In developing my service action proposal, I was excited. I had a good idea of what I was going to do since the beginning of the semester and knew I was passionate about it. STEM education is something I have done research on in the past and being part of the Hawktimus Prime robotics team for 2 years, I became even more involved and acted as an advocate for FIRST and STEM ideals. My experience wasn’t much different than I expected. I knew the interview would be pretty casual since I had the interviewee (Mr. Snead) as a teacher and he is the faculty advisor for the club. The unexpected part was that I would actually learn something from interviewing him. Being on the team for 2 years, one of these as President, I learned everything about the team and was the one to help build the mission. Going into the interview, I figured I would know all the answers to my own questions. Throughout the conversation though, I found that Mr. Snead was telling me things in a different way than anticipated. His perspective as a teacher/advisor is similar to mine was as the President, but he has different goals. Hearing answers to my questions from a different perspective than my own was eye opening and I found myself more drawn into the interview because of that. My perspective about the area I chose did not change too much. The interview affirmed my assumptions, but Mr. Snead also helped me to remember that STEM education has many different aspects to it (i.e. women in STEM). Talking to him also reminded me that I am not part of the team this year. Hawktimus has different members, different events, different opportunities that have been made available to them, different everything. My top strength is communication, which means I am able to put my thoughts into words efficiently and fluently, while also being a good conversationalist and being personable. I feel as though this helped greatly in making my interview casual and more of a conversation. I also think my 4th strength, belief, was challenged during this interview. I had thought of Hawktimus in a certain way and had certain beliefs about them but in talking to Mr. Snead, I was shown a different way to think of the team and a way that others may view the team. Teamwork is integral to any project that includes multiple people. Working together as ILV and Hawktimus Prime will ensure success in the project. Along with collaboration, empowerment is important. Making sure all of those who are participating in the project know that they can help even if they don’t know how. Showing the target audience that they are able to apply various teachings in the real world through STEM will help them to see that they can do anything and that there is more than one way of learning things. One main takeaway I got from conducting the interview and piecing together this project is that there are many different ways to look at an issue. On top of that, my own views of a group is different than that of someone else’s. I already knew this of course but this being something I am passionate about, hearing someone else’s thoughts was very intriguing. I can apply this to ILV by being more open minded and trying to look at an issue or group from all angles. I can also work harder to be more of a team player and empowering others. Communication is also key in understanding others, so talking things out and trying to understand people rather than assuming things is the best.