Just Puttin' Along

So this year has been pretty crazy. Going through so many teachers and all. I learned from these past months to just keep on truckin' and roll with the punches. I learned that whether it's the school’s fault or not, it's my future and I should not put any less effort during class just because our teacher is a substitute. We finally got our house teacher back so now I feel like were heading down the right path. I'm hoping he will be with us the entire year, which would be great! My Thanksgiving was awesome! Got stuffed like a turkey! I never got the chance to go to the Bavarian garage during break but I look forward to the next weekend I show up. This year is going by fast and I am determined to do my best this year! I promised myself that I would put God first before everything and trust in the Lord! Like it says in Matthew 6:33 "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you." I found my purpose here on earth and it's to live my life for Jesus and to save as many of my brothers and sisters as I can! I'm only here for a short time and the time is ticking for all of us! I'm here to tell you all the Jesus loves you and died for your sins! Give yourself to Him and everything else will fall into place. I can tell you that this is true because of what He has done in my life! I trust in the Lord with all of my heart and know that if I trust in Him, I will be satisfied! I'll leave you guys with this, hoping that you all take the time to question yourself on your relationship with Jesus. After all, we know that everyone lives forever, but it's in our hands to choose where we spend it, eternity with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ or in the lake of fire with the devil. I don't mean to scare you guys but this is real serious stuff, and I feel that everyone should know and question themselves about where they want to spend the rest of their lives. Love you guys! Don't forget who loves you the most! 1 John 1:9-10 "I we confess our sins, He is faithful and just forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us." Proverbs 3; 5-6 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths." Romans 10:9-10, 13 “9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. 13 For whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” And remember Romans 8:28 “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” That’s all for this post. God bless you all!

Blog 10: EQ

1. "I reviewed the rule of three for writing an EQ."

2.   
      a. What is the most important factor in healthy weight loss?
       
             This EQ meets the rule of three because it requires you to research in depth the different
              ways to lose weight in order to determine the best way. It also allows you to choose
              a stance on how to answer it since there are so many different ways to lose weight. It
              also has no errors in grammar and makes sense.
                  
      b. What is most important to securing a conviction in a criminal investigation?
               
              This EQ meets the rule of three because it requires you to do lots of research on the different 
               ways to secure the conviction. It also requires you to take a stance on answering it since
               there are different ways to secure a conviction in a criminal investigation. The question makes
               sense and does not contain any grammar mistakes.
      
      c. What is most important in creating a hairstyle that best satisfies a customer?
    
             This EQ meets the rule of three because it requires deep research on hairstyles and
              the opinions and trends of people today. It also requires you to take a stance because
              some people may think that your way of creating a hairstyle is wrong and you must
              defend that your way is best. It also makes sense and contains no grammar mistakes.
      d.  How can an anesthesiologist best treat chronic pain?

             This EQ meets the rule of three because it requires further research on how to
              treat chronic pain and the different ways to treat it. It requires you to take a stance on
              your own opinion on how to treat the chronic pain. It makes sense and doesn't contain
              any grammar mistakes.

My EQ: What are the most important factors in keeping a BMW or any Automobile maintained? 

Lesson 1 Reflection

1. Positive Statement

What are you most proud of in your Lesson 1 Presentation and why?
 
      Probably my prop, which was a spare tire, because it helped me elaborate more on the presentation.
 
2. Questions to Consider
      
      a.     What assessment would you give yourself on your Lesson 1 Presentation (self-assessment)?
               P

      b.     Explain why you deserve that grade using evidence from the Lesson 1 component contract.
                  
               I believe that I deserve the P because I hit all of my points and I believe I met all the requirements and communicated well with my audience.

3. What worked for you in your Lesson 1?
            
            I think that speaking out from my own knowledge worked well because it allowed me to flow better and not run off some sort of script. I present better when I don't plan too much.
 
4.  (What didn't work) If you had a time machine, what would you have done differently to improve your Lesson 1?

            I think that I would have been a bit more organized with my presentation because although it was filled with information, it could have been re organized in a better order to flow better.
           

