Thank You

Dear City of Apache Junction:

I want to thank you for what has been a wonderful internship thus far. I cannot simply state in words how grateful I am for the opportunity to learn under city management, finance, and human resources. Every day I learn about how much I do not know, which encourages me to work even harder and learn as much as I can before I finish in late July.

I especially appreciate the mentorship that Matt Busby and Bryant Powell have offered, allowing me to ask many questions and to gain from their wisdom through active listening. Without their leadership and the kindness of the rest of the Apache Junction staff, the internship in the city manager’s office would not be the same.

A simple and short thank you is not enough to express my gratitude for the education I have received already in a little over a month. I am looking forward to finishing my projects in Apache Junction and I am excited for all of the new things to come.

All the best,

Boaz Witbeck

The Lessons I’ve Learned

For my internship with Apache Junction, I have learned an exorbitant amount of beneficial information. I am very grateful for the amount of effort that the city manager’s office and other employees within the City of Apache Junction have offered to support me in my master’s of public administration (MPA) internship.

As a student, I pay for my internships because I believe in the power of having real world experience to apply what I am learning in the classroom. I have accomplished that basic goal, but more specifically I will address the three goals that I wrote about in my very first blog:

1. To learn the many ways that the CIP fits into the overall budget plan and to find the best fit from the options I will research for AJ
2. To build professional relationships and get to know the roles and importance of various persons within the city manager's office
3. To prepare myself to be a budget analyst and a future leader in city government

For simplicity’s sake, I will address whether I have accomplished these goals so far in a list of three corresponding comments:

1. This first goal of the CIP is actually one of the main goals that has not come to fruition. It is quite ironic that the primary project I thought would be consuming my time is barely a blip on the radar. Instead, I am editing and organizing the content of the city’s budget book, collecting and creating organizational charts from all the city departments, and doing research for other important managerial issues.
2. I have definitely been able to build good professional relationships and learn about the importance of many departments in AJ. I am offered many opportunities for quality time with both Assistant City Manager (who is actually acting as the interim City Manager) Bryant Powell and Assistant to the City Manager Matt Busby. They both are previous interns, know where I am coming from, and want to help me have the best experience possible at AJ. I have also come into contact with multiple department heads with my projects and it has been very rewarding to learn about everything the city does and how it functions as a whole.
3. I do believe I am much more prepared for the next step in my career likely as a budget analyst or perhaps even an assistant to a city manager. I want to be involved in local government in the future and I will be able to use my experience in AJ to talk about my skills and knowledge as a future leader and administrator.

The most important thing I have learned from this internship is that I like the job of working in the city manager’s office and is something I can see myself doing for years to come. I enjoy the challenge of communicating with many people with various personalities and multiple types of issues at once. I thrive off of difficulty and excelling in potentially stressful situations.

Although I do not know if I want to work in city government all of my life, I see it as a next step to bigger and better things. And as long as I keep learning, I’ll keep growing not only in my career, but also as a person.

"Career Services" Must Die

Andy Chan, the Vice President for Personal and Career Development at Wake Forest University in Florida, says Career Services must die. 

In this online lecture about how students and career advisers should approach "Career Services", Chan says that college recruiters often leave students disillusioned by the end of four years about why they should get a good education.

One of the many reasons why people get an education is to get a better job and hopefully make more money than if they did not go to college. And perhaps that's the immediate case with some professions, for example science and engineering. There are some specialized skills that one must learn in college to be able to be the most successful as an engineer or a scientist.

However, a lot of people, including myself, go to college for a liberal arts degree. I got dual degrees in political science and economics. Although I could have chosen a career path as political scientist or an economist, that's not what I'm doing now. I am working in a call center for American Express, delivering great customer service every day (which I am very grateful and count myself blessed to have). 

But I didn't need a degree to get the job, and as Chan says, this is why there is a lot of angst among college graduates--they either aren't finding a job or are working in a job they could have gotten maybe a year or two out of high school.

A good job does not come easily. A lot of times employers are looking for people with experience and don't count a degree as business experience.

But thankfully there is another side of the coin. Businesses and employers have communicated to career services that they want to hire the best student available that is interested in their industry, not just the best business student.

