I thoroughly enjoy learning about the community. I have benefitted greatly as an individual from participating in WCLI and I am honored to have been accepted. I feel that the connections I have been able to make as a member will help me along my career path. The trainings on personality types and learning my strengths provided invaluable knowledge and help me understand why I feel I have to work so much harder to connect than what I observe in others around me.
Honestly, I dread the portion of each meeting that is for us to work on our project and have for several weeks. Well, the last three weeks have been better.
I disagree with the group structure we chose for our committees. During our early classes, we took personality tests and completed group activities designed to show us our strengths. I feel like we were supposed to use that knowledge to organize our committees. Instead, we formed cliques. In a group of 9 strong women, a clique is toxic to progress. The vociferous lack satisfaction with our progress displayed last night accurately reflects this choice of structure.
I feel like the clothing drive is the main focus. In actuality our drive team, in my opinion, is short-changed into being runners for the event rather than an active committee. Publicity chair is currently driving the whole affair, but the agency we have chosen to help does not want any publicity at all. I still feel like publicity should really be a sub-committee of the drive team. Facility committee has their timeline in place and a polished representative. Anne, thanks for taking over the timeline tonight in Nicki’s absence.
I also feel like I have no voice in class. I fight to write the letter because I feel like nobody likes my ideas. I know who reads what I write; your picture pops up next to your name when you log in while I’m logged in. I have long prided myself on being a team player. I prefer to be part of a group than work independently. I suggested the blog and our Steering Committee liked it enough to suggest it to the class. I believe they wanted to watch our progress, especially those who don’t live in town. But for me, participation is zero, strike for idea one.
When my class voted, 6:3, for the clothing drive, I admit I was disappointed, strike for idea two since mine was the only other idea in the running. I don’t feel any connection to the project chosen, but I jumped on board and measured the room and wrote a letter and made a bunch of corrections based on suggestions from the passionate few who offered them. I suppose I could have done more, passion is my forte, but I don’t feel it.
I suggested we build our teams by our color attributes because that way our skills would be divided evenly among committees, and there goes strike three for me. I have been an active member of Toastmasters Top 5 since last year and I requested I be one of the media contacts for the group because I have practiced being interviewed under a variety of situations, but was dismissed; strike four. I get discouraged too, you know, when I feel like my contributions are undesired.
WCLI has helped me grow as an individual, has placed me in a position of great opportunities, and was the impetus for finding the job I have now. I spent my service year getting myself connected to this community, and I get to spend the interim between VISTA and my fellowship (I find out in July if I will be awarded the Bush Fellowship) as a marketing intern. I feel blessed to be here in the western part of South Dakota, and I hope to become more involved in future generations of WCLI as I continue to develop my skills and make myself a more useful team member in a different capacity.
In addition, I would like to thank the Steering Committee for allowing me to create this blog. My vision for this blog was a place to brainstorm outside of class and that we would learn how to maintain a professional presence in a digital environment. I hoped that we would all post reflections after class, even just your favorite key point. I thought we could brainstorm ideas from home between classes and get our frustrations out online. When I am frustrated, I write it all out, save it as a draft until I've cooled down, and then I edit. Heavily. And when I am reasonably confident that I am not impugning anyone, I post.
I appreciate the openness of a blog for communication and criticism. I intend to use this blog on my resume to showcase my contributions to prospective employers when asked what have I done since I graduated from college. I hope that my words accomplish that goal.
