I found this cool little blog that was created by a student that works in the MTC mailroom. It is called MTC Going Postal. I found it while browsing through some of the websites on the Mormon Times website under the “Today in the Bloggernacle“. Many of you may not know but the MTC (Mission Training Center) is filled with BYU students trying to work their way through college.

When I was at “The Y“, I worked at the MTC too but I did not have the cushy job of sorting mail for the missionaries. My job was a little more gritty and unpleasant. I worked in the dish room. Yep, I washed the dishes of thousands of missionaries. I would wake up really early in the morning, like 4:30am or something crazy like that and washed dishes. I remember putting in earplugs because of the noise of the dishes clanking together and the noise from the dishwashing machines, drying machines and disposals. I would put on green rubber gloves, a plastic apron and stand by a conveyor belt. I was assigned the job of cleaning off all of the major pieces of food off of each plate, bowl and cup. Then I would stack each piece nicely on another convener belt so that it would go through the washer correctly. On some of the days, I would work at the end of the washing line where I would have to take off the clean and dry dishes and stack them. At that time, I would have to wear cotton gloves because the plates and bowls were so hot coming out of the rapid dryer that they would burn your skin. After a couple of hours of staking hot dishes, the gloves would be soaking wet. Even though it was not fun work, it did help pay my way through my classes. So, if you want to know what missionaries eat, or don’t eat, I could tell you. I must say, I don’t think I have ever put that work experience on my resume.

Tags: lds, mission, missionary, mormon, mtc

Several years ago I volunteered to be a Mormon Seminary Teacher for the 9th graders at the local Junior High. It was early morning seminary so for me, it has a huge undertaking since I hate getting up early in the morning. After about 2 weeks of teaching, I had completely run out of mission stories and personal experiences as it relates to the Gospel. I began spending about 2 hours per night preparing for the next day of seminary. I learned a ton about how teachers work and why they do that they do. For example, I wanted to be one of those nice teachers so I let the 9th graders sit where they wanted. A few weeks later I found my classroom getting louder and louder. I asked some of my teacher friends and they suggested implementing a seating chart and to organize the chairs into rows. I didn’t like the sound of that, however, I knew it would help with the noise and the visiting with each other during my classes. Needless to say, I was not prepared to be a teacher and had to learn by trial and error, mostly error. At the end of the year, I totally felt like a failure. My only hope and prayer was that all of my students would sign up for seminary in 10th grade so that they could be taught by a “real” seminary teacher.

I tell you this story so that I can tell you this other story. I was walking out of the YMCA last week and a young adult stopped my and called me Brother Carter. He looked at me intently and asked, “do you remember me?”. I looked really hard but could not place the face. He told me that he was in my seminary class in 9th grade. He said he had served a mission for the LDS Church and was now married. Wow, that was cool. I asked him if he remembered anything from his days in my class. He said that he did and mentioned a “magic square” that we used to memorized the Doctrine and Covenants scriptures. It was just nice to know that he remembered me and remembered some of the scriptures we worked on.

Tags: church, family, lds, mission, missionary, mormon, seminary

My son had an assignment yesterday to look up information about 3 different Colleges or Universities. I thought it was an excellent assignment so I went searching around the web to help him find the information he needed.

We came across a wonderful website that shows all of the different LDS schools that are available. It shows how many students attend the school, the different colleges that are available, tuition costs, admissions standards. It was just great. So, if you have any kids looking at going to college at one of the LDS Colleges, you definitely want to visit this site.  It has information on BYU Provo, BYU Idaho, BYU Hawaii, College Prep, LDS Business College and the Institute of Religion.

http://www.besmart.com/

I thought I would also mention that by doing this little assignment for school, he was able to complete a Duty to God requirement. The requirement is on page 22 of the Teachers DTG program item number 7. It was nice to use one of the School assignments to pass this one off. And, because the website is so cool, it was entertaining.

Tags: aaronic priesthood, dtg, duty to god, education, family, lds, mormon, priesthood, School