Starting in November, I began work on an electronic medical records (EMR) system at Clinica de Familia La Romana a clinic providing low-cost or free care to sex workers and HIV patients among others. The project involves an implementation of OpenMRS.

Prior to departing for Peace Corps service, the Peace Corps requires that you provide an introduction of yourself to in-country Peace Corps staff by responding to a number of writing prompts. Collectively, these are referred to as your aspiration statement. Here is an excerpt from my aspiration statement:

When considering strategies for working effectively with host country partners, I think as a Peace Corps volunteer I will wear many hats. When I read about duties in the Assignment Description like helping my community devise strategies to maintain its computer lab, I begin to envision my role as that of someone who stimulates creative thinking and invites community members to consider problem-solving from a perspective that involves what they have rather than what they lack.

To read the rest, follow this link to it’s page on Scribd (be sure to “like” it):
http://www.scribd.com/doc/42671293/Aspiration-Statement

You can follow developments during my Peace Corps years by visiting my blog at:
http://pcvcharlie.blogspot.com

“Charles has been an integral part of the team and has helped establish Innovative Changes as a viable and valuable organization in the Oregon nonprofit community.”

“Charles helped us design our curriculum, articulate our educational vision, connect with partners and potential partners, identify and reach out to donors, and translate and preserve templates for key organizational documents. “

“Integrity and a good nature have been the hallmark of Charles’s work.”

Click here to read the full article on the Innovative Changes website

To understand the challenges of running a nonprofit in Latin America, there is really no substitute for going there and working as an intern. My understanding of social enterprise has been permanently altered.

I came to pilot a program for IE3 at an NGO that provides classes in language and technology. Little did I know I would be entering at a time of gross change and upheaval within the organization. During my time there they lost a fifty-thousand-dollar government grant due to corruption and about half the staff was laid off. They had to roll back an entire area of operations, their storefront, in order to stay afloat.

As a web developer, my role was to help leverage the web as a source of income. I was immediately tasked with completing a half-cooked project written for a system I was unfamiliar with and which was completely undocumented. Add to that power outages, lapses in internet access, and floods, and it’s not hard to see the degree of challenged I faced.

Having worked under such conditions, I truly feel I can work anywhere. From my coworkers I have learned many things; how to work around technological obstacles, how to navigate corruption and office politics, and even the life skills of patience and tolerance.

I will certainly not come home the same person I was when I departed for Guatemala.

You can read more about my time in Guatemala on my Guatemala blog:
http://guatemalacharlie.wordpress.com/

For my second MECOP internship I was placed with OECO, LLC, a 300-person company located in Milwaukie, Oregon that manufactures electromagnetic devices and power conversion products, mostly for the aviation industry. I worked for Tim Krajcar, head of OECO’s three-person IT team. My role as an MIS intern mainly encompassed the development of web applications for the company intranet. My applications will be used on the manufacturing floor to support operations.

Projects

• Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) System – Web solution consisting of a comprehensive database of MSDS files kept by OECO as per OSHA requirements and an application for management of the database.
  This project consisted of several distinct sub-projects:
• Requirements gathering
• Gathering of MSDS files
• Database development
• Application development (general user and administration components)
• User education (including nearly all 300 OECO associates)
• Reconciling the digital system with the pre-existing vertical file containing physical datasheets (printing new datasheets, scanning old datasheets)
• Documentation
• Resin Mix System – Web solution to address costly miscalculations when mixing resins.
• Receiving/Inspection System – Web solution to replace existing MS Access system for processing incoming inventory before use in production.
• Electronic Stamps – Digital versions of stamps used on physical documents such as engineering drawings for a number of uses including conformance with International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR).
• Obsolescence data – Parsing of data stored in an awkward format so that it could be provided to buyers.

MSDS System

I designed the MSDS System to enable OECO associates to quickly access information on potentially hazardous materials. I did this by providing a simple search interface for them to use to look up the material safety data sheet for any of the 740+ materials used at OECO. The benefits of the MSDS System are twofold. Firstly, the time taken to locate and update MSDS files is reduced. And secondly, there is a significant cost savings associated with maintaining MSDS records in-house. An outsourcing alternative considered before I was assigned the project would have had a recurring cost of $8,952. The cost to have me do it was estimated at $5,600. That’s a cost savings of $3,352 in the first year alone.

