A Student Technology Intern, A Semester of Meaningful Work & A Dear Data Style Reflection

This is the latest in a series of blogs by a partnering cohort teacher - this time with a special guest!
--
By: Mike Zolnierczyk & Brett Slezak, Allegheny Valley School District

This year at Allegheny Valley School District, Mike Zolnierczyk (a senior student) and Brett Slezak (a central technology administrator) embarked on a brand new journey of creating a Educational Technology Internship, in which the two worked together to create more meaningful learning experience through hands-on work.  At the end of the semester, as a final project both of them sat down and co-created questions they thought would be interesting to know about each other’s thoughts on the program. Inspired by the Dear Data project, they answered the same exact questions separately to be able to compare each others honest responses.

Here are those responses:

Can you describe your experience in participating in the AVSD Ed Tech Internship program?

​Mike
​I enjoyed my time as the AVSD Ed Tech Intern and feel that it was a great way to change the pace of my normal day. This internship allowed me to gain valuable life experience. I have been given responsibilities and helped make decisions that have had an impact on hundreds of students. This experience will help me be successful in my future career.

​Brett
​​As an administrator taking on an intern it was a really interesting process for me.  From the beginning, with no specific curriculum in place and logistical barriers to deal with, it was a wonderful learning process in how we can think differently about the opportunities students have to do meaningful work.  I personally struggled with the idea of being the mentor of a student while simultaneously taking a very hands-off approach to managing the work Mike was doing in a daily basis. However, after settling into what that feeling was and how it would impact my approaches, I was really blown-away by how well Mike took to the idea of self-regulating his work based on what he felt comfortable with and what he felt was important.  I was also deeply impressed by the passion which he brought to working with me. Personally, I felt like I was not doing enough to keep up my end of the bargain in mentoring Mike, but ultimately I feel like I was able to see and hear more of Mike’s voice in the work that he was doing by being more hands-off. Most importantly though it helped me better understand the unique value that Mike brought to the experience.

How has inquiry or your own passions guided what you did this semester? ​

Mike
This was the first year for this internship. I was passionate about making a real difference on the school and pushed for weeks to get this approved. The Allegheny Valley School District was very accepting of the idea and saw the value in it. I feel my passion paved the way for me and others. I was able to choose what and how I learned instead of being put in a senior elective.

Brett
​Inquiry has specifically been the model that I used to guide Mike through the internship process.  I wanted the experience to be something that was uniquely rooted in who he was as a person and learner.  For this reason, I specifically set out to not be the “manager” that set daily check-lists of tasks that needed to be completed, even though I could have easily filled up his schedule with busy work that I personally did not want to complete.  Keeping this in mind, when Mike and I sat down for our first couple of meetings, we really focused on asking the question “why” he was there and “why” he felt like he needed a technology internship.  At first we got to some surface deep answers around college admissions and graduation credits, but after some deeper reflection and not moving forward until we had a solid answer to “why” we were doing this internship we got to something deeper.  Ultimately Mike told me he wanted to be doing work that was more meaningful in his senior year, something that made some type of real difference in the school, not just a filler elective class to coast out his senior year. I think once we got to this point we were able to focus in on what type of work was meaningful and what was not.  Ultimately Mike was able to forge his own path that really focused on helping teachers get more involved with vinyl cutting, as well as working with our Elementary STEAM teacher to support the work she is doing in grades K-6.

How was that experience different than what you were expecting or what people have expected of you before?

Mike
I was not completely sure what to expect because this had never been done before. I had thoughts that I would do repairs on technology and shadow my advisor. I had a lot of freedom and was able to teach the teachers how to use technology. I worked in professional development and sat in purchaser calls. This gave me an opportunity to connect with the faculty and give them a different perspective. I was given much more freedom and my responsibility grew as a result. I took pride in this and went over and above to produce professional quality work.

Brett
I honestly thought that I would spend a lot more time coming up with work for Mike to do and keeping him on task as far as to do lists and workflow timing.  I thought the idea of inquiry based learning in an internships would be a bit too theoretical and not practical enough to actually come up with a meaningful experience for Mike.  Also, I believe that “internship” has a certain connotation of essentially working to every beck and call of your supervisor as some sort of early career hazing. While I certainly would rib Mike and poke fun with him because we have a strong relationship, I certainly think that other people  were not expecting me to give him such freedom in the work he was doing. Reflecting back honestly on the process, I was expecting to have to supervise Mike more and others probably had the expectation that he would be doing all my grunt work I dislike doing, but happily I think we had an experience that was much different than that. ​

Do you feel like you understood the other person’s expectations?  How do you feel like you met those expectations?

Mike
I was not sure what was expected of me at the start of this internship. There was a great deal of flexibility and not a written curriculum. We emailed often and kept each other updated on the work we were doing. I feel that I met expectations and produced quality work. There were multiple projects that I was responsible for that would not have gotten done otherwise. I completed work to the best of my ability and made a positive impact on the school district.

Brett
I honestly wasn’t sure what Mike was expecting from me at the start of the internship.   I think maybe at first he was expecting me to have “the answer” to what he was supposed to be doing. In that sense, I guess I probably really did not meet those expectations at all (not even a little), which may have caused some anxiety at first on his part.  Over time though, I feel like we learned what to expect from each other simply by communicating (mainly via email). It seemed like Mike would come to me when one of two things would happen.  First, if he needed guidance on a specific problem or process he was working on and needed feedback. He would certainly ask when this happened. Second, I felt like Mike would come to me when he sensed that I was overwhelmed or becoming overly busy and would then ask what I needed help with.  Through this pattern that I feel emerged from the work we were doing, I believe we were able to really figure out each others expectations.

How have you grown from the experience?

Mike
This was a great experience for me. I am grateful for the flexibility and support from the district. It has helped me grow and gain real world experience that I would not have gotten in a traditional classroom. This will help me be successful in my future career in technology sales.

Brett
This experience has validated to me how the inquiry process can work to help students create work that is personally meaningful to them.  It has also given me more insight into the dynamics of what a different type of “internship” in a public high school might look like.   I have so much more confidence that students can function on their own with the right type of guidance and the permission to be themselves.  I am already looking at how I can continue on this program next year with another technology intern.  In addition, I feel like I’ve explored other ways that student voice can manifest itself and be supported in a school district.  It gives me great joy to walk around the high school and see the real meaningful work that Mike has completed. 

I’m also excited for Mike to read my responses to these questions so he can understand my perspective.  I’m realizing that as the person “in charge” of this experience, I’m just as excited for Mike to get to understand my perspective as hopefully he is excited for me to understand his.

I will miss Mike terribly next year