Weekly Wrap-Up

The wrap-up from last week is coming to you on Monday morning, because the week spilled over a bit into my weekend. This was good, because I was having a more challenging time getting focused last week, and I was able to pick up momentum again over the weekend. The tasks that I have for this year are pretty in-depth and go in several different directions, so it is easy to get lost in it if I step back too far and look at all that there is to accomplish. I need to be able to focus in a bit more on the smaller things so that I can keep things moving towards that big picture.

Here is where I wound up on my goals:

• Attend city council meeting on Thursday (again) and make introductions. 
• I did this! Whew. I look forward to working with the city and council members as I go forward with the needs assessment and program development.
• Finish, or at least get close to finishing, the volunteer manual.
• Meeeerr. I need to get some more focus together for this. Lynn, the library director, had to make a last-minute trip out of town last week, and I was hoping to do this conjointly with her so that we cover all the bases. This will be tabled until she is back in town and has some free time. 
• Have a final draft of my survey/interview so that I can begin doing interviews.
• I am CLOSE. I chatted with several people in town over the week and have some of my questions narrowed down. I am going to spend some time with the city administrator tomorrow as we travel together to a meeting, so I will have this done (hopefully) tomorrow or the next day. 
• Promote and conduct the teleconference for people looking to start their own business.
• Done! I had three people attend the teleconference, which I thought was pretty good for the first one, especially because there were several other events going on at the same time. 
• Get some things together and scheduled for Alaska Book Week. 
•  Still working on collaborating with some folks to get this happening. 

Other things that happened:

•  I completed a volunteer assignment worksheet for my online class, which will actually be very useful to me in working on different volunteer positions.
• I was able to get some last-minute things together for the library computers to run a live web conference on gun wound first-aid, which was able to benefit a couple members of the community who will get CEU credits for their emergency responder certification. I was also able to learn from this that there are several members of the community who would be interested in having this kind of medical education for their own knowledge or for various certifications.
• I found some good resources that are made available through the Institute of Social and Economic Research through the University of Anchorage that will help inform the work that I am doing over the course of the year.
• I met with Representative Jonathan Kreiss-Thompkins, who is the elected state representative for the district in which POW Island is located. We brainstormed a bit about the question presented in my VAD and I was able to gain some insight into how Coffman fits into the island community and Southeast Alaska as a whole.
• I participated in a webinar on using social media at VISTA sites. It was somewhat helpful, but a lot of the ideas are not very applicable in rural communities. 

On the agenda for this week:

• Volunteer manual? This will be worked on throughout the week but may not be finished, as it is up for final review and input from Lynn when she returns.
• Have a final draft of my interview questions. Really! 
• Get an event together for Alaska Book Week.This has been dependent on me hearing back from teachers and getting their input, but if I don't nail down a way to coordinate with the schools this week, then I will go ahead and create an event that will not be run during school hours. 
• Attend POWCAC (Prince of Wales Community Advisory Council) meeting on Tuesday. This is where people from all the communities on the island come together to discuss matters that impact the people who live on the island.

I just want to keep writing things on here that I can be doing, but I am trying to keep myself from biting off more than I can chew, and I already have items on here that have been rolled over from last week. I am hoping that I will be able to stay a bit more focused and get some stuff done!