In my Writing for Engineering class, I was required to write multiple engineering related documents, as we worked towards achieving the Course Learning Outcomes. I believe I have fulfilled the first bullet point, to understand and utilize my peers’ different perspectives and writing styles. I often realized that the peer review process we did in class added helpful hints that improved my writing.
The second bullet was fulfilled through the constant assignments where I had the opportunity to practice these skills in realistic situations like writing a resume, lab report, and product proposal. I worked with other people who helped me review their work and in turn, I reviewed their work and checked it for grammar.
The third bullet, to understand the audience I am writing for, was fulfilled by being professional in the Lab Report. This document requires that no personal pronouns (like I, we, him or you) be used. Furthermore, because it is a lab report, I had to explain jargon to those who might not understand. For example, in my lab report I had to explain what electrolysis is so that my audience would understand the scope of my project. I was unaware of the pronouns that were in the first draft of my paper, but luckily during peer review my classmates were able to find them and point them out to me. Therefore, I was able to quickly rectify these mistakes.
I was only able to fix these mistakes by fulfilling the 4th bullet, collaboration with others. After I had someone look over my work, I was able to find mistakes that I normally wouldn’t have been able to, like the previously mentioned pronouns. I was also working on my final proposal with a group, and it was necessary to delegate tasks to certain people in order to complete the assignment on time. I was responsible for the plan of work and the timeline, but I needed the input of my group members Lea and Abid, responsible for the introduction and budget respectively, to decide what steps to take and whether they were fiscally possible in a given timeframe.
In class, we were exposed to reveal different sources of information, such as Google Scholar, JSTOR, and the CCNY library databases. Although I seldom used these, when I did I was able to find a wealth of information to be used for my assignments. I did this all throughout the year in order to support various statements I made in my essays. Furthermore, I believe that I effectively utilized these sources by learning to cite them in IEEE format. I often used a technique that Professor Barber told us about, the quote sandwich, which consisted of introducing a topic, quoting a source about that topic and then explaining that quote. For example, in my Lab Report I stated “Michael Faraday created two laws of electrolysis: “The amount (in ‘Faraday’ units) of electric charge required to discharge one mole of substance at an electrode is equal to the number of ‘excess’ elementary charges on that ion” [3]. and “The mass of a substance produced at an electrode during electrolysis is proportional to the number of moles of electrons (the quantity of electricity) transferred at that electrode” [3]. These laws accurately describe the process of electrolysis and allow us to calculate the specific amounts of substances used and created in these reactions.” This quote sandwich allowed me to effectively use my quote to support my statements.
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