The Internship

As my internship comes to a close, I will take a lot away from this internship. It has been a great experience and has given me more of an insight into how the state runs programs. I also have learned how much cooperation it takes to have successful programs. I have also learned that there are many people who are very passionate about their work. They are there to serve the public and want to make this are a better place. Some of the values and commitment that some of these employees exhibited is something that I want to incorporate into my own career.

Black Friday

My wife and I have a tradition to go out on Black Friday and get most of our Christmas shopping done. This year was a lot less chaotic than last year. Last year we waited in lines forever. This year we were in and out of the stores that we went to. Last year we were thinking of getting a LCD TV. There was a great price on one but the store we went to had ran out of them. There were even better prices this year but we still have not purchased one. We have been unable to justify buying one. We have a pretty good TV right now so we may wait a little more.

United Way

The director for the department that I have been doing my internship has moved on to the United Way. This is a good idea since Governor Napolitano is moving on as well. The higher up positions may be replaced by the new governor and they may lose their jobs. I am happy for her moving on and the United Way sounds like a great place to work.

Resort in Phoenix

My wife had a CME conference in Phoenix and so we were able to stay in the Hilton Resort. The resort had a small water park which was one slide and a couple of swimming pools. They were all heated and we went out and swam in the afternoon. There were also a lot of hot tubs that were open until 11:00. We bought a lot of candy and watched movies all night. It was a fun relaxing weekend.

A New Home

My wife and I are moving into a new home at the beginning of the year. This is our first home and we are way excited. Our new house has some great extras that are really cool. We have been having fun looking at different ways to paint and decorate. It is great to get out of renting and paying for a house that we can gain equity in.

Legislature

In this office the legislation that is passed can have a large effect on this office. Every time there is a bill that has been introduced in legislation people email it around the office. If it appears that the bill will pass the office will start to make a plan on how to implement it. This is a fun experience because it really helps you get involved in the legislative process and the laws that are being introduced and passed.

Cubicle Life

I have never had a job where I worked in a cubicle. I am in a cubicle and the life in a cubicle is a different experience. There seems to be this large maze of cubicle spaces and for the first few days I would get lost in this big mess. It starts to drive me crazy when I have sat in there all day. I find that the walls begin to close in on me. The crazy thing about this is some of these people have worked in that type of environment for years. I don't know how long I could work in this type of environment. I really respect these people that can continue to work in this environment without getting lost in madness.

Security

I need to go out into the foyer to use my cell phone because I don't get reception in the office. When I was in the foyer I watched as people went through security and the officers. The officers seem to do a good job, however sometime I see some very questionable characters that just stand and sit around in the foyer. I guess they know what they are doing better than I do.

Time of Internship

I have found that there are few people at the governors office that come to work early. I found this interesting because I live in the East valley and find that if I don't leave the house by 6:30 it will take me double the time. I arrive at my internship at 7:00 and am usually the first one there. I can leave early at 3:30 and get my 8 hours in. This has been great because I miss all the traffic.

Personality Tests

We had a meeting that involved the whole division of children, youth, and family. The people that gave a presentation to us were people that evaluated personalities and this would in turn help the certain employees to know how to interact with each other effectively. It was very interesting that many of the directors were in the category of being basically book worms and they were those who love to do research. These people liked educating themselves and read text book type material. I for one was not in this group, in fact that was the personality I was least like.

Back to School Drive

One of the projects that I was able to help work on was a back to school drive that was done. The person in charge had put many drop off boxes across the city. There were many people that donated lots of large amounts of office supplies. What was needed most were back packs. These are the most needed of all the supplies because they are more expensive than the other supplies.

Governors Office

I was given a tour to the top of the Governors office. It was very interesting to see her office and the board room. The person that was giving me the tour showed me a staircase that was put in by a former governor. It is elaborate and gives the office more of a official look. This was done out of the tax payers money just to make the office look better. The lady showing me the office said it was a very frivolous upgrade.

Iowa's Exective Order

A part of my research has included finding executive orders that are from other states for the purpose of reducing the number of minorities that are detained. There are some states that have initiatives to do so but Iowa has an actual executive order that was issued by the governor to help reduce the disparity of minorities being detained. Here is the link to the executive order http://publications.iowa.gov/5705/1/05-071030.pdf the executive is a model for one that is being developed to bring forward to the governor. I have been assigned to find as much information as I can on this and then help right up the executive order that will be given to the governor.

Environment of the Children, Youth and Family Department

One of the best things that I have seen here at my internship is the way that people help each other. There is a good environment and it seems that everybody sees the many goal of the division and they are willing to help other out when they need it. The people seem to work out any disagreements quickly and there very kind to each other.

An Example of the Minority Committe

There is an inspiring example of how someone changed the problems with the minority disparity in juvenile detention centers. In Washington there is a man who helped change the problem. The statistics showed that the there was a proper representation of each race in the juvenile detention centers. It seemed like a great success. But when we looked into it closer to see how they accomplished this we found that one man ran the juvenile detention and he himself changed which people were put into juvenile detention centers. This was interesting because in Maricopa county it is to complicated for this type of effort. So this is not viable for our situation.

State Minority

Some of the problems that are faced by this department is the incarceration of minorities. There is a committee committed to trying to reduce the number of minorities that are put in to detention. This committee is set up to reducing these problems throughout the state. One of my research projects is to see if there have been executive orders done that have to do with setting up a task force that would have authority to help change these problems throughout the state. There have been little done in the past about this problem. But there have been a push to change this throughout the country and there have been rising awareness of this problem throughout the United States.

Down Time

At this internship there has been a lot of down time. They have told me that this is slow time for the year. I have been doing a lot of research still for them, but I have come to dead end on a lot of it. So know I have gone around the office to try and find people that need help. I have been helping people move boxes and helping set up fundraiser for under privileged children.

Research

I have been doing a lot of research for the division for children. I have done research on what states have laws that determine the punishment for juveniles who have committed crimes. There were many solutions in states but most of them stated that they would have to be put in a juvenile detention for a judge determined amount of time. They then are placed on probation and will be assigned a probation officer. The reason for my research is that the governors office is looking to update the law and to see if there are other innovative practices around the nation.

Children's Welfare

I have been invited to a few meetings between the governors office and other departments. It has been interesting to see the complexity of some of the issues and the amount of effort that is put into the issues. One of the issues that they have discussed is children welfare. The questions that were brought up was how to help children that have parent who have been incarcerated. Some of the participants were from CPS and some from law enforcement. There were also some doctors there that worked with CPS. This is an ongoing issue that has taken a lot of effort. This meeting was missing some participants so they talked about the agenda for the next meeting. Which included how to give personal one on one attention to the children.

An Intro to David Walker

I am originally from Utah and completed my undergrad in Criminal Justice. I attended DeSales University in Pennsylvania. My wife also received her masters as a Physician Assistant there at DeSales and she works in pain management.

I have been married for 4 years and we have no children yet but we do have a dog named Riley. I love sports and follow most of them. I also enjoy playing sports and spending time with my family. I also enjoy reading and music.

We have lived here in the Phoenix area for about a year and we love it. My brother and his family also live here so it is nice to have family near to us.