When I first entered Writing for Engineers 21007 I was expecting it to be a repetition of all my other english courses I have taken. That repetition started to make my writing feel like it has plateaued. My writing started to feel very cookie cutter like since I was repeating the same formulas professors taught to get a good grade. I usually ended up talking about a topic I do not enjoy from the heart, whether it be comparing two works from philosophers that I do not understand or write about the issues in the 1700s.
This all changed with my first writing assignment, the Technical Description, in Writing for Engineers 21007, since I had the freedom to choose what I wrote about. It did not follow that previously stated cookie cutter shape. I actually enjoyed writing the technical description to the point where I lost track of time. For instance when describing the Apple Earpods I could release some creativity without adding my opinion.I could feel my writing evolve from opinionated works to a more factual and strictly visual aspect. By taking into account that the audience could have some restriction, such as being unable to see pictures, I was able to write a description that they could understand. Personally I think writers have this bias when looking back at a previous work, noting that I feel as if I had gotten all the course learning outcomes achieved. But for my first draft I had not followed any course learning outcomes. What elevated my work was the peer revision, by reviewing another peer’s work I was able to see many flaws in my own.
My next work was a memo, this was a new experience for me since I had never written a memo before. I again had to take a not opinionated approach where I also have to be careful not to offend anyone as well. So I became cautious trying to highlight my concern for the students in almost every part. For example I mentioned the dangers of a slippery floors or mentioned the safety of the students in the Subject, Summary, Discussions, and Recommendations. This subliminally would keep the blame on the custodial services without directly saying it. I unfortunately did not include any pictures due to the issue of the gym being closed at the current time, due to a virus outbreak. I am not sure if I had achieved any new learning outcomes since the topic was relatively personal so I just said what I felt but kept it professional. Overall again my work was brought up to a new level with my peer editing, since it was my first time writing a memo I did not include the to, from, subject, and date as shown in the picture of my first draft.
After writing the memo I moved on to the next assignment, which was the Engineering Proposal. For this assignment I had to work in a group, being on the quieter side I was not sure how this was going to turn out. But from the start my peers where kind and understanding throughout our entire project. Our project topic was adding Turnstiles to the CCNY campus, specifically the NAC building. We first started off by dividing the roles of the task among us, I was given the task of the Introduction. After writing the first draft of the proposal our professor and another team reviewed our work and gave constructive criticism. After that review we moved on to working on the final draft, since we all had already divided the work we stuck with out parts. In the end, with the help of my peers criticism we ended up with a very robust introduction. Overall I learned how to work more efficiently with group members as well as how to be a bit more vocal.
Image of First Draft for Memo