Resin Mix System

The Resin Mix System is designed to address a problem that occurs periodically when production workers mix resins in incorrect proportions. While uncommon, when this does happen, it is often the case that large amounts of product are rendered useless and must be discarded at a high cost. Jeff Williams determined that a key reason for such an occurrence is that an associate has made an arithmetic error when calculating the various amounts of ingredients needed to mix the resin. He came to me and Tim with the suggestion that we create a system that does the arithmetic for them. While I developed a working prototype, it needs more data. What remains to be done is for a complete set of resin recipes to be added to its database.
Jeff tells me that last time a resin mistake was made, the cost was $10,044. Since this happens an average of twice a year, my solution could potentially save the company $20,088 a year.

Receiving/Inspection System

My Project for Receiving/Inspection is essentially a redesign of the system they had in place when I started. The old system is very inefficient, often forcing associates in the Receiving/Inspection department to find other things to do while thousands of records are accessed merely for the sake of displaying a handful of them. The Receiving/Inspection System I put in place requires that only the records to be displayed are loaded, thus drastically reducing the time users take to do their job.

Conclusion

Of my two MECOP internships, this one has certainly been the more rewarding and productive. I truly feel more accomplished for the time I’ve spent here and the work I’ve done.

OECO has helped me claim the benefit of a variety of technical skills including database normalization, database design, web application development, basic version control system use, use of the W3C Document Object Model, and use of ColdFusion, MySQL, JavaScript, and ajaxCFC.

In return, I have given them a complete solution for managing Material Safety Data Sheets, provided them with a potential solution to costly errors in resin mixes and developed most of what is needed to reduce lead times in Receiving/Inspection.
Here are some lesson’s I’ll take with me:

Finishing a solution is not the same as implementing it – When I wrote the last line of markup on the MSDS application, my job wasn’t finished. In fact, it had practically just begun. In order to ensure the system achieved its goals, I had to tie the processes associated with its precursor in with the new system and integrate it with parallel workflows such as the labeling of materials using it. This required that I train many people on how to use it and also that I do plenty of low-tech, labor-intensive hand work to integrate it with what was already in place.

When intimidated, start small and build up – I spent perhaps more time than was warranted hesitating out of intimidation by the Receiving/Inspection project. It seemed like such a big undertaking that I was afraid I would waste time if I took the wrong path when addressing it. I should have taken a lesson from any of my many math classes throughout the years; To tackle a big problem, you’ve got to break it into smaller problems and tackle those. Another strategy that helped was to go and talk with users to gain a better sense of the situation. This helped me to pick a portion of the whole as starting point that I could duplicate in altered form until I had about half of the project practically completed.

User buy-in and cooperation is a must – Even with all the potential benefit and the high degree of completion on the Resin Mix system, it’s fate seems uncertain without the expertise and labor required of administrative users who will have to supply it with data.

This is a truncated version of the final report I wrote for OECO and the MECOP administrators. Feel free to contact me if you want a copy of the full report

Siltronic AG (formerly Siltronic Corporation) is the world’s third-ranking producer of silicon wafers. The facility where I was employed was the company’s only production site in North America. During my time as an intern at Siltronic I worked in several capacities performing tasks in the field of information management for both Tip Rouse in Management Information Systems (MIS) and Paul McKelvey in Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES).

Projects

ADE Status Application (Paul McKelvey, MES) – Development of a text-based application to present at-a-glance manufacturing information

Physical Hardware Inventory (Tip Rouse, MIS) – Comprehensive update of a hardware database with all Windows server hardware

General Assistance (Linda Ahner, Resource Management) – Cell phone recycling, organization of physical files, misc.

Further Description

In the beginning, my principle task was to bring up to date an excel spreadsheet containing a detailed account of every Windows server in each of the three server rooms spread throughout the various buildings on campus. This required that I actually read the serial number from each “beige box” (or black box as it were) and match it to a unique hostname within the Siltronic DNS (for example “zptlas12”).

In cases where there were discrepancies (i.e. more than one hostname to a serial number, a serial number without a hostname) I would consult Tip and other members of the MIS team to diagnose the problem and adjust the record accordingly.

The reason this work was required was because, as old systems were replaced or reused and shuffled around, the record of where the various servers actually sat would become out-of-date, making it difficult for anybody to put their hands on the actual machine that needed fixed if ever there was a problem.

