My Histories of both higher education and the workforce I started out of high school with bright hopes and a great outlook on life, and have since spiralled downward into a seemingly hopeless struggle to find some meaning in what I do in my everyday life. With a great high school career behind me, I begin attending Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, to continue to shine in my academic excellence in the field of engineering. I went to the majority of my classes, and left the school a year later, having only failed one course. I transferred to The Ohio State University in Columbus, OH, where I continued to study engineering at a school of barely less caliber but much less tuition. Ohio State proved to have way to many distractions, which, coupled with a couple of jobs with terrible hours, has up until this point (four years later) destroyed my academic career. I can only take two classes per quarter to have any real chance of succeeding, but I instead normally sign up for three, failing/withdrawing from two of them. It is an endless cycle which I will be able to go into further detail in the workforce history.
So let's discuss my work history. The three job's I held before my present position were meaningless jobs, including Pizza Hut, Meredith Hall dining room worker, and AMC movie theater usher and concessionist. These jobs didn't really effect my school, except AMC, with its eight hour shifts and no breaks. My present job has reaked the most havoc on my academic career. On April 21, 2003, I was hired as a loader on Primary Direct 2 at the Columbus Hub of UPS. I began in the training room, watched videos and learned how to properly load UPS feeders. I was put into the Willow Grove (WILPA) truck on our line, which took all New Jersey 080-084 zip codes and 189-196 PA zip codes. This truck was very easy because the flow was light and the zip codes were easy to memorize. My training supervisor Andy Barzak is (still to this point) probably the best trainer I've seen at UPS. He taught me how to care, load, and read better than I could have asked for. My first operation supervisor, Ross Rubina, was a funny guy who was on the brink of quitting, and his constant happy demeanor helped me through the first few weeks. It took a while to get used to loading trucks for five hours straight. I loaded WILPA for about three months, and throughout this time, I became better able to leave the truck when it was taking no flow. I began to not only load my truck, but also help out loading in the New Stanton (NEWPA) truck, which was the took the most volume on the belt. Soon, it was my job to go between the trucks, loading in NEWPA until I heard WILPA called out, and going to WILPA until NEWPA was called out. I grew tired of this, and asked the new supervisor, Hoyt Baker, if I could just load NEWPA. This truck took about 2,200 packages instead of my normal 1,000, but I figured that I had been loading about 800 of the scans in NEWPA before anyway. This was the biggest mistake of my UPS career. I was the only person on my belt soon, who was able to hold down the NEWPA beast without help. As soon as Hoyt noticed this, the NEWPA help was taken away. I was to load 2,200 by myself every night, despite the fact that our line was taking 8,000 pacakges and we had 8 people. It didn't seem right to me, but I struggled and bled and sweat for thirteen months loading that truck. However, my needing no help made us the best belt in the building. Our misload frequency (bad packages put in trucks divided by total packages put in) was always over 1/3,000. We had Jessica in WILPA and BALMD (Baltimore), taking 1,500. We had Doug in CHAWV[P] (Charleston Deliery), taking 1,900. We had Joe in HUNWV (Huntington), taking 1,200. Adam floated between BALMD, CHAWV[N] (Charleston Hub), taking 1,000. We ran the highest production numbers in the facility, and they promoted Doug, Adam, and myself to supervisory positions. Jessica and Joe quit, leaving us with practically no one. Luckily, Doug got promoted six months before Adam and I, giving us Evan, who replaced Doug's 1,900 scans in CHAWV. Evan is included in what will forever be known as the "dream team" to UPS. We hung out after work, and were good friends, and worked together like a well-oiled machine. As aforementioned, in August of 2004, I was promoted to a supervisor position at UPS. I was placed on Primary Direct 5, which took mainly southwestern Ohio cities and Kentucky cities. I was only knowledgable to Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and Virginia-the trucks on my line. PD-5 also takes every night a gigantic amount of volume at the end of the night in the Cincinnati suburbs truck. This truck will take 1,200 packages in an hour, and without loading it, I would now have to supervise people to do what I need them to do to survive the huge shot of volume. I ran that line for two months, cursing and sweating and nearly quitting every day. The line had a bunch of people who hadn't worked at UPS for long, and didn't have the knowledge of the belt or the care to put forth any effort. I decided to transfer to the training department in December, because of the stress I was getting in Operations. At this point, I had been at UPS for a year and a half, and had only passed about five out of fifteen classes taken. However, three weeks after going to the training department, my former full time supervisor yanked me back to operations to run the belt I used to work on, PD-2. Now, instead of seven bas asses working on the belt, running the best numbers in the Hub, there were twelve people, including Evan still, who no longer loaded, but floated much as Adam used to. I had Jon in WILPA, who never got out of the truck and struggled to get 800 scans. I had Lynn in BALMD, who also never got out, and struggled to get 1,000 scans. I had Luke in CHAWV[P], which now takes 1,300 scans, and he would need help for about 600 of the scans from Mike who also loaded 300 scans in CHAWV[N]. I had Brent, who loaded 1,000 in HUNWV, and needed help for 400 of the scans. I then had Adam, Shawn, and Matt in NEWPA--three people doing what I used to do by myself. NEWPA still took 2,200, but they couldn't even keep it as clean as I used to with three of them in there. I also have Raymond, who is a tad overweight, and very slow. Our belt takes 400 packages a night that don't go to our belt, and he can't build carts with them and take them to recycle belts as they come, and he falls behind often. It was a catastrophe. Only Evan's ability to help Raymond with recycles, help out in the trucks despite the fact obviously adequate manpower was already installed. But the main nine people were never able to keep up with the volume. Finally, after three months of running the belt, I have raised their misload frequency from 1/1,200 to 1/3,200. The production on the belt has risen from 160 pieces per hour to 179 pieces per hour. Most importantly, we were able to run clean all week without Evan being there.
TO BE CONTINUED...

