5/18/2021

This is it, the final journal entry. It’s been a really fun and productive semester, and I learned so much, especially from this course. I was always able to handle the math and science aspect of things, but the writing and communication part is always where I struggled and so this class really helped me. I just finished my final draft for my engineering proposal and I’m very proud of the final product. However, I feel like I could’ve done better, but I just don’t have enough time to really work on it and touch it up because of all the finals I have from other classes. It’s still a product that I’m very proud of, but I just know I can do better, especially with this being the last assignment in the class. Regardless, it’s a topic that I’m very passionate about and reading it back, I sound like an actual scientist or engineer with resources and experiments conducted. I’m excited to see what proposals I can write when I become an actual engineer with years of experience and research to back up my claims in my proposal and who knows, maybe I’ll use the same proposal I used for this assignment. I still have my self assessment that I need to write, but I already have an idea of what I’m going to talk about. Looking back and seeing how far I’ve come from the technical description essay which was very poor to be honest, all the way to the engineering proposal, which is a much better final product. I’ve learned so much about writing, about how to do it, about its importance and relevance in today’s world, and I’m going to carry all that I’ve learned with me through my future academic career. That’s all for today, and I wish you all the best of luck with the rest of your academic careers and your futures!

5/8/2021

Hey everyone! Welcome to my ninth journal entry. In this entry I want to talk about my progress so far with the engineering proposal. I drafted it today and finished my first two sections and outlined the rest. When I turned on my computer to start writing, I kind of blanked out because it felt like I had nothing to go off of. With all previous assignments, we usually had to outline it first and then start writing but there wasn’t an outline assigned for this one, which made starting really hard. I just had a bunch of really good ideas in my head but no way of organizing them, so I made a little outline for myself to start off. I actually never realized the importance of outlining until now, when it wasn’t something assigned but something I needed to do to start writing. It’s not just for the professor or my peers to get an overall picture of my essay topic, but it’s more for me, as the writer, to organize my thoughts in a way that makes sense and has an impact on the reader. What started off as a five minute very rough outline became very detailed as I did more research and found more sources and information. After that, the essay just writes itself, with ideas building off of each other. The outline is most of the leg work in the assignment, after that it becomes very easy. I’m very proud with what I’ve come up with so far in my engineering proposal, as I was able to tackle very complex ideas and technologies that I never really learned about before and had to research on my own. I also thoroughly outlined the rest of the proposal so that in the coming days as I finish it, it’ll be a lot easier and more coherent. We’re very close to the end of the semester and I’m going to make sure to make a good final impression.

4/30/2021

Hey everyone! I want to start off this journal by looking back and seeing how far I’ve come not only as a writer, but as an engineering writer. I’ve never had assignments that really emphasized the science and research portion, they all stressed the actual essay. This class has really helped me hone my skills and be able to write with an engineering purpose in mind, not for a grade. With that being said, there’s still a lot to work on. I’ve started thinking about my Engineering Proposal, which is the last and heaviest assignment of the semester. I want to make this one count, to represent that I really have improved and learned a lot over the past few months. I decided to write about developing and advancing current CRISPR technology in order to help treat and potentially cure cancer patients. In its current state, CRISPR can go into a cell, change and edit its DNA, and get out. However, if we’re going to use this to combat cancer, we can’t edit the DNA of cells one at a time, which is what my main focus is going to be. If I can come up with a way for CRISPR to target multiple cells at the same time, that would be a huge step towards the cure for cancer. This honestly means a lot more to me than just an assignment for this class, because it’s something I really believe could work and would do it myself if I had the experience and resources. I’ve lost multiple people to cancer and I wish I could take the matters into my own hands but unfortunately I can’t just yet. However, being here and writing this proposal is all pushing me towards that goal, and I’m very excited to start drafting. I want to make a good final impression in this class, and this is how I do that. That’s it for today, I’ll be back next week.

