Lifeguard Training

The first week of June, Jennifer went through training as a lifeguard at Typhoon Lagoon, then started working shifts.

When she's not working she spends time in the parks, mostly dressing up and meeting characters. This month she often went with a friend from University of Portland that just started a Professional Internship with Disney.

Sometimes though, the characters come to her workplace. 

While Jenn was settling in as a Disney Cast Member, the rest of us moved out of our rental in Beaverton, and into our house in Bend. I rented a room from a friend in Vancouver Washington, and usually drive to Bend on the weekends, but sometimes Susan comes over to stay with me in Vancouver. When I'm in Bend I often work on the pole barn, and sometimes I get visitors.

Traditions

 

Last Friday morning Jenn attended Traditions, a class that every new cast member takes to learn about Disney's expectations and processes. It was held at Disney University, which is located behind (north of) the Magic Kingdom. At the end of it, Jenn received her name badge and ID card. 

She also went on a short walking tour of Magic Kingdom to see where the magic happens, including the backstage areas that she photograph. There are a number of tunnels, called Utilidors, under the park that cast members use to get around.

Now that she is a cast member, Jenn has pretty much free entrance to the parks, so Friday night she went into Animal Kingdom with some of her roommates, and on Saturday they did the Magic Kingdom. 

 

On Sunday, she had two classes - Welcome to Operations and Welcome to Recreation. They were both held at Disney University. On her way back she took a photo of the entrance sign for Typhoon Lagoon. 

Monday was the last day of the Flower and Garden Festival at EPCOT, so she and a friend got there at opening to do some rides, meet some characters, and check out the booths. In the afternoon they went down to Hollywood Studios for a bit, then returned to Epcot to ride Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros. She was excited to find out they had installed new audio-animatronics and no longer had a digital background at the ride's finale.

Disney College Program

 

As soon as we got back from Japan, Jennifer headed out to Florida to start in the Disney College Program. She had tried to get into the program in previous years, but was not accepted due to her young age.

Last Monday she arrived in Orlando and moved into a room in one of the apartment complexes Disney maintains for the college program east of I-4 near Disney Springs, then went to the Casting building to start the hiring process.

That night, she and her new roommates went to the Polynesian Resort to eat dinner at Kona Cafe, then watched the MK fireworks from the beach. 

She spent Tuesday going to a meeting on the housing rules and hanging out with her new roommates. On Wednesday she went to Mickey's Retreat, a sports and recreation complex for cast members on Little Lake Bryan near CP housing. She passed her swim test, and was assigned a role as a lifeguard at Typhoon Lagoon water park. 

Thursday evening she and her roommates attended the CP Welcome event at Animal Kingdom Lodge. It was themed to the Lion King and they got food and swag and got to meet Timon and Rafiki.