For my extern position I worked with Kendal Gray at the EIJATC with a headquarters in Pocatello, but the trade college is out of Blackfoot. I had the chance to learn the process that the school uses for applicants, the interview and selection process based off of a point system. I helped the school create a record of intern hours for their students, helped make student’s school transcripts, and include a count of work performance forms that the students had submitted. I had an interesting time seeing how to use welding, grinding, and threading equipment in working with stainless steel pipes, and was able to learn how pipefitters use math to calculate angles, length, diameter, using the same math skills that me students are learning how to master. I learned a lot about how unions operate in funding trade colleges, and how pay is calculated based off of skill and years of experience. I learned how employees of the union pay dues and what those dues are used for (insurance, schooling, union staff). I had the opportunity to use what I learned to help make letters out of stainless steel pipe, by using math, drawing the dimentions, and cutting, spot welding the parts together, and those pipe letters will be used as part of the sign that will go out in front of the union offices in Pocatello. One of the aspects that was neat to see about the trade college was how that they work within a state and region with different companies and universities to determine where a student gains professional expereince to be able to count in their placement in the program. I really enjoyed seeing the school, and how they used math, the tools and equipment, as well as the learning enviornment to help teach their aprentices the professional skills that they needed to be able to do professional work that had a good salary, retirement, benifits that can go anywhere with them. I observed how the students attitudes going into the application, testing, interview and skill sessions influenced their employability along with the actual abilities to use the technology and math, and I felt that it helped me visualize the type of professional mind frame and skills that I could help my students master so that they can be sucessful in careers that use technology. Kendall (the EIJATC school operator) made a great point that often times kids will say they will never use the math that we spend so much time teaching them, however in the plumbing and piperfitter, or construction world professionals do use those math skills, and seeing it being used in that type of a professional setting helps me feel that the gap is that students need to use it in more meaningful ways that they can get excited about the math that they are learning, and I feel like it can get my students more excited that what they are learning in school has real meaning and isn’t just numbers and information on a test. I feel like this STEM opportunity to experience a field that was so different from what I have ever done was a great experience for me as a teacher because it made me more aware of careers around me, and that helps me have more ideas about how I can present information to my students in a meaningful way that helps them to be more qualified to work in different industries that can target kids with very different interests.