4/25/2021

Hello everyone! I finished my first draft for the lab report and I’m very happy with how it turned out. After receiving my grades and feedback for the technical description and memo projects, I realized that I really need to work on my citations, especially the in text ones. In the technical description and memo assignments, I didn’t include any in text citations at all which is a problem because that is technically plagiarism. I’m using an idea that isn’t my own and not citing the proper source. Although I did include the source in the references page for both assignments, it’s still not enough because I need to cite the specific ideas that I got from each source. This is something I aimed to improve upon in my lab report which I did. I managed to cite all my sources and ideas, both in text and in the references section. It also helped me realize the importance of the in text citations because now my audience can differentiate between my ideas and the ideas of others. Granted, this assignment mainly focused on the ideas and research done by others simply because I didn’t conduct any labs or experiments on my own, but I still did include some of my own ideas which I obviously didn’t cite. I have to begin revising my first draft now and based on the feedback from my peers, there isn’t really much I need to change. The one major issue is that it’s too long and so I need to condense the information a little more which shouldn’t be too much of a problem. I’m eager to start working on the engineering proposal, since it’s the biggest assignment of the semester, and will require me to put together all the skills I’ve learned so far. But that’s it for now, I’ll be back next week!

4/15/2021

Hello Everyone! I realize that I’ve been slacking recently with the journals so I’m gonna try to keep it every Thursday so I have a consistent weekly journal. More importantly, however, today I started my lab report assignment. I’m really excited to start drafting and working on it because I’m actually very interested in this topic. The two previous assignments I’ve done haven’t been about topics that I’m all that interested in so they did really feel like assignments for an English class but this doesn’t. This is something I want to explore and learn about. I chose to study vaccines that are delivered through inhalation, which are really interesting. They have so many implications and are so important, especially with the global pandemic we’re living in today. I realize that this assignment is a very different lab report than any other lab report I’ve done for a science class. My science classes focus more on the data and experiment, while this assignment focuses more on the actual lab report which is an interesting difference. It means I have to take a different approach to this lab report, and focus more on how I’m portraying my information, data, and ideas. It’s also going to need a lot of research since I’m not actually doing any experiments myself, just citing the works of others. Regardless, it’s an assignment I’m excited to tackle. I have already outlines it and created a title and abstract. However I will be changing the abstract because it feels more like an introduction. I’m a little confused between the two, so I will have to do some research to find the distinction or go back to the textbook. But that’s it for today’s journal, I’ll be back next week!

4/5/2021

Wow it’s been a while since I had a journal entry! I just got off spring break and I told myself that I really needed this break so I won’t be doing any work, but I have a lot of catching up to do now. We submitted our memos which I’m very happy with how it turned out. My team and I all worked together to produce the best final product possible and it turned out great! Working as a team was a really good experience, although I would rather it have been in person instead of online. Working together remotely is just difficult, awkward, and inefficient but certainly doable. Looking forward, I’m excited to start the third assignment, which is the lab report. I’m comfortable enough with the layout of this class to start working on more difficult and involved assignments, and focus on topics that are more geared towards my interests and my major, which is biomedical engineering. Over the next few days, I will start thinking about a topic to use for this lab report, something that really interests me so that the assignment won’t even feel like an assignment. However, I don’t know how this lab report will be formatted considering there isn’t an actual lab or data collection associated with the report. All lab reports I’ve done previously had data associated with them so I knew what to include and how to draw conclusions and make connections. I’m sure this will be cleared up in class, but I just like to think ahead. That’s it for today’s journal, and I’ll try to be more consistent with them now considering that spring break is over.

3/19/2021

Welcome to my fourth journal entry! I realize that I’m actually a day late with this entry because I did this on a Friday and I usually do my journals on Thursdays. I don’t want to start slacking with the journals because I enjoy giving back feedback on how I’m doing in this class every week. So far, my team and I have completed the outline for the memo, which I’m very glad about. Being able to give and receive feedback from my teammates while doing the outline helped a lot actually because it made the final product more detailed and also helped give me new perspectives on my writing. Our first draft is due this upcoming Monday, which is in three days. I’m excited to start working on it collaboratively with my team, because it gives us all an opportunity to make a better memo, while also doing less work per person because it’s split across the three of us. I recently looked at the class website and saw that this was the only major group assignment which was kind of a bummer because I’m actually starting to enjoy group work again. It’s very different from high school, which I’m very glad about. I understand that this class is about focusing on your own writing more than it is about groupwork, but I would’ve liked to see some groupwork as well, considering that our careers will be all about group work. There will most likely be more group work posts in the discussion board, but working on a major assignment just feels like we’re working together towards something greater. Regardless, I’m excited to see what happens with this memo assignment and the rest of the semester!

