Final Projects at UGA

Hard to believe it, but mine and Kelvin's time at UGA is nearly complete. Today is our last day of work, which makes for some very mixed feelings. Happy to have met so many great new people and learned so many valuable things for our future careers, and also happy to be heading home to see family and friends that we have missed so dearly, while at the same time sad to have to say "see you later" to so many people that took us in as if we were family for the past two months.

This past week Kelvin and I finished up our second big project, which is a customer service training module for student workers and management in food services at UGA. We created a program called G.R.E.A.T. standing for (Greetings, Responsibilities, Education, Above & Beyond and Teamwork). We believe that these five words truly exemplify customer service. In the online training course we explain in detail how each of the words has meaning to the food services workers and then how it translates to the guest's experience in the different food service units at UGA. We also hope to get all of the units to hang posters with the G.R.E.A.T. words where all of the workers can see it every day and be reminded of the training. In order to introduce this new program to upper management, we have a formal presentation this afternoon.

As for our other final project, Kelvin and I finally hosted our Hawaiian themed Freshman College Banquet at the East Village Summit Commons. After more than a month of planning and careful considerations the day finally arrived. Kelvin and I spent a total of three days prepping for the banquet. We marinated pounds of pork ribs, arranged 100 floral centerpieces, folded 400 napkins, polished silverware for 400 guests, built 9 large palm trees out of pineapples and leaves, and strung pineapple chunks and cherries onto 500 umbrella toothpicks for placing into specialty beverages. We oversaw the set up of the entire dining room and banquet lines, including teaching the student staff how to set the tables, how to arrange the centerpieces, and how to distribute the beverages (Blue Hawaii and Volcanic Punch). Our guests arrived at 5:30pm and were greeted by cold beverages at the entrance way. Around 6:15pm they lined up at the banquet lines for an array of foods that included:

Char Sui Pork Ribs

Macadamia Nut Crusted Chicken Breast with a Banana Cilantro Butter

Tofu Poke

Sweet and Sour Pineapple Meatballs

Mahi Mahi with Mango Salsa

Sweet Plantains

Pan Asian Noodles

Sesame Cabbage

Hawaiian Sweet Bread

Banana Bread

Lilikoi Salad (with a dressing imported straight from Hawaii)

Molten Lava Cake

Mini Cheesecakes

Mimosa Cake

And an incredible display of fresh fruits sitting underneath a 3 palm trees made from pineapples

The event ran very smoothly and the student guests and the dining commons staff really seemed to enjoy themselves at the event. The Executive Director of UGA's Food Services Mr. J. Michael Floyd as well as the Director Mrs. Jeanne Fry both came to our dinner along with several other mangers and workers that have been a large part of our internship experience here at UGA. Our special guests also truly enjoyed the meal and the atmosphere of the event. At the end of the night we had many congratulatory statements telling us that it had been one of the best Closing Banquets of the Freshman College! We even had a special request for our Ribs recipe. What a great feeling of accomplishment!