As time went on, and I worked in this fashion I began to develop a sense for the way the servers were named and managed so that eventually, when this project entered another phase I was in a position to apply what I had learned in the context of an IS solution. In particular, I had some ideas for adding table columns and modifying existing ones. I also wanted to look into changing processes with the aim of further leveraging the database.

The next phase took the form of inputting all the server data I had collected into a hardware database that was part of a larger ERP system designed to give members of the various teams within Siltronic a means of gathering information from various computer systems and applications used in management and operations.

I spent some time interacting with the hardware database as a user and was ready to start looking at the back end and its place in the bigger picture when suddenly Greg Bernards in Shop Floor Automation (SFA), who was in charge of the hardware database and its integration with other systems and who was going to get me started, left the company to find work elsewhere.

Meanwhile Paul McKelvey lost an intern. Given the Circumstances, it was decided that I should go over to Paul’s team and fill the other intern’s shoes.

Before I go on, it is important to describe some background. The manufacture of silicon wafers consists of essentially two parts: Growing, and processing. The silicon for our wafers was grown in monocrystaline ingots and shipped to us from Germany. We then put the ingots through processes such as “grinding”, “slicing”, “final polish”, “epitaxy”, and so on. As part of each of these processes, certain measurements of each wafer are taken by special machines called ADEs. The measurements are then gathered on systems called concentrators and stored in a number of databases.

There existed several legacy concentrators which ran an operating system called VMS (a carry-over from the old VAX systems that used to concentrate ADE data). On these concentrators there was a captive account called “ADESTATUS” which ran a VMS shell script that used a text-based menu system to let users query the concentrators to determine information about various ADES and the wafer lots running on them (wafers traveled through the “fabs’ in lots of various sizes).

The way I used to describe it to laypeople was to say that it was like a text-based library catalog you’d see at a library in the late 80s or early 90s. The only differences were that there was only a handful of books (analogous to the different processes) and that each library patron (a wafer lot) checked out only one book at a time and did so with several books in a particular order (according to its recipe).

The job Paul gave me was to develop a version of the ADESTATUS script which would run on his new Linux concentrators. I was able to do this since I had spent significant time in the months before teaching myself the basics of writing Linux shell scripts (It had been Paul with whom I had first spoken upon receiving my MECOP assignment and he had mistaken me for his own intern, telling me that I could expect to work with Linux and to be prepared).

I set out in late June and by mid September I had completed three of the five main menu options presented in the ADESTATUS script, plus an auxiliary application for the identification and assessment of emerging trends in errors which Paul had tagged on. It should be noted, however that some of the time can be accounted for when one considers the time it takes to become familiar with the concentrator file system and understand the ways data get stored and actions get logged. Furthermore, I spent a fair amount of time documenting and diagramming my efforts.

I kept a detailed daily journal of my internship which is available upon request.

Conclusion

Being that this was my first internship it’s hard to deny that some of my most important lessons came from the simple adjustment from school life to the working lifestyle and from becoming adjusted to work in an office environment. All my previous work experiences had been in direct customer service which has a very different ethic and pace of work. In the technical realm, I would have to say that Linux shell scripting was the biggest skill I learned. Thanks to this development, I am no longer intimidated by a command prompt and I have even gone on to apply this in my personal life.

The benefit I provided Siltronic was aid in their migration from legacy software to Linux, a still-ongoing and complicated process. By working with it firsthand, I gained a better understanding of what this kind of transition entails. On my last day, at my own request, I presented at an IT all-hands meeting with members of several different teams. My presentation covered in more technical detail the purpose and workings of my port of the ADESTATUS script to Linux.

It also bears mention that during the time of my internship I volunteered at a local computer co-op (Freegeek) to gain experience with Linux and with computer hardware.

Next stop, just down the road was Nike. At Nike we went from the museum-like multi-story entryway to an immense presentation room where we got our heads rocked by some rockin’ sports action and were briefed on Nike’s round robin format. Not only did they feed us, but when it came to presentations the Nike folks really got down to brass tacks. A very pleasing afternoon, all told. Next we toured some of the grounds and workout facilities on the 125-acre campus. Some might agree that the scale of things at Nike was grand, perhaps even swollen.

We said our goodbyes at Nike, and a brief stint on Sunset Highway found us parking the swollen vans stories above the streets of good old Rose City. We had come to see a number of presentations on various IS topics given by Standard Insurance employees of diverse expertise and presentation ability.

