Blog 26: Senior Project Reflection

(1) Positive Statement

What are you most proud of in your 2-Hour Presentation and/or your senior project? Why?

One of the things I am most proud of about my 2-Hour Presentation is being able to present a “non traditional” presentation by using my powerpoint effectively. During my 2-Hour, the most essential thing I wanted to achieve was to convey a message to all the students that my project isn’t really about social media networks, but about ourselves (how we live our life, and why things are the way they are). I am so very proud of myself of being able to accomplish this by taking accountability for my studies and dedicating myself to research based learning while applying ESA that Mrs. Pittman taught us. I’m very proud of accomplishing all of these things because it really gave me flesh to my topic and allowed me to communicate to other students my genuine passion for the online world. In addition to this, what all these things have allowed me to do is to take a step back from my project and see what I have done and say, “wow, it all makes sense.”

(2) Questions to Consider

a. What assessment would you give yourself on your 2-Hour Presentation (self-assessment)?

AE       P          AP       CR       NC

b. What assessment would you give yourself on your overall senior project (self-assessment)?

AE       P      /    AP       CR       NC

(3) What worked for you in your senior project?

What worked for my senior project was my ability to: have a conversation with teachers about the progress of my topic, being able to effectively apply my research to my project, interviewing people who use online media, taking a sociology class at calpoly that allowed me to find the foundation of the human aspect of my project, the Technology Entertainment and Design network, utilizing expert source analysis on research, all three presentations, research checks, applying mathematical language to my project, having a 65 slide powerpoint (lol), my room environment/sponge activity, utilizing online media to enhance my project (my blogspot, my blogspot for my 2-Hour).

More importantly, the thing that worked most for my senior project was my growing interest in my topic and passion for it by the end of the senior year experience.  

(4) (What didn't work) If you had a time machine, what would have you done differently to improve your senior project if you could go back in time?

What didn’t work was seriously my mentorship. Lacking a mentor really weakened my findings due to the lack of experience in the field I had with an expert. I wish I would had tried more face-to-face efforts versus via email or telephone, because if I were to had networked myself out like this, I would had most likely found a nice PR firm or even social media networker and had been able to improve my senior project.

(5) Finding Value

How has the senior project been helpful to you in your future endeavors?   Be specific and use examples.

I am an aspiring journalist, in fact I am actually going to CalState Fullerton aiming to major in communications with a concentration of journalism. With this in mind, my senior project has prepared me to conduct investigative projects and heavily research. In addition to these aspects, my senior project taught me the importance of networking yourself out there as well as dedicating yourself to a goal.

For example, research based learning was essential to my project. By understanding how to apply Expert Source Analysis on nearly every source I accumulated, I learned that to have valuable findings, you have to expand outside of Google. My senior project has given me the reality that talking to people, whether it be through formal or informal interviews or even mere conversations, is something that helps give a person validity. Validity is important for a journalist to establish. This is because, it shows a lot about someone's character if they are  not only willing to dedicate themselves to the books and online sphere, but to talk to people who have experience in the question you are investigating.

Although this was an area I failed in my project, I learned that networking yourself out there opens many doors that leads to endless possibilities of success. Thanks to the senior project, I now know that to establish relationships with people, especially experts, limiting yourself to email and phone does not get you anywhere. 

Despite not going anywhere as far as mentorship, I learned that if you have dedication for something, things sorta just fall into place. I don't really know how to describe it in any way besides this, because dedication is the drive of how far we push ourselves to achieve success. For example, my dedication and passion towards my topic enabled me to really establish valuable findings and understanding to social networks. This understanding and value helped other students grasp the material taught in my 2-hour, because of the fact that: because it mattered to me, it mattered to them.

In conclusion, the senior project ultimately really allowed me to experience what not to do when doing investigative research projects.