Andy Chan has changed the name from "Career Services" to "Career Development" because he believes any career-related office is a long term commitment by students and employers to develop their career with internships and opportunities to talk with professionals in a field they may still be exploring. The goal of a career-focused department should be to facilitate multiple arenas of career development (ex. interviewing, internships, etc.) and to encourage students to engage with employers well before they get to the end of four years of college.

A Positive Perspective

"I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind." - Ecclesiastes 1:14

One of the podcasts I have been listening to  recently has been talking about the message of the book of Ecclesiastes. Without critical analysis, reading this biblical book will get you depressed. Why would a book in the Bible say all is vanity, that everything under the sun is utterly worthless?

Is life really worthless?

The perspective from the author is to show two opposing perspectives, which I think are very relevant for opposing worldviews in the United States.

1. The first worldview is that history is cyclical. That there is no ultimate purpose in the events that happen on earth. Nothing new every really happens. Life is lived in the present only, without an eternal perspective. It is the perspective that says "eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die" because everyone will die and evil happens to everyone.
2. The second perspective says that there is a God and that there is an ultimate purpose in the events  (good and evil) of the past and present that are leading to an eternal outcome. This is a worldview that says the actions that you do on earth matter eternally. 

Ultimately, the author of Ecclesiastes reveals his true opinion at the end of this persuasive book which juxtaposes two conflicting perspectives:

"The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil." - Ecclesiastes 12:13-14

The author concludes in the last two sentences that the end of the matter lies in a God who exists whom we should honor and obey. And in the end, God will judge the righteous and evil deeds of men to reveal his justice.

Moving Tomorrow

Moving to a new place is almost always something I dread. Especially in the Arizona heat.

There's always the ominous giant couch or something else that you know is extremely heavy that you do not want to lift, even with the help of two or three other people.
And in the back of your mind you have the horror stories of 14 hour days of moving things back and forth because you didn't get enough people to come and help you. Or, in what my opinion is the worse scenario is when you go to help someone move and they have only packed half of their stuff, so a good portion of the time you're packing instead of moving.

Packing and moving at the same time is a nightmare.

I am of the opinion that almost everything should be packed beforehand and there should be just a handful of things that can be packed in the last hour before people start arriving to help. Since my lease is up for this year and I am getting new roommates, I have a new season of my life starting and moving is just one of those steps to help me get on track.

For everyone else who is moving sometime in the near future in Arizona, stay hydrated, make sure to plan your packing ahead of time,  and invite people to help earlier rather than later.

Can Eternal Life Be Earned by Being Good?

I have been reading through the Bible chronologically this year and currently there have been some reoccurring themes I have noticed in my studies. Also, at my church (Tempe Vineyard Church), we are going through a sermon series of the book of Romans written by Paul the apostle and author of much of the New Testament of the Bible.

The main theme that has been highlighted to me is that salvation and eternal life is something only God can give. It cannot be earned. It cannot be gained by doing good things. It cannot be because of the works of any man.

Paul argues:

 "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins." (Romans 3:23-25)

Also, I read today in Galatians 2:16, which is also written by Paul, that:

"yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law,because by works of the law no one will be justified."

Through my studies I have come to have a more full understanding of the grace of God. Salvation and eternal life are not something I can earn, but it's a gift of God for those who have faith in Jesus Christ as Lord. Although this is just a portion of scripture, the truth portrays that God is love and that He is truly good in all that he does for all mankind. That every person sins and does wrong, but he still chose to offer his Son for all of mankind.

Public Service and Urban Governance

Apache Junction is an excellent example of a local government that portrays the ideals of public service and urban governance.

Public service, which is generally defined as a service or public good provided to citizens within a particular jurisdiction, is the basic purpose of any local government. Apache Junction provides services that include: public safety, public works, public library, development services, and many more areas of public need.

The overall good for the city of AJ is the completion of projects and promotion of private individuals to all work together for the common good. Public service in order to be successful requires good urban governance.

Urban governance is broadly defined as a political institution that influences the economic and social aspects of society through policy, participation, and accountability. Good governance is the political authority responding to it's citizens in a way where the overall society benefits from the decisions made by the government.

Apache Junction strives to meet these ideals of serving the public and offering good governance through the services provided by local taxes.