Work Experience
Donte’s Pizzeria: Line Cook
Since February 2020, I’ve been working at Donte’s Pizzeria, a pizza shop near my home in South Park. I started out at Donte’s as a dishwasher, but I’ve been a cook for about 3 years. My responsibilities as a cook include running the kitchen as well as supervising the dishwashers and prep staff.
Donte’s was established in 2006 by Dwaine Marasco. Dwaine worked at other pizza shops for nearly 20 years before opening Donte’s. Donte’s currently has a single location in South Park. There was a second location opened temporarily in Castle Shannon, but Dwaine decided to close this shop down and maintain just the South Park location
Donte’s was the first job I ever had, and I started working there when I was 16 years old as a junior in High School. Despite being away at school, I have been working at Donte’s regularly this entire time. Since W&J is only about 30 minutes away from my house, coming home on the weekends to work isn’t much of a hassle. Additionally, the people at Donte’s are so supportive and so fun to work with that I have always tried my best to work as much as I possibly could.
Washington & Jefferson College: Tutor
Since the beginning of my junior year at W&J, I have been one of the five tutors for the CIS department at the school. I typically tutor once a week for three hours, and during this time I help students in the introductory and intermediate level classes. Sometimes we can even offer help for students in advanced classes providing that we have taken these classes.
My main responsibility is to help students understand the core concepts they need to complete an assignment, but I can also help students diagnose software issues and provide feedback and suggestions for assignments. Rather than giving students the answers to problems, we are encouraged to assess whether students are properly applying the skills necessary to complete a task. If not, I will use words or draw diagrams that help students reinforce their understanding. I will also ask leading questions to students that point them toward the right answer without directly giving the solution away.
Although it is easiest for me to help students who have taken the classes that I have previously taken, I am also often able to help students in classes that I have not taken yet. This is because the skills that I have learned as a PAL tutor and as a CIS major are highly transferrable to other classes. For instance, a class that many students come to PAL for but that I have not taken is the Introduction to Data Science course. Although I have not explicitly taken this course, I have taken two other advanced data analytics courses at W&J, which both use the same software and many of the same skills that are required for the Introductory Data Science course. In the event that I can’t offer much aid to students, I can still direct them towards helpful resources, including APIs and documentation or resources offered by the professor of the class.
Sheetz: Data Science Intern
During the summer in 2024, I will be working at the gas station company Sheetz as a Data Science Intern for their Business Operations department. This position will primarily use SQL to generate data reports that will be used by Sheetz executives to make important business decisions.
For example, one task that this department works on is assessing the best placement of new gas station locations. Along with retrieving the necessary data from the Sheetz Databases with SQL, the department uses this data to generate new metrics that are used to assess the effective range of individual locations. The Data Scientists use this information to strategically place the locations in a way that minimizes overlap while still reaching a high number of potential customers.
I will primarily be collecting data with SQL and using data visualization software like Tableau and occasionally Microsoft Excel to generate these data reports. Although most of my work will be database oriented, I may be responsible for completing other tasks such as writing code to automate spreadsheet tasks for other departments at Sheetz. Other programming languages such as python can be used for those tasks that aren’t database oriented.
There will be two other Data Science interns in this department as well. In the first half of the summer, I will be working primarily with the full-time Data Analysts on short-term projects. In the second half of the summer, I will be working on a long-term project with the other interns. The topic for this project has not been decided yet, but this project will be designed to challenge us while still being possible to complete in a timely manner.