The First Day

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Captions

1. This is what greats me when I step out of the car. The sun shinning on the marina at the end of Liberty Station. This is located right outside SeaBotix. One word came to mind. . . Wow!

2. This is Adam, he is one of the employees I am working with. He is displaying the norm for our 'dress code'. Jeans and collared shirt or as my mentor puts it 'smart casual dress'.

3. This is where I do most of my work. The computer is not set up yet but it turns on, yay! I was super surprised when I found out I got my own work area.

4. This was the fun part, driving the ROV. This is what I will be getting to do hopefully a lot because this vehicle is scheduled to be released soon. Right then I was driving it so it would not tangle up in the tether (the line that holds the wires to make the ROV work).

5. This is just a picture of the ROV in the water.

6. This is all the electronic components we were running at the time. It struck me because didn't think that so many components were needed to run an ROV. (then I was told that we were running extra settings and test)

Sarah's Questions

1. How is the recession impacting your business or institution?

A: It has slowed our overall growth. However our core product has grown 20% in the previous year, 2009.

2. What is the role of your business or institution in the economy?

A: We have a product line which has a diverse sales demographic. Therefore there is consistent and level growth.

3. If the economy begins to drastically drop again, how will your company fair?

A: By having a diverse market we are less susceptible.

4. Do you see the effect of the recession in the amount and the type of consumer demand?

A: Yes. The private sales are down because money is not nearly as available as it was eighteen to twenty months ago.

My Day

The photo listed as #1 is what greeted me this morning at 8:21AM. The only reason I knew the time was because I had been staring at the clock for half of the ride to school and then to my internship site. Unfortunately there had been no traffic to detain us and my brother left with no complaint. So as i step out and say good by to my mom, I turn to the main building and walk in. I say to the receptionist and get my name tag. My mentor has not come yet so we talk about how our holidays were and so as we talk I start to feel calmer, more excited instead of nervous. My mentor walks through the door (I don't have a cool slide key yet), and reintroduces me to the people I will be working with. Most I have met before but some I don't know at all.

After introductions are made I ended up standing awkwardly not know what exactly to do. My mentor is sitting at his desk looking very busy. I walk up to him and ask "Is there something I can start working on?", he looks at me and go "Oh yes of coarse" . He hands me two purple folders, and tells me to go through them and edit anything that does not sound right or has a mistake. As i go through the folders I find out they are manuals for the ROV we ended up testing later that day. For the next three hours I go through both manuals and right as many changes as i could find or correct. I did not dawn on me till I got home that the corrections I made would end up in the final product. Kinda cool.

By the time lunch is over I have nothing to do and my mentor is in interview's. I ask Adam if I can go down to the dock, I had just seen the garage unit for an ROV head that way. He says that it's fine with him as long as I get the OK from whoever is working there. Best decision ever to ask if I could go. When I get to the dock I end up helping set up the equipment for the test being conducted. This test was to see how the censors were working on the garage pulley for the tether that was connected to the ROV. At first they wanted me to launch the ROV from the garage and I proceeded to tell them it was not a good idea; I'd break it. Once it was out and a couple of test had been run I got to drive it and make sure the new HD camera was working. It was really cool to conduct. We also had the special treat of seeing a dolphin that SPAWARE was working with in their free floating pen.

I was suppose to leave at 3:30PM just like a normal school day, but I ended staying till 4:30 so I could help with the ROV test and caring the generator back up to SeaBotix. As I was signed out and waited for my mom I realized that my first day ended up being better than I thought it would.