On Thursday April 26, 2012 I had the the opportunity to attend the Spring 2012 Portfolio Showcase held in Park Center Building where the Cortland P.E Department awarded 16 teacher-candidates with honors on their professional portfolio. The recipients who I really admire were Lima Stafford and Jamie Boldish.
Lima Stafford
Jamie Boldish
By viewing Lima's portfolio I notice that she very organized and everything looked neat and presentable. She had a lot of certificates showing how active she was during her 4 years at Cortland and everything she did, she did to the best of her ability. One thing Lima told me was "take advantage of your college experience by getting involved. The years are flying by quick and will not be waiting on you. Take advantage of what college has to offer and get to know and understand yourself first. You can't help others if you can't help yourself or have no idea who you are. Learn to love Suny Cortland instead of complaining about it". I really took that to heart and she really inspired me get involved more with the physical education program and any other programs on campus. When I viewed Jamie's portfolio, I notice that it was different from the others. It was unique in its own way, and Jamie is a very creative person so she made her portfolio stand out among the others. Just like Lima, Jamie was very involved during her 4 years at Cortland, and she received many awards also for all her great accomplishments. Looking through the portfolio, I notice that everything was easy to read and every section had great pictures of Jamie teaching or volunteering. Jamie told me to "do more than I'm ask of, instead of just doing what's required because it shows how much you care about your profession and brings out the best in not just you as a teacher but the best in your future students". I really learned a lot from this portfolio showcase and it gave me motivation to stay involved and to take advantage of every opportunity given to me because you never know when that next opportunity will roll around.
For my 10 hours of outside practical experience, I spend my hours mostly with the sport of track & field. Some of my hours are spent during actual track practice. I am a member of Suny Cortland's Men's track & field team, and also one of captains and leaders of the team as a whole. As a leader on this team, my coach expects me to conduct my event group (400m runners) everyday in practice and teach them how to be better runners. During these practices I give positive and specific feedback to my teammates on proper sprinting mechanics. I also explain and demonstrate the principles, techniques and methods of regulating movement of body in order to achieve proficiency as a track athlete. If I see someone in my group or on my team slacking off or not giving enough effort, I try to bring them back on track and motivate them to work harder in practice. For the rest of my outside hours I did volunteer work at our Suny Cortland Track & Field Clinic on March 25, 2012. Every year my track program here at Cortland puts together this clinic for middle and high school athletes and coaches to learn more about the sport of track. In this clinic the athletes are able to physically perform warm-ups, drills, and other important aspects of track. Since I'm a sprinter with a lot of experience in this sport, I was able to conduct and demonstrate a proper warm up and taught the athletes proper sprinting mechanics. I taught the high school athletes how to use starting blocks if they ever were able to use them at a track meet. Similar to my college teammates, I gave positive and specific feedback to the athletes on technique and body alignment; and I explained and enforced safety rules and regulations in the sport of track & field. Through these experiences I have grown more as a future educator and my passion for track & field will help me bring that passion into the classroom when I teach. 
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