And so it begins...

If you haven't already, take a look at the updated map of our work sites in Hardwick, VT (follow the link from the last post).  Since the DEC sent in their project proposal some time ago, many things have changed and since I have made a couple visits out to our site, I have updated the maps.  But enough of that...
Today is the last full day of Pre-Program Week and tomorrow at 3:00PM marks when all the techniques we have learned will pay off as our Corps Members all arrive to begin their 7 weeks of leadership development, group dynamics assessment, and technical skills application.  After running around the barn all week like chickens with our heads cut off, we finally get to settle down with our Corps Members and...run around like chickens with our heads cut off -- but with 8 younger kids that don't know what they're doing.
Time again to resort to jotting down my notes from the field in my notebook and leave the luxury of a computer for the weekends.  Hopefully you'll hear from me next week, but it may not be for a little while and suddenly a pile of posts will appear backdated probably as far back as tomorrow.
Until then, enjoy "civilization."

Finally!

You may have noticed that this post does not begin, "Entry from..."  That's because I am making it up right here in front of a computer -- what an odd idea!  Until my Corps Members come on the 24th, I will be working along in the West Monitor Barn trying to get everything read for them so I actually have some time to sit down in front of a computer and put some good effort into this Blog for once.
However, not much has happened since last night...

Except that we finally got our project assignments!  Click on this link to see some of the details of our first project that will take up the first 3 weeks of the summer.  The project that we will be completing over the last 4 weeks is still in the works but I do know that it will be around the Royalton, VT area -- maybe an hour or two from this first project.  Until then, enjoy the map and enjoy the coming posts all about Pre-Program Week!

Entry from June 14th

Today was our last day of official Spike and Classroom Training and thus begins what we call Pre-Program Week.  During this upcoming week before our Corps Members arrive, we must finalize and tidy-up all our remaining paperwork, do our bulk grocery shopping, load up our work trailer, complete our worksite visits, and last but not least begin representing the VYCC as leaders and ambassadors for this organization outside the West Monitor Barn.  With the completion of our training and the majority of my concrete educational experience for this summer wrapped up, we Crew Leaders were finally given our long-awaited uniforms.  For the most part sans holes and stains, dressed with VYCC and AmeriCorps pins, and with a shiny new nametage reading Jay Snowdon: Conservation Corps Leader, my neat and folded uniform gave me a whole new sense of responsibility which came long before I even touched it with my own hands.  I had touched it with my eyes and in doing so, it touched me.  It reached out and assured me I would always have support from the HQ staff.  It told me I can do it.  In general, it became not a weight to bear on my shoulders but a symbol of responsibility, education, environmental stewardship, and something for my Corps Member to look up to and think, I can't wait to have pins and a nametag, just as I thought almost a year ago when I looked up at my Crew Leader's clean green uniform (one of my Crew Leaders from last year, Chris Ricker, is now my Field Supervisor and the person I will go to with most of my questions). 
I am writing this entry without a computer and therefore without the objectives I outlined at the beginning of this internship.  That being said, I can only slightly recall what I wrote but know even now that I didn't write nearly enough.  I learned far more during training than I thought was possible in those few weeks and know that this is only the tip of the iceberg. 
I can't wait for my Corps Members to get here.

Entry from June 6th

Spike Training, or Hitch Training as it is usually called out west, was started a week ago yesterday.  This type of outside-the-classroom training and education is designed to simulate just what it will look like when we get our crews in 18 days -- only now with 36 other Crew Leaders, not 8 younger Corps Members.  In the past week, we have learned techniques for trail building, rock splitting, stone step and check step building, water bar building, and different techniques from professional trail builders like a head officer of Professional Trailbuilders and the founder of Timber and Stone, LLC (who used to work for the VYCC).  Additionally, we got a long and detailed history of Vermont (again, from a previous VYCC Corps Member and Crew Leader), including a demonstration on a three-dimensional relief map of the 20,000-year old ice dam that broke on the Winooski River and drained all the meltwater into a young Lake Champlain in Huntington.
So far this has been an incredible educational experience and I look forward to our last day of Spike Training followed by more classroom training and visiting our future worksites all before our Corps Members get here!

Entry from May 31st

Do you remember the first day you walked into a new place full of people you have never met before?  If there wasn't any real previous instruction, everyone probably just stood around trying to make small talk while a couple people casually and quietly stood around the periphery analyzing the scene or waiting for a chance to jump in to something familiar.  Yesterday, I was one of those peripheral analysts.  Even after all my training in leadership, communication, and simple ice breakers, I am still often awkward in new environments.  After a couple hours of name games and active socializing, however, I (along with all my fellow peripheral folk) are chatting up a storm and socializing with our new friends like we have known each other for weeks, now hours.  Now, after our first full day of intensive Crew Leader training I am beginning to get excited to see the Corps Members I will be leading through this exacting same thing.  On the topic of these first couple of days, let me lay out the details of just what has happened thus far and what is supposed to happen in the near future.  To start things off, all the summer's Crew Leaders (save my Co-Lead, who is teaching abroad until June 10th) arrived at the West Monitor Barn in Richmond, VT yesterday and soon started our first round of classroom training which included an overview of VYCC history, VYCC Crew Education workshops, Crew Supervision and Support workshops, a quick overview of some of the projects the crews will be completing this year, and a look at the type of crews we will be leading this year (I will be leading the Junior Leadership Development Crew — the same crew I was on last summer).  These workshops and classroom time carried on into the next day's work, also.
As I lay for the second night on the hard lean-to floor, I am beginning to prepare mentally for the most physical 9 days I may have this entire summer as we jump into our technical skills training in the following few days.
To get yourself oriented, here is a map of the West Monitor Barn in Richmond.  The lean-tos we have and will be occupying for our near-month-long training are closer to the top-left of the farmland hidden away in the woods: