present to see how current projects aligned with it; and looking forward to where the Gardner Center is going. It was a great day of reflection and collaboration (with an excellent lunch!), in which we all got together and aligned our individual visions with an overall direction for the Gardner Center. 

On Wednesday, I met with Al, who is an alum-mentor that was paired up with me through the Haas Center. We had lunch at Tresidder and had a great conversation, not so much about work (although we did touch on that), but about post-Stanford life. It was definitely a little weird realizing that we were both alumni (as opposed to an alumnus and a student). But it was still very comforting and reassuring talking to another person who went through Stanford, especially one who went on to do such inspiring work. We talked for about an hour about careers, finding housing, and reflecting on our Stanford experiences. I really hope to meet with him again!

Thursday featured more planning; this day was our monthly phone meeting with Jana and Manuelito. We spoke for an hour creating a draft of a work plan, bouncing ideas off each other for projects that I could be involved with or even lead. My work was really about to leap off the plane of the page (reading research) and into the world/the Redwood City community. 

So, all in all, things here are moving quickly toward the future. With proper planning and foresight, I hope to maximize my time as a fellow, while still remembering to reflect on where I have been.

Week 6 (8/19-8/23): Roots and Fruits

This week, the seedlings of a project began to take root. I spent Monday fostering what I anticipate will be a fruitful and recurring relationship with Post-It Notes and whiteboards. At the suggestion of Manuelito, I created a wall of color-coded Post-Its that represented Gardner Center Research, Redwood City 2020 Partner Organizations, Redwood City 2020 initiatives, target population and issues (e.g. poverty, obesity, chronic absenteeism, etc). It looks like the world’s easiest and most colorful puzzle right now, but eventually, I hope to move all the Post-Its around to help visualize strategies for addressing, say, health and fitness, by taking the relevant Post-Its and seeing how different combinations can interact with each other. This can help generate new questions and relationships among populations, issues, and resources (e.g. does early intervention in fitness for low-income children make more of a difference than a later fitness intervention?). After I brainstorm as many questions about as many issues as I can, I can start weeding out the more implausible ideas (“Have Arnold Schwarzenegger come and teach a fitness class”) and focus on the more practical ideas (“Have a community member teach a culturally-relevant fitness class”). 

The rest of the week was a standard week until Friday, when I went with Pat and Jana to Shinnyo-En USA, the head temple located in Redwood City. We had a really good lunch around a conversation about Redwood City 2020’s role in partnering with the Shinyo-En Foundation and vice versa, with an emphasis on my fellowship. I also got to see many people I had met on the Annual Retreat, so it was great seeing them again. Seeing the temple was very inspiring, and very calming; it was so grand, yet simple. We left with a greater understanding of the Shinnyo-En Foundation, as well as full stomachs and fuller hearts. 

We said goodbye after the tour, so I went to work from home until Nuestra Escuela which started at 4 that afternoon. Nuestra Escuela is essentially an open house for the parents of Hoover Community School. I had been invited to come by Elena, the Hoover Community School Coordinator, when I toured the school in the week before. This was my first real experience with this aspect of community schools: family engagement. And boy were they engaged! When I was a kid, parent involvement meant driving a car full of kids to the museum or something because we didn’t have school buses. But here, parents were taking a very active role: they were hosting stations (“Parent Education” and “What is a Community School?”), leading groups from station to station, and generally helping other parents find their way around the school. It was really cool to finally see this thing that I had read about for a month in action. I hope to come back during a school day and observe how the community school works on a day-to-day basis, but, for now, it feels good to have these roots in the ground. 

So, all in all, things are starting to feel more concrete. I have a few roots grounded in a few different pots of soil (projects, Gardner Center, Redwood City 2020, the Redwood City community). I hope to keep watering and nourishing this flower of a fellowship (flowership?) so that, by the end of it, there is very tangible fruit. Though there is sure to be winter ahead, I’m confident that I can come out of it smelling like roses.