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Michael Hensley

1,165

Bold Points

1x

Finalist

1x

Winner

Bio

I'm Michael, a 25 year old husband and father to two children. I work full time on a surface coal mine while going to school full time as well. Needless to say there is not enough time in the day. While in high school, I managed numerous technology related projects. I love working with technology and I plan on pursuing two separate degrees related to technology.

Education

Southern New Hampshire University- Online

Associate's degree program
2022 - 2024
  • Majors:
    • Communications Technologies/Technicians and Support Services, Other

Miscellaneous

  • Desired degree level:

    Associate's degree program

  • Graduate schools of interest:

  • Transfer schools of interest:

  • Majors of interest:

  • Not planning to go to medical school
  • Career

    • Dream career field:

      Computer Software

    • Dream career goals:

    • Crew Member

      McDonald's
      2016 – 20193 years
    • Equipment Operator

      Blackhawk Mining
      2019 – Present5 years

    Arts

    • Sherman High School

      Videography
      School News Series
      2015 – 2016

    Public services

    • Volunteering

      Sherman High School — Technology Lead
      2015 – 2016

    Future Interests

    Entrepreneurship

    Tam and Betsy Vannoy Memorial Scholarship
    Winner
    Growing up in the coalfields of Appalachia, technology is not a strong suit of our people. Kids my age were primarily focused on hunting, fishing, and other outdoor activities. While I enjoyed those activities, my primary focus was computer-related tasks. Naturally, upon entering high school, I worked closely with the computer teacher, Randy Herron. I took every class he had to offer, only one of which was required by the school. I became a computer assistant, it was a program that replaced typical vocational school. Shortly after, I found myself volunteering for different projects around the school. These became available through an after-school program called Project Goal and video journalism was offered as an elective. As a computer assistant, I managed the school website, started live-streaming school events, and spearheaded video journalism and drone programs. With the help of Wanda Dotson, Matthew Stollings, and Randy Herron, all teachers supporting these projects, these programs took off. This sparked an interest in many students who likely would not have interacted with this technology otherwise. An untold amount of hours was put into the programs by myself and other computer assistants. I'll begin with the school website. One of the projects that I supervised as a computer assistant was the school website. Sherman High School has maintained a student-designed website for many years. I eventually built a reputation for my HTML scripting. Randy Herron took notice of this and asked if I would be interested in maintaining the website for the school. I accepted the offer, I operated the website from January 2014 to June 2016. At the end of the 2013-2014 school year, I approached Mr. Herron with the proposition that we could stream the 2014 graduation ceremony. Working closely with Mr. Herron, we discovered many issues with this idea logistically. The largest being YouTube was not an allowed website on the school's internet access. Unfortunately, the 2014 graduation ceremony was not live-streamed. However, the information that we learned was invaluable. Beginning in the 2014-2015 school year, I began working on live-streaming sports events. This was not a small task, I was placing phone calls to Board of Education officials, and even the technology director of the county. Eventually, I received all permissions needed, through the proper channels. My team and I began streaming with the 2015 graduation ceremony. In the 2015-2016 school year, my team streamed numerous sporting events and the torch was passed to the next group of computer assistants when they streamed the graduation ceremony for my class, the class of 2016. This was arguably one of my larger contributions to the technology program at Sherman High School. The last live stream on the school's YouTube channel was completed a year ago. Project Goal was an after-school program, in which I participated. The teachers that supported this program were Wanda Dotson and Matthew Stollings. I was approached by these teachers with the task of ordering video editing software, video production equipment, and a drone capable of recording video. We started a drone tour, going to the feeder schools for Sherman High School. Part of this drone tour was an aerial demonstration of the drone. During this section, a picture of the students was taken. After, a question and answer took place, to which we answered numerous questions from the students.