3/11/2021

Another week another journal entry! So far this week, we started brainstorming for our memo project, which is the first group project I’ve done in a while. Ever since the pandemic, I haven’t really done any group work because it’s so difficult with online schooling. In high school, I used to hate group work. Me and my teammates were just never on the same page and it always felt like I did more work, and yet we all got the same grade which wasn’t fair. I was always the lone wolf, and felt like I could never trust my teammates to handle anything in the project, otherwise it would all fall apart. But it’s different now that I’m in college. I feel like I could trust my teammates more, and also really love the fact that we each get our own grade, so that my grade doesn’t depend on the work of my teammates. I used to really dislike that because I ended up doing all the work, and we all got the same grade. However, I actually miss the groupwork now, because it’s been so long. I miss discussing topics and playing devil’s advocate and bringing multiple points of view to a specific subject. It’s different now because we can’t really meet up and discuss in person, but there’s still a lot of means of communication and it’s not really an issue. I’m looking forward to working on this project with my team, because teamwork is a skill that I really need to work on. It’s so essential in pretty much every job, and if I can’t work with a team, then I just won’t be able to succeed. I’m hoping to learn a lot from this project, about both engineering and teamwork. But that’s all for now I’ll be back next week!

3/4/2021

Happy March! I can’t believe it’s been a year since the first confirmed coronavirus case in New York, it feels like it’s been forever. It’s just frustrating because I feel like I could learn so much more if classes were in person. This coronavirus pandemic ruined a lot of my plans for this year and a lot of my college experience. Everyone always says that these are supposed to be the best years of your life, and I’m spending the best years of my life in my bed. In person classes are just so much more helpful. For example, the email that I received from Professor Otte was very helpful and the feedback helped push me in the right direction, but receiving that feedback in person and working on my essay together in person would be so much better for me to understand what needs work in my essay. Also giving back and receiving feedback to my peers would be easier in person. There’s a lot of meaning that is missed when it’s just emails back and forth or texts back and forth. Regardless, I’m happy with where I am in this class. I did very well on my first draft for the technical description, and aim to make it even better in the final draft due next week. I really enjoy receiving feedback from both my instructor and my peers because it offers multiple perspectives so that I can get a better overview of what I did well and what I need to work on. I will be spending the weekend working on this essay to get it as perfect as possible and meet all the requirements for the essay. But that’s it for now, I’ll be back next week!

2/25/2021

This is my first journal entry! I started a bit later than I wanted to, but that’s okay. I wanted to make sure that I had worked a little in this class so I have something to talk about. I just submitted my outline for my technical description assignment, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot recently. I have to get started soon on the first draft, but I’m feeling really good about this assignment. I like the freedom we have to describe pretty much any device or machine we like, so it helps keep us interested, rather than writing about some Shakespearean literature. I decided to write about a gaming controller, and I’m probably going to pay special attention to the PlayStation 5 controller simply because that’s the one I use the most. It also has some of the best features out of all other controllers, making for a better and more essay to write and more interesting research to do. Who knows, maybe understanding how the controller works will help me use it better. I still haven’t done much research, I left that for when I actually begin writing the essay because I don’t really see a point in doing research well before starting the essay. I also really like the way discussions work in this class. At first, it was kind of strange having a fully asynchronous class because I felt like I wasn’t really going to learn much. However, keeping up with the assignments, the readings, and the discussions posts is all I really need. And to be honest, having a fully asynchronous class is a lot less stressful because I can do my work on my own time and I don’t have to wake up for a zoom session to learn something that I can really just learn on my own. This class allows for the collaborative aspect of writing, while also removing all that unnecessary stress of online school, which I’m very grateful for. Anyway that’s all I have for today’s journal, so I’ll be back next week!