Today, I started my first day of Work Experience at the local Paper! I was so excited to start! It took a while for my Work Experience teacher and I to find a placement for me. I was thrilled when we finally did though. All the work and planning is done and I finally get to start my job.
The work experience course is highschool is meant to give students an oppourtuunity to go out into the work force and pick a job that they might be intrestered in doing when they leave highschool. They pick a job that they are interested in learning about and I get to complete one hundred hours of Work Experience there. I have some of experience with writing articles for the local news paper, and some with reporting as well, so, with some help deciding, I thought working at the paper would be a perfect fit for me.
Students are expected to attend work once a week. My day to go is always on thursdays. I had a meeting at Paper, which is called the Valley Echo, at 9;00. I had planned to go in my wheelchair all by myself. I wanted to treat it like a real job, and in reality, I wouldn't have someone dropping me up off at work. That is a little less professional. There is no snow on the ground so I decided I should take advantage of the nice weather and wheel down. I left home, got a good luck hug rom my parents , and went to work.
One thing I was a bit concered about was weather or not I would be able to fit m chair in the small building or not, but that worked out perfectly.. I worked in the back room, so I just parked my chair right outside.
First, the ladies that I worked with, Renice and Nicole, sat down with me and we talked about what I would like to do at the Valley echo. Ater chatting we came up with a few good ideas One of them was for me to put copies of this blog in the paper. As I continue to write more, people are starting to know more about my blog. I am excited to put in out there a little bit more. Be ready for lots more blogs, because I have to write lots them to have something to put in the paper. We also talked about writing some articles about things that are going on around town. The last thing we discussed was the idea of me wriiting a profile once a week about someone who has a diverseability. I get to interview people in town and ask them about what their life is like, liviing with their challenges. I think tthat will be my favorite thing to write about in the the paper. There are a lot of people living in Invermere with diverseabilities. A lot of them are invisible to the eye. I would like to draw attention to the fact that people don't have to be in a wheelchair to have struggles in their lives Everyone has different struggles. We tend to forget about that and sometimes the people with the invisible diverseabilities get a little bit left behind. I think they deserve a little bit of recognition as well. What they go through isn't always easy. I hope that by doing this, I'll help some people get to be heard, and be a little bit more accepted in this town, and that the town will be just that much more diverse.
I only stayed for a half day today, being my first day at the paper. Renice and Nicole were quite busy, so they couldn't be by my side the whole time. They thought I wouldn't have very much to do, but I thought I kept quite busy, and I had fun too. Everyone that writes for the paper has to introduce themselves a bit to valley as a new writer. They do an article about each new staff member. I had to write a little introduction about myself. Then, I got to file some newspapers. I had to organized them by the date they were written. I loved doing that. The Valley Echo keeps every paper it's ever written, so if someone was in an issue a while back, and they wanted to keep it for memory sake, or to show off, they could get it from them. It was so awesome to see all the old versions of the Valley Echo. It was hard not to read them instead of work. I recognized some of the things that they talked about in the older papers.. It was really cool.
I came back to school this afternoon, with a big smile on my face. I was so excited to tell everybody about my day. It feels so great to be in the working field. I've had volunteer jobs before, but this is like getting ready for a real job. It's really important for me to be able to go to work independently. I feel like I am capable of anything when I go to work. I may have Cerebral Palsy, I can still have a job, and that feels awesome. Every time I complete a milestone like this, I get more and more independent. It feels amazing, really it does. I can live a very productive life and do the same things you can do. I just have to believe that I don't have any limitations. I can do anything!
Renice and Nicole were awesome. They didn't question what I could do at all. They just told me what I needed to do for them and left the decision to me on weather or not things were too much for me to handle. I had an awesome day. I have some work to do. I have to set up an interview with someone so I can put it in the paper. I will be pretty busy. I'm very excited to be starting at the Valley Echo. It's going to be lots of fun. Thanks to Renice and Nicole for giving me the opportunity to work with you. I had a blast
I'm glad I got to tell you about my day. I feel this job is a perfect fit for me. This is Reporter Kate Gibbs, signing out after a great first day at the office. Bye for now.
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