Scarsdale High School

JUST PRIOR TO SENIOR OPTIONS:

Mentors and Mentees should meet to:

• Confirm placement and plans with sponsors  and contact sponsor to confirm all details.
• Schedule regular times to meet with your mentor, share journal entries and hand in time logs.
• Discuss expectations regarding the Senior Options journal requirements.

DURING SENIOR OPTIONS:

• Go to your internship according to the agreed upon/approved hours.  

Students may not: (POTENTIAL GROUNDS FOR FAILURE)

• Work for pay or compensation, even for transportation (there must be no monetary association between you and the internship site).
• Work at a place of present employment.
• Be supervised by or work with a family member.
• Be sent home to do work or work while you are away/out. The sponsor must be around at all times.  

Legal Absences:

• Prom days: 5/29-5/30/2025 (off)
• Memorial Day: 5/26/2025 
• Senior transition day: 6/2/2025 (off)
• Sick days – if you are legally sick, you are responsible for contacting your sponsor (these hours must be made up).
• College orientations:
  • Students who can provide documented evidence that they must attend a college orientation during Senior Options because there are no other possible dates will have those precise days and those days only treated as an excused absence.

On the job:

• Complete 29 hours of work per week (plus one meeting per week with mentor).
• Have your supervisor sign a weekly time sheet

Travel

• If you travel more than 1 hour EACH way you can deduct 30 mins from your S.O. hours per day.  So if you travel 1 hour to your internship and 1 hour back home 5 days a week you can deduct 2.5 hours from your internship.  This means that instead of 30 hours you are required 27.5 hours.

At your mentor meetings (once/week):

• The minimum meeting time is weekly. The optimum time is about the length of a class period face to face. Meetings can be electronic via e-mail, IM, or video conference if necessary (such as with international internships).
   
• Mentors can, at these meetings, help you solve problems you face either with tasks or your sponsor. They are your partner in this adventure. Get their help. If you need them to call your sponsor because you are not getting their full promised cooperation… ask them to call.
   
• What matters is the quality of the conversation. Are you teaching your mentor what you’ve learned and they don’t know?  Are you having intelligent, adult conversations about something that you are becoming expert in?  Does the time go by so quickly that you don’t know where it went?
   
• If those things are not happening, you must ask yourself why. Your mentor will help you, but you must ask, “Why don’t I have anything interesting to say?”  If you don’t have anything interesting, check your journal. Is it interesting, or is it merely a list of:  today I did….
   
• Mentors will also be doing bureaucratic duties.
  • They will be checking for quality of daily journal entries.
  • They will be checking and collecting your signed weekly time logs.
  • BOTH are requirements for Passing. They may have to send home progress reports too.
     

• Finally, use the last meetings to have our mentor help you with your presentation or, at the very least, check it for you. 

Problems:

If you, with the help of your mentor still can’t solve a problem, you and your mentor should ask the Case Manager assigned to your mentor for help. If the problem still isn’t solved, ask Mr. Lamela, the Senior Options Coordinator.

• Your presentation is an opportunity to share your experience with other students, your mentor, your sponsor and your parents.  On average this is a 20 minute presentation during a specific slot on presentation day. 
   
• Your presentation should discuss an overview of your internship and what it was like/what you did.  It be engaging.  Include pictures and videos and do not overwhelm it with text.  Here are some examples 
   
• Give your presentation a shape -- make sure it has a clear beginning, middle and end.
   
• Involve the audience -- consider what would engage you if you were sitting and listening to the presentation.
   
• Analyze what you liked or disliked about the experience.
   
• Describe problems you encountered; explain how you solved those problems.
   
• Comment on surprises.
   
• Comment on how your goals altered as the option developed.
   
• Reflect on what you learned about the field or subject and what you learned about yourself.
   
• Read from your journal.
   
• Tell stories.
   
• Provide illustrations; show as much as you tell. Use AV materials to enhance the quality of the presentations.
   
• Offer sketches of the people with whom you worked.
   
• Comment on what you would do differently next time.
   
• Comment on whether you would recommend this experience to others.
   
• Comment on how this experience might affect your future plans.
   
• Upload to your Senior Options Google Classroom.
• Also, equally important-Dress appropriately.  This is your final presentation in high school.  What would you have worn in the office or at your location?