APCA Midwest Conference 2012 – Day 2

The conference officially kicked off on Friday morning and I went to an educational session on recruiting. The presenter gave us some good tips on choosing the right kind of events for our campus and how to encourage students to come to events that we host.

Becca volunteers

We had a buffet-style lunch in the afternoon where Becca and Robyn, Moraine Park students, volunteered to take lunch tickets. During our lunch in the ballroom we listened to all different kinds of acts that included comedians, musicians, and acrobats. Throughout the performances we could send tweets on Twitter using the conference’s hashtag and see them on the projection screen.

Resa's got a monkey on her back

After the showcase, we got a chance to meet with the acts that were performing throughout the weekend in the exhibit hall. Resa, our West Bend Student president, had the opportunity to hold a monkey. There was a tarantula as well, but I didn’t go anywhere near it. Yikes!

There were more acts to see before and during dinner, and the late night event included a mentalist and hypnotist. Both of them were good and a lot of fun to watch.

Some of the MPTC crew

APCA Midwest Conference 2012 – Day 1

I packed my Moraine Park Tech swag in a suitcase and headed over to our meeting place, the Beaver Dam campus, Thursday morning. We were going to Iowa for a full weekend at the APCA conference to check out entertainment acts and participate in educational sessions. APCA stands for the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities.

My MPTC swag in a suitcase

My Trick-or-Treat bag design

We crossed over the Mississippi River before getting to our destination, Coralville. The hotel and conference were in the same building, which was nice because the weather was cold and wet. We had some time before registration, so we went to a nearby mall.

At registration we had an opportunity to participate in some service projects and novelties that were set up at a table. We wrote cards for soldiers, created encouraging letters for kids, made ghosts out of suckers and tissues, and decorated trick-or-treat bags for children. Then our group, consisting of Student Senate members from all three MPTC campuses, talked about the conference schedule and chose educational sessions to attend.

Our last activity of the day was to create a poster for the poster competition. Becca and I drew our mascot, the grey wolf, and incorporated the construction theme of the conference.

MPTC's poster with construction theme

Another Great Meeting

Inside the room where the club meets

The Web Developer Club had another great meeting, the second meeting of the fall 2012 semester. Our new club president taught us about website security issues when using and customizing templates for CMS (Content Management Systems). He showed us a mobile version of a CMS I didn’t know existed.

Our new vice president gave a presentation about responsive design, which has to do with adapting web pages to fit all types of computer and mobile device screens automatically. It was a very useful discussion, and she gave us some additional resources.

We spent a few minutes brainstorming topics we’d like to learn more about in future meetings. Some of the things we’d like to cover are image copyright issues, child themes in WordPress, infographics, and the design process.

After the meeting, some of us went out to a local pizza place to celebrate one of our members’ birthdays. I’m not sure if he liked it or not, but we sang Happy Birthday to him (loudly) at the restaurant. Good times.

Test Anxiety Lunch ‘n Learn

Test anxiety can induce a fight or flight response. You can actually have a physical reaction to this kind of stress including sweating, headaches, and going temporarily “blank” before or during a test. It’s a normal reaction many people have. It’s also something that can be subdued or eliminated. This was what I learned during October’s Lunch ‘n Learn at MPTC in West Bend.

Although I don’t really take traditional tests in my classes, there are times when my performance is evaluated by projects I create and presentations I give in class. I find the best way to combat anxiety is to be prepared. During the Lunch ‘n Learn I learned a few other ways to beat anxiety.

Before the test:
- Eat nutritious food, not soda, energy drinks, and junk food
- Prepare by studying early and taking practice tests
- Take breaks while studying so you don’t get burnt out
- Exercise by going for a walk, jogging, or Yoga
- Get sleep because your brain functions much better when you’re not tired
- Practice stress management techniques like breathing

A Month Worth of Weekends

Week in Review: A Reflection of October 8 – 14

I am happy to report I have turned in my last assessment for Principles of Accounting class—forever. It took me most of the weekend, but it’s done, and I’m done with the class. It’s a good thing, too, because the next four weekends I am booked and would have a difficult time fitting in any more accounting assignments.

This weekend I am hosting a Halloween Party. I’ve got some straightening up to do and a lot of baking. I’ve made the banana bread with crystallized ginger (it’s a very good addition that I recommend trying), but I still need to make skeleton cupcakes and monster finger cookies. Last year I made cupcakes with spiders made out of candy on top.

