Hi, My name is Sam and I’m finishing up my first semester at Dynamy. I chose to take a gap year because I don’t know what I want to go to college for, so I thought taking a year and moving to a different state would give me a better Idea of what I want to do as a career and what kind of college, if any, would help me get there.

I came to Dynamy because it was recommended to me by a gap year counselor and it looked like the perfect way to get hands-on experience at different real businesses to see which career path I thought would be the best fit for me. Being from Vermont, I was worried about adjusting to living in an urban setting, but after the adventure challenge when I finally moved in I realized that it wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be. The apartment is large enough for all 6 of us and it is always clean and organized.

I was given 3 internship interviews at 3 very different places in Worcester, and I ended up choosing to work at 3B Auto because I was really interested in working at a shop and getting hands-on experience with the tools and specialized equipment that I wouldn’t normally have access to. Even in just the first month, my job taught me so much about what it means to be a good mechanic, and how to go about solving complex issues in a non-destructive way so that even when I haven’t done some specific tasks, I can adapt other solutions from similar issues to fix my problem.

I have also learned a lot about the importance of teamwork. Specifically, I’ve learned how to act as a useful team member to the other mechanics for advanced, multi-person repairs. A typical day for me starts at 9 and I am expected to do basic maintenance to customer vehicles like oil changes, headlight bulbs and tires. When more advanced projects come into the shop, I work with one of the full-time Mechanics who will walk me through the process and show me how to use the relevant tools so when similar projects come in I can do them either completely independently or work with another Dynamy intern to complete the task. A great example of this is when I had to fix a broken tire pressure monitoring system. I was shown how to use the proprietary tools to work with that part, and now when I encounter that issue I can use the tools to troubleshoot the issue and then devise a solution without being directly told how to solve the problem. This is a really important part of my learning because instead of following a step by step guide, I can come up with my own solution based off of the information I collected and then implement those changes to the vehicle without compromising the safety of the driver or occupants and not decreasing the lifespan of the product. All in all, it’s been a great experience so far and I can’t wait to see what the rest of my time at Dynamy holds.