Heather Wharton

My greatest communication strength is that I am a good listener.  I will always take the time to listen to everyone's view on a subject.  My greatest communication weakness is that it is hard for me to understand the way others think.  Although I listen to both sides of an argument, I usually continue to think my ideas are stronger. I respect their opinions, but we just see things differently.  To improve my communcation I can learn to keep an open mind.  My summit groups communication has improved this semester.  We write reminders on our white board and have weekly meetings to prepare for upcoming events.  One thing we could improve on is updates on time issues. We need to respond to texts or emails quicker for weekly meetings because many times they have been cancelled last minute.

Communication and Conflict Resolution

The class on 2/17 was focused on communication and conflict resolution.  This class was very beneficial to me because I am not a very assertive person and learning ways to communicate properly will help me in the future.  My greatest communication strength is that I am a considerate and polite person, so I do not usually offend people.  My greatest strength is that I am not assertive so I will often let things slide or not say things when I'm offended.  I do not have any communication issues with my Summit team because we are all very close and good friends.

Stephanie Dulany

Communication is key when working with a group especially when working on a project. Last class period we had in February, we learned just how important communication was with your fellow peers. Reflecting on that class, my greatest communication strength is the fact that I always want to find a solution right away rather than ignoring the problem. My greatest communication weakness is getting TOO involved when communicating my interests. Some issues do not necessarily need excess aggravation and other factors that my anger plays into. In order for me to communicate with my Summit team better, I need to be patient when I voice my issues and concerns. I also need to be able to listen to their concerns as much as I talk about my own. This improvement could help me be a better leader in the sense that I could possibly be the mediator to help with communication in order to resolve problems quickly and efficiently.

Delaney Sweeney

The communication and conflict resolution class was helpful in certain ways. I had already heard a lot of what the speaker discussed, but it always helps to be reminded. My greatest communication strength is that I listen to all sides and then make a decision. I do not base my decisions upon one story, I like to see the full picture. My greatest weakness is that I hate conflict of all sorts. I never want to get in the middle of an argument, unless is has to deal with some one hurting some one I love. I'd rather just pretend like there was no problem and move on. I think my summit team has done a lot better communicating this semester. We got a white board and write messages on it for each other as reminders and as notes if we can't make it to our weekly meetings. We also do mass texts and emails to one another. I think the only thing we could improve on is reposnse time when getting back to each other. I think I can learn to deal with conflict better so that I can deal with situations that arise more easily. I need to learn to deal with conflict because it happens everywhere, everyday.

Stephanie Dulany

Making connections and diversity are important in life as far as communicating with others around you. The acitivity we did in our last class was called "cross the line." The point of the activity was to watch your peers as they answered serious, private questions by crossing the line in the room. By seeing the individuals answering their questions, and their reactions, I was able to better understand them from a friendship/peer standpoint. This activity showed us how diverse we all were, yet how, on some questions, we had connections with some we may not have thought possible. This activity really opened my mind up to steer clear of judgments and to communicate with one another solely on the task at hand. This outlook will help me to communicate better with our project's affiliates. One of our community partners is Girl Scouts, and this tool of communication is very necessary when trying to work out problems/details, set up meetings to discuss our project, and so forth. You can get involved with ProjectAware by going to www.projectaware.org. We help to try to keep our local water sources clean and share the importance of having clean and safe water. We will try to take a few field trips to local rivers and lakes to clean up, and it is a good way to give back to your community.

Delaney Sweeney

I thought that the speaker was pretty interesting. She did a good job of keeping our attention and making it as comical as she could. I did not like the exercise we did when we had to cross the room; it put people on the spot. Questions were asked that shouldn't have been, especially after one of our summit members dad's just passed away. Our community partner does not have a website, but I will post the national partners website-- PROJECT AWARE.

http://www.projectaware.org/

Project AWARE is a non-profit organization that promotes water quality and education. Others can get involved by joining Project AWARE and doing their part to keep our rivers, lakes, and oceans clean. Anyone can join for free and get information they need to start their own project or to join some one else's.

Abby Williams

On January 27 we had a class session focused on communication.  I think the communication skills we learned were very helpful and will be useful in the future. These will particularly come into play as we communicate with various community partners such as the 4H group and the Girl Scouts.  We also participated in "the line game" and were able to learn things about everyone else in summit park, as well as in our own house.  It was interesting to see who we share opinions or characteristics with that we did not realize before.
We have a lot of exciting projects coming up this semester, so keep checking back with us! We encourage you to get involved with our water clean-ups, learn more about Project Aware, or become a member at: http://www.projectaware.org/