Gettin' Busy

Hello everyone! This past month has been very busy for me but I was able to make a few more visits to Bavarian before the end of this month. Just a few weekends ago was my last visit which was very busy and hands on. I showed up early in the morning and was put to work right away, washing cars with two of the mechanics named Miguel and Jojo. We must have washed over ten cars in around 6 or 7 hours! I was also Nick the mechanic's wheel dolly, lifting tires up to their hubs all day long, giving me a great shoulder work out! We did the normal oil changes and brake changes all day long. I also learned how to stop the squeak of the brakes on one of the many BMW's. We took the brake pads out and he showed me how to "champer" the brakes which is basically shaving all the corners off the pad which worked miraculously, stopping the annoying brake squeal. Lastly and my favorite part out of this entire visit was when I was allowed to drive the 2013 BMW M3 which happened to be super charged with an awesome exhaust system. I was very excited to have the rare opportunity to drive such a beautiful piece of German machinery. I loved the look of that car since the first day I saw it and I was offered to drive it and was ecstatic! Even just starting up the car gave me tingles on my back, it was absolutely gorgeous and very fast! I drove it into the garage from the parking lot and gunned it a little when I had the chance and felt the power of the beast pull me into my seat! It was awesome to feel that amount of power right underneath my foot! Anyways I will stop now because I could talk about this all day. I really enjoyed that weekend’s visit and look forward to the next one! Have a Happy Halloween everyone!     



Blog 8: Research and Working EQ

1. What are the most important factors in keeping a BMW or any Automobile maintained? 

2.   Possible answers

• Visit your regular mechanic maintenance shop every month for checkups.

•  Use fuel additives to keep your car running clean and efficiently.

3. The most important source that I have used to come up with these answers is the website "howitworks.com".

4. My mentor is Pedro Miranda, the owner of the Bavarian garage in Covina. What I am doing for my mentorship relates directly with automotive repair because I'm literally being hands on, repairing and doing preventative maintenance on BMW's. 

Blog 7: Independent Component 1 Approval

1.For my 30 hours I plan on going in to the Bavarian Garage, a BMW repair and maintenance shop in Glendora Ca. I plan on doing the basic maintenance done on every BMW that enters the shop, for example, I will be doing oil changes and assisting in brake jobs. The basics of any car's maintenance starts with oil changes and simple fixes like switching out light bulbs in the headlights or brake lights. I will be getting hands on and getting my hands nice and dirty and performing the simple but most important preventative jobs, which also includes brake flushes, another preventative measure that we must do to almost every car that comes in the shop.

2. I plan on taking pictures of all the oil changes and brake jobs done while I am there to show the 30 hours of work.

3.Doing this project will help me learn the basics of auto repair and give me lots of experience, which is a necessity when it comes to automotive repair because you must get your hands dirty in order to learn, like Nick a mechanic at the garage said, " You gotta git your hands, dirty ya know?". That is the best way to learn about cars, by just "getting in there" and take things apart and put them back together and learn from it.

Clean Is Better

So I went last weekend to do some more hours at the Bavarian Garage and we got busy! We had a car waiting for us right when we walked in. I worked with Nick, one of the mechanics and we did work on few different cars. We first changed the "halo ring" part of the headlights on a early 2000's BMW, which required us to take the entire bumper off, which was ridiculous but had to be done. We also did an oil change and a brake flush on that same car. Then we moved on the to the next car and replaced the radiator, water pump, and thermostat which took us around an hour. The I worked with Jojo, the "Big Dog" around the shop who has had over thirty years experience working on BMW's at the dealership. He showed me how to change the brakes and rotors on the last car and he did in amazingly fast, he did the rear wheels in about 15 minutes. What I learned that day from Nick the mechanic was that the main goal of the shop is to keep everything clean, he says "clean is better!". The main goal for the shop is to keep there customers cars running cleanly and effectively, to do all of the work for the owners. It was a great experience meeting and working with Jojo and I'm looking forward to my next visit.

Blog 6: Second Interview Preparation

1. My mentor is Pedro Miranda and he is the owner of the Bavarian Garage. A BMW maintenance and repair shop.

2. My five questions I will ask:

      1. What made you want to work on BMW's and open up your own shop?
      2. Where did you start your journey to becoming a BMW specialist?
      3. What was the most challenging part of getting where you are now?
      4. How did you open up your own shop?
      5. What was the biggest factor that helped you to succeed in opening your own shop? 

Blog 5 - Mentorship Reflection

1. My experience getting a mentor was not very difficult for me. One reason is that contributed to an easy search for me was the seemingly never ending supply of mechanics shops to ask around my house and at one point I even considered making my own grandpa my mentor since he has had plenty of experience and know-how to teach me lots about auto repair. I have always loved cars and motorcycles, it's in the blood of my whole family, which also made it easier because many of my uncles and cousins are mechanics themselves, and know plenty of other mechanics for me to try and ask. But before I made my final decision to make my grandpa my mentor, I had came up on a great opportunity. My step dad is a barber and cuts peoples hair from all over the place, he happened to be cutting our friend Nick the mechanic's hair and told him about it and he told me to speak to PJ or Pedro, the owner of the BMW shop he worked at and to ask him about it. So I asked him and he was willing to let me come in a and learn, and things went on since then and he has been great so far. 