For almost three hours, we all sat inside the same warm, warm little office and watched as IS was explained from every angle as it is applied and executed at The Standard. Sakthi Angappamudali (Data Architect at The Standard) greeted us, and Greg Bergs (Assistant Vice President of IT at The Standard) provided a welcome note. OSU alumni Alisa Conklin and Justin Hart, recalled their experiences of transitioning from an OSU student to an intern and then a full-time employee at The Standard. Bernie Shadder (Data Applications Manager) talked about the role of IT in Business Success at The Standard. Tom Perkins (Senior Project Manager) shared his wisdom with regard to project management and basic prerequisites for effectively managing large scale IT projects. Roger Speigle (Data Administration Manager) briefed us on the challenges in managing data. Brian Kronstad (Director, Quality Assurance) with his humor, effectively highlighted why he views Quality Assurance as the Lifeline of IT. Sundeep Thakkar (Business Process Architect), quoted results from Gartner Research Studies and provided his view of what skills students needed to be successful in the job market. Barb Lymann (Associate Business Partner, Human Resources) shared some of her experiences at Standard. Surely, no stone was left unturned.

My special thanks to hosts John Kinney and Rick Beadnell at Nike, Sakthi Angappamudali at The Standard, V.T. Raja (OSU SIM Club Faculty Advisor), Manoj Garg (Academic Liasion, Portland SIM Club), Rene Reitsma (MIS faculty member) and my fellow SIM club Officers (Stephen Andrada, Jeremy Gragg, Michael Hatheway and Jeff Schroeder) for their contributions in organizing the field trip events. It was a pleasure to interact with Byron Marshall, V.T. Raja, Rene Reitsma and Dave Sullivan (MIS@OSU faculty members) outside the classroom environment. As we drove home to lively discussion with our professors, I felt genuine candor and camaraderie. I couldn’t help but feel a bit swollen with the sense of accomplishment and indeed reward today’s trip had given me.

Stephen
Stephen Andrada worked for LSI Logic at their Campus in Gresham where they develop custom semiconductor products. He found surprise in the great flexibility of hours LSI employees had, he himself working from 8:30-5:00 weekdays. At LSI, Stephen had the opportunity to work on four different software development projects which employed the use of things like .NET and PHP. His projects included developing electronic forms to track corrective action for “defect events” and software to process Cp/Cpk data (I’ve learned in my OM class that Cp and Cpk are statistics which are used to manage quality control).
The people Stephen worked with included test engineers, end-users, people from the department of human services, and another department called “ARO.” He said that in his position at LSI Logic it was sometimes his job to call meetings. To begin with, a lot was put upon Stephen to achieve within a short amount of time, but he was able to overcome this challenge by communicating effectively and getting from his coworkers a better sense of what exactly was needed of him to do.

Phillip
Phillip was in the middle of his second MECOP internship. He was working For Consolidated Metco, a company founded by Freightliner and later sold. Metco’s many locations included one in Canada and one in Mexico (a fact interesting when you consider that when Freightliner spoke with the SIM Club it was noted that they had no locations outside the US). At Metco, Phillip was given a twenty-thousand-dollar budget to implement wireless network security.
Phillip worked forty hours a week, 7:00-3:30 Monday through Friday. He said his position required a lot of hands-on work with servers and access points as well as purchasing research that employed the use of products by SAP. It was important that he make careful use of language and also explain things carefully. Another thing that helped him was to stay current with technology. Phillip was offered a permanent position at Consolidated Metco.

Simon
Simon Bee worked in Beaverton developing software for Leopold & Stevens, a company that makes top of the line tactical optics products (mainly rifle scopes). Simon’s description of Leopold & Stevens’ corporate culture made it sound very warm and welcoming. He noted the great trust Leopold & Stevens gave its employees regarding company property such as computers. He said that this afforded them quite a lot of freedom and ease of use.
Simon was another intern who had little confidence in his technical skills when he began. To develop the skills he would need for his job, he followed a series of training CDs. Although he did not speak to their effectiveness, he did say that they were boring. Simon’s work was demonstrated in an enormous flow chart he put together to map out a very complicated business process called “MD runs”. It seems to me that he was not quite prepared for the sheer degree of responsibility he would be given as an intern right off the bat. One of his greatest revelations was that it is best to under-promise and over-deliver.