Engineers Can Write Too This semester has brought huge improvements for me as a writer, with major improvements in my own life reflecting over to my writing. The shift to online learning gave me more than enough time to get myself straight and in my level of productivity has improved as a result. The previous semester felt like mental torture, and this semester felt like a complete change in direction. Although my writing isn’t as polished as that of a best-selling author, I think it has come a long way since the beginning of the semester. My self-reflection assignments are a good place to start to see how my process as a writer has changed. Looking at my self-reflection for the technical description[1], I’ve been able to quickly pick up on the flaws in my own writing and address them accordingly. In my self-reflection, I said, “From this assignment I learned that avoiding gray areas in your description that don’t seem like gray areas to you specifically may make the described object very confusing for people who are unfamiliar with that object.” In my technical description, I left out some information that I thought was not necessary, but it made it more confusing to understand for my peers. There were some terms in my description that made sense to me but a person unfamiliar with the described object may not know what it is, such as a “gyroscope sensor” or “fiber-glass reinforced plastic.” This issue of leaving out necessary information is something I believe that I improved upon in the memo[2]. In the memo, my goal was to address issues regarding the cleanliness of the NAC escalators, but I also went to elaborate further on how we should fix the escalators entirely. I wanted to discuss how a student found the remains of a mouse on the escalators and how this shows that the proper measures to keep the escalators clean were not taken. I wanted to emphasize how poorly managed the escalators were by also introducing another issue about the inconvenience of escalators turning off at certain times of the day. The purpose of the memo was to address a certain issue to a superior, and so it would make sense to address all necessary points to make the problem more evident. This addresses the course learning objective of enhancing strategies for reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment. By learning from my mistakes in the technical description, I was able to write out a detailed and direct memo with a strong voice. This mistake in my technical description also made me conscious of the linguistic differences between the audience and me, which is something that I believed I learned to address in the lab report[3]. The lab report felt like the most important assignment we have had up to that point in time, and it was an assignment that allowed me to achieve several learning objectives. In my lab report, I acknowledged the linguistic differences between the audience and me by describing certain important terms, such as “the digital divide” and “laptop loaning services,” to clear up any confusion and to make my report more accessible for others. These terms may not need to be explained for me, but not everyone knows what they are, and thus explaining those terms eliminates a linguistic barrier between the audience and me. This accomplishes the course learning objective of acknowledging the linguistic differences between others and myself as a resource and drawing on those resources to develop rhetorical sensibility. Another course learning objective I achieved from writing the lab report was being able to formulate and articulate a stance through and in my writing. This objective should be achieved naturally through this assignment as that is the whole purpose of the assignment. In my lab report, I took the stance that the COVID-19 pandemic has widened the digital divide and made it more difficult for students and adults to transition to online work/class. By using surveys from research centers and recent articles regarding the digital divide during the pandemic, I’ve been able to maintain my stance throughout my writing and made it clear that necessary actions need to be taken to address the pandemic’s impact on the digital divide. For example, I used surveys from the Pew Research Center to back my stance and show the necessity of technology during this pandemic, and I used that data to further elaborate on how those in poverty are hurt the most during the pandemic. Using the information I gathered, I discussed how we should expand our efforts to help those in need, such as having large laptop loaning services that use refurbished devices to keep costs low while demand is high. In addition, I explored how pre-existing solutions, such as free public WiFi, have a number of limitations that make them inefficient on a larger scale. Using my sources to develop a strong stance also shows that I have accomplished the learning objective of strengthening my source use practices. I also learned to practice using various library resources, online databases, and the Internet to locate sources appropriate to my writing projects. However, since my lab report is discussing a concurrent event, finding sources through online databases and library resources was difficult, and so I had to resort to using a simple Google search to find the necessary information. I was able to polish my ability to use various resources to find the appropriate sources in the engineering proposal[4]. Just like my lab report, I was able to accomplish several learning objectives from the engineering proposal and by doing so, I feel that I’ve been able to enhance my writing greatly since the beginning of the semester. As I mentioned before, I polished my ability to use various resources to find the appropriate sources in the engineering proposal. Throughout this assignment, each group member had a specific role to fulfill, and we all had an initial stage of background research. While I did use a Google search to attain a good portion of my information, there were some parts where I had to do a more extensive researching process to get the information I wanted to find. One of my group members had written a lab report before regarding the topic of our proposal, so that was one source of information we were able to rely on. Additionally, I contacted one of the vendors that we mentioned in the proposal in order to be able to get an approximate price to buy and install a certain number of turnstiles for a specific model. The representative may have gotten mad at me for not actually buying the turnstiles, but I was able to get the necessary information to continue with our proposal. In addition to this, we used data directly from the MTA in order to be able to come up with a proper financial plan and to also determine where the money needs to be spent. We also researched on different types of turnstiles that work in other countries in order to determine why NYC subway turnstiles are ineffective. Being able to do individual research and coming together to collaborate, plan out, finalize, and present our proposal shows that we were able to accomplish the learning objective of developing and engaging in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes. This assignment also helped me learn how to negotiate my own writing goals and audience expectations regarding conventions of genre, medium, and rhetorical situation. Splitting the workload of the proposal and assigning a role to each person helped me be able to set my own goals in how to approach the task that my role requires me to complete. Since I was in charge of determining what makes us qualified, as well as who our vendors are and how we wish to work with them, I needed to adjust the convention of my writing to make it more formal and to emphasize our skill sets to show that we are qualified for what the proposal calls for. This was a deviation from my expressive style of writing, but I think I was able to adjust my writing accordingly and state the necessary information without fluffing too much to maintain the formality and conciseness. For example, I discuss in the qualifications how we have worked with various vendors to deliver quick, efficient, and secure turnstiles throughout NYC. I also discussed each team member’s qualifications, like the skills we each have to offer as well as our job positions in our company FasTrans. The learning objective of engaging in genre analysis and multimodal composing to explore effective writing across disciplinary contexts and beyond is the only objective that I feel that none of my assignments have helped me accomplished. However, I do think that I still accomplished this objective by being engaged in in-class discussions. Although I rarely participated in class, I made sure to at least pay attention and see how we interpret different genres of writing. During in-class discussions, the professor would typically ask the class what they think a certain genre of writing is about, and students would give varying answers. Being able to see and understand the varying perspectives on these genres allowed me to get an understanding of what forms of writing are most suitable for me. Analyzing genres and understanding multimodal composing through these discussions has made it easier for me to comprehend how I should approach a writing assignment. For example, I learned how a technical description benefits greatly from the use of visual elements such as labelled pictures in order to describe how an object works. All the assignments I’ve done throughout this semester have benefitted me greatly as a writer and as a result, they enhanced my understanding of what the course learning objectives entailed. I did not simply just learn a course learning objective and then never try to improve my understanding of it ever again. With each assignment, I took what I learned from previous assignments and strengthened my writing by addressing the mistakes I made and attempting to fix them in later assignments. This process of going back to old assignments to address any mistakes so I do not make those same mistakes again has allowed me to strengthen my understanding of the course learning objectives. References [1]https://gazishahi210.commons.gc.cuny.edu/technical-description/ [2]https://gazishahi210.commons.gc.cuny.edu/memo/ [3]https://gazishahi210.commons.gc.cuny.edu/lab-report/ [4]https://gazishahi210.commons.gc.cuny.edu/engineering-proposal/