Next weekend I will be going with Moraine Park Technical College Student Senates to the APCA conference in Iowa. This is my first trip with Student Senate. We’ll be going there to view some entertainment acts that we may bring back to perform at the campus in the future. I’m still not sure what we’ll all be doing, but from what I understand, they’re going to keep us busy from morning until night with activities.

The following week I’ll be celebrating my friend’s birthday. She has a whole weekend-worth of plans for us. We’re going to be doing karaoke somewhere, going swimming (indoors of course), watching the Packer’s game, and possibly going to Wisconsin Dells. I’m not sure how she plans on fitting in all of that, but she’s a really organized person, so she’s probably got it all figured out.

The weekend after that I am going to another friend’s wedding. I hope that the weather will be good that weekend, because it will be November. I’m looking forward to seeing a handful of people I haven’t seen in a while at the wedding.

What do you for fun on the weekends?

My Customer Service Essentials Class

Providing good customer service is much more complicated than just being nice to the customer. This is what I have learned over the past two months in my Customer Service Essentials class here at Moraine Park.

We’ve learned about service culture, which includes things like mission statements, employee roles and expectations, motivators and rewards, and training. These all contribute to how customers are treated. We’ve practiced some hands-on ways to improve our verbal and nonverbal communication as well as listening.

Learning about how technology plays a role in providing customer service was especially interesting. Functionality and usability of a company’s website is more important now than ever since that is sometimes the first place a customer goes to get information or to make a complaint.

Top Places to Study on the West Bend Campus

Staying focused can be difficult. I find that the best way to get my assignments done is by doing them on campus. Sometimes it’s just easier to focus on academics in an academic setting. Here are a few places I like to work on homework on the West Bend campus:

Sitting Areas

The area outside the library has chairs, a couch, and computers in a relaxed environment. I’ve seen people work on group projects here. The Web Developer club hangs out here before our meetings.

If you peak around the wall, there are chairs and tables near the main entrance.

A lesser-known area has comfy seating on the upper floor. Take the steps or the elevator in the T hallway.

  

Cafeteria

The booths in the cafeteria are a great place to set up your laptop. You can easily plug it into the outlets above the tables if your battery is low.

The Dog is Burying Fishbowls?

As you may recall from my blog post, “The Ox May Die,” last semester, I was in a class called Document Processing at MPTC. This semester I am taking Advanced Document Processing, which is pretty much a continuation of what I was doing last spring.

I am convinced the writers of our book for this class had a sense of humor, because they have me write the most absurd things sometimes to improve my keyboarding skills and accuracy. Once day I had to type, “The big dog down by the lake may bury the eighty fishbowls” in the keyboard program used for the class.

Besides improving our speed and accuracy, we also learn and practice language skills and learn how to format documents. The first few lessons were review of such documents as memos, academic and business reports, and tables. Now I’m learning about formatting itineraries, agendas, and meeting minutes. The next time I type up meeting minutes for the Web Developer club, I’m going to format it this way. I really liked how clean and organized the minutes looked.

My tip this week is to apply what you’ve learned whenever you can. It reinforces skills and concepts learned, and it will also help you improve.

Looking Forward to an Awesome October

Week in Review: A Reflection of September 24 – 30

September has been a very busy month, and I imagine October will be more of the same. However, I am nearing the end of my accelerated Principles of Accounting class. It’s an eight-week course that started at the end of August. I’m pretty excited to have Wednesday nights free again soon; especial since the new fall TV shows have just started.

At the end of October I am going to the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities (APCA) Programming Conference in Iowa with some MPTC Student Senate members. At the conference we’ll get to check out entertainment acts we think students will like so we can have the acts perform at our campus in the future. I’m not quite sure what the weekend all entails since I’ve never been to anything like this before. I’ll be sure to take photos and video and tell you all about it when I come back.

The week before I go to the conference, I’ll be hosting my annual Halloween party. Everybody dresses up and we play BINGO for prizes. I’ve got my Halloween costume put together already. I won’t tell you what it is, but I will say that I have purple gloves that go up to my elbows.

The only downside to October is all this leaf raking that needs to be done. Can’t we just vacuum them off the tree? No? Okay, I’ll go back to raking now.