2. I would say that the most important article I have read so far has been, "What That Car Really Costs To Own" because it answered a lot of the questions I had about BMW's and there cost to own. It gave good statistics on many different cars which gave good insight on how much it would be. For example, they gave a table that showed the ratio of an assortment of cars' costs in the time of five years, the ratio was comparing operating costs with carrying costs, carrying costs consisting of depreciation, interest, and tax while operating costs consists of fuel, insurance, maintenance and repair costs. This gave a great look on how each cars expenses change over time, and really showed me how much a really nice car costs to own over a good amount of time.

Mentorship

            Hello everyone!! So Friday I went to my mentorship, which is at a BMW repair/maintenance shop in Covina. It is called the Bavarian Garage. I went in to interview one of the mechanics there at the shop, I know all the mechanics there so it wasn't hard to find one to ask questions, it was hard to get them to give good feedback and not goof off! They are all very nice dudes but are also crazy and like to have fun too. But I finally found one that answered with good answers. It was a good experience even though I didn't get hands on that day. I cannot wait to finally get my hands dirty and crank on one of the cars. I consider myself very lucky to be able to work with mechanics of such caliper, most of the mechanics there are very smart and know these expensive cars inside & out. I am hoping to learn a lot this year so that I can use my own knowledge on my own vehicles and not have to pay some guy to do the job, and possibly come up on a job opportunity. Have a great three day weekend guys!! 

Blog 4: Interview Preparation

         1. I plan on interviewing my mentor, Pj or one of his employees, Nick because they are both very knowledgeable of my subject and are capable of giving strong and reliable answers.

         2. Additional Questions:
                                1. What do you think is the most expensive item to maintain in a BMW?
                                2. In your opinion, is buying a BMW worth all the money?
                                3. What would you say is the biggest/most common cause for repairs in the shop?
                                4. If you had to choose between a BMW and an American made car,
                                      what would you choose?
                                5. Would you prefer a turbo charged or a super charged car? Why?
 

Blog 3: Topic Choice and Working EQ

1. Topic: BMW Maintenance and Repair

2. Research Question: What are the most important factors in keeping a BMW or any Automobile maintained?

              

Blog 2: Summer Mentorship

Blog 2: Summer Mentorship

         

1. Summer Mentorship Log

2. Contact Name & Number:

  Pedro Miranda:: 626-372-05689

3. Questions Raised:

   About how much do these people pay to have they're alternator replaced?

  

   What will I learn in the time to come?

   Will I learn more about the electronic tuning needed to be done to a car with a new engine?

   Will we eventually take out a transmission from one of the cars?

   Does it cost more to have an older BMW or a newer BMW to be worked on?

4.  What is the most important thing gained from this experience?

   The opportunity to watch how an engine is pulled out and how to use the lift to get it out.

5. Senior Topic:

    My senior topic is going to be automotive repair. Doing my mentorship hours here led me to further confirm my topic choice because I loved being there and it was a great experience to be able to work in a top notch shop.

Blog Assignment 1

Blog Assignment 1

  What presentations did you see?

                        Ski Patrol- Jackie Boyd
                        Soccer Training- Jasmin Quiroz
                        Photography Galleries- Viviana Bravo
                        Bodybuilding- Christian Velez
                        Military Leadership- Samantha Cooper
                        Boxing- Alfredo Nunez
                        Basketball- Leo Larino
                        Surfing- Garett Soapes
                        Landscaping- Juan Rizo
                        Electrician- Cesar Lopez
                        Brazilian Jiu Jitsu- James Britt
                        Coffee Shop Management- Brandon Rodriguez
                        Strength Training- Adrian Olivares
                        Automotive Repair- Junior Rico
                        Fire Protection- Christian Vasquez

What questions do you have that haven't been answered about the senior project?

             - How early can you get the rubric for your final presentation, the one with the colored boxes that I had seen them looking at sometimes?

What has the most important part of the senior project based on what you are seeing in the 2-hour presentations?

             -  I thought that the most important part of the senior presentation was to make time and make sure you explain all three answers and your best answer.


What topic are you considering doing and why?

             -  I am considering doing something that has to do with cars, most likely repairs or modifications because it is a subject that I am passionate about and I thought that it would make things easier if I did my project on something I love.

What are you doing for your summer mentorship?

             - If I stick with the subject of automotive, I might end up doing my mentorship with my grandpa or one of my cousins who is a mechanic.