Final Blog: Transformative Learning

For my final blog, I wanted to reflect on my final thoughts on this course.

I learned two major things to make this course "transformative" :

• I learned that academic writing does not have to be formal.

I now think about academic writing differently. Now, I write like I am actually trying to communicate - to speak - with someone. I focus less on the formalities, and more on the rhetoric. I can persuade a reader without being formal; if anything, I learned that writing informally may help readers understand my point.

• I learned that marketing yourself and your work is one of the most important skills.

This course taught me how to use Social Media and create a campaign. As a young adult, it is pretty surprising that I had no idea how to use Twitter, but I quickly learned. There is so much information and so many profiles to go through. I not only interacted with others in my field and curate my feed, but I learned how to create meaningful posts. I learned how to market my Twitter, earning followers who enjoyed reading my posts. I also learned how to create a website and market the website. This website looks so much better than it did 10 weeks ago!

As for how I can improve in the future, I want to get better at researching. While I found articles that fit with my essays, I felt that I could've broadened my search. Most of my sources came from the National Library of Medicine, which is a website I am comfortable with; I should become more comfortable with other websites. I could have spent more time at the UC library, asked a librarian to help with my research. Unfortunately, due to time constraints, I was not able to do this.

Another problem I faced was my time issues. I started the quarter off strong, finishing assignments early. However, towards the end of Week 7, I started to feel the pressure of my other classes. I also had events to attend (it is graduation season) and a family emergency, so I was pretty busy.

In the future, I plan to ask a librarian to help in my research journey, I think that they could be a good help, and I could have found sources that are unique. In terms of my time management, I think that I should work a little harder to complete assignments when I can, and not when I want to.

Overall, I enjoyed taking this "transformative" course. It was really fun! I will be using the skills I have learned in my future. Good job and good luck to everyone!