Presenting Andrew Holt:
The High School Story

My name is Andrew Holt. I was 17 years old and I live(d) in Sidney, Ohio. I went to high school at Sidney High School, also known as the Sidney College of Knowledge. At my school, we were known both academically and athletically throughout the nation. Okay, so we weren't. But, hey at least we were known throughout the state. Your fighting Yellow Jackets are in the top five in our state in both teen pregnancy AND illegal drugs per capita. Yay! Let's here it for Sidney!
w00t w00t!

Anyway, at our school, I hung out with my friends as well as tried to be involved in everything as possible. Let's see what all I was involved in: I was on the Academic Team, and I made the varsity squad in that little spiel. I was in Chess Club, and made the second team!!! I was at first board, considered to be the best, and prior to Christmas break I had gone 6-1. Then, after a supposed needed break, I came back and didn't win another game, finishing at 6-8. Boy did I suck. I WAS in Student Government, and I got kicked out because i only got two merit points one quarter. I was always plotting ways to get back in, even though I didn't really want to. I tried coming to meetings, going to yearbook pictures. It was pretty fun. I think I even got to work in the candy booth once or twice illegally. Anyway, I was also on the Sidney Mock Trial team. I was an attorney for Sidney for two non-consecutive years, that both got shafted at the District Mock Trial Competition and finished terribly. I think we beat two teams one year, and finished in the middle the other year. I'll should have never been in that. I was in Foreign Language Club, one of about five from the German branch of it. I was forced to dance a little gay dance at the Day of the Dead. If you didn't see me, you didn't miss much. I was also in the Junior Senior Mixed Choir and I sing the bass part. We sang all these gay songs about "seasons of dreams" and gay stuff. I was last in Mens Choir, and sing the Bass part. I was, along w/ Rahul and Fred, the core of the entire choir program at Sidney High School. That's about it, except for sports.

Here's an average day in my life:

What goes on in this sick, twisted head of mine

Well, now that you know about me, let me describe my friends to you.

Adam - Adam is one of my bestest friends. We've stuck together through PJ, POD, and even Wentworth. And I'm sure he writes fabulous essays, I just can't read them.

Andy - Andy is Thee Frogger, the first and foremost man in Academia. He is probably the smartest person I know, and it is fun in Chemistry when we just sit in the back of class and critique m.h.'s "teaching style." (rapping) chemistry is not a class, it's just a f*** up the a**. hehe

Becky - Becky is the only person I know who can write essays perfect. She includes little fact and most B.S., a very great combination. She also used to be pianist for our choir, and when comparing the two this year, I think she still should be.

Bryan - Bryan is probably my best friend, especially since he got his licence. He is cool and drives me places, and is the organizers of the parties at his house every once and a while that turn into playstationfest and moviemania and it's a really good time. He can also break any habit you have with help from his neighbors.

Bryan -This Bryan is a pretty cool guy, though he is to me ignorant for choosing to be in indoor track over swimming. But that's okay. He comes over to those parties at Mertz' house, and he always kills me in Street Fighter type games.

Candler - Claudia is what we call him sometimes. He is one of the funniest people I know. He always says his jokes in his monotone voice, while keeping a straight face, and you can't keep from laughing. But the coolest thing about him is that he works at CJ Highmarks.

Cara -I met Cara at a Youth Congress, and she was a great person to hang around with. We've even kept in touch, and stuff. I look forward to seeing her again in January. She is the one we said, "Yo quero Taco Bell to." hehe

Curt - Curt is another one of my bestest friends. He is cool in that he likes everything I like, RATM, old school rap, everything. He is also in the group of my friends who do everthing together, go to church, go to school sometimes, etc.

DYV -

Erin - Erin is involved in a lot, but is totally committed to running. She is the most committed person to running that I've ever seen at Sidney. She is also the person most concerned about her GPA. Whenever she gets an assignment back, out comes the calculator, to figure out the grade in that class, but she is pretty cool.

Fred - Fred is at the same level as DAYV. He was Jesus in the religion they made up. He is also one of those people who try honors for a week, then drop down to college prep. But he'll be in honors next year. He should be in Cross-Country, but he is smart and stayed out, got out while he still could.

Gail- Gail is such a great person. I love chatting with her on mIRC and getting her wonderful e-mails that brighten up my day. It also great to see her in the hall, cause her smile just brightens up my day, no matter how much Mrs. Herrick or others have ruined it =) I think she should be in swimming next year, too...

Hideki - Hideki Jobu was the fastest kid in Junior High, but we all caught up with him. We lost him this year though, cause he moved back to Japan. I can understand though, he has a woman in Japan, so I would've gone, if I was him! But, you know, I'll miss him, especially in German class, cause everything he says in that class is hilarious, but he doesn't mean it to be funny, it just comes out that way.

Jon - Jon was on my team for Mock Trial, and that is the time I got to know him. He is also one which kills in Academia, and he, despite what I thought, knows a lot. He also got shafted out of Best Witness at Mock Trial. He is in Chem AP with us also, making fun of Herrick.

Lauren - Lauren is the largest contributer to making this webpage possible. By telling me my webpage sucks, I was prompted to make it better. She also told me about the wonders of HTML. She is also a member of Fred and DAYV's new religion I believe. She is also the bestest video store worker thingie I've ever seen.

Lawrence -Lawrence is the lucky bast*** who got E.J.s book in PJ's class. He is our extra man in our "team Southeast Asia" in Academia. He is also the best choice to replace us in Social Studies in two years. He's on this list because he's cool and because he b*tched about not being on it. hehe. I still think we need to fight-a certain fight to the death.

Logan - Logan is the last of the three awesome seniors in Academia. He is cool, cause he always acts like he doesn't care, as well as being great at chess and being a Jew. I really admire how hard he works in Military History and how he did 13 TV credits so fast. hehe

Rahul - Rahul is the biggest fan of Metallica I know! He is cool in that he loves Heavy Metal music. He is someone who looks like they wouldn't try in school, but he's gotten 4.0 for who knows how long, probably forever. He is also in most of my classes and helps make fun of our "great" teachers.

Takashi - I am in all but two of Tak's classes. We're in most of the same extra-curriculars, too. He is cool because he always says, hey holt check my grammar, and so I do, but steal his ideas. Pretty great friend, huh? He also writes great essays on good topics (like APUSH slackers and not "Mark Twain's problems, etc")

Tatsu - Tatsu is the little Jap that got MVP in swimming. He is one of those people who don't talk very much, but when they do talk, its so hilarious. I still think he should run track though, just cause he can.

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