E-portfolio Reflection

The process of creating and writing the E-portfolio was a useful learning experience in the art of web design and how to present writing in a widely consumed modality. While I have colleagues who are capable enough with HTML code to manually create elements of their websites, I do not have that same skill, so I relied on a platform called Webador for preset design features in order to present my E-portfolio in an engaging manner. An essential takeaway of this assignment for me was an added awareness of a personal brand’s importance. In a competitive job market, it can be difficult to find ways to stand out to employers, and having a website gives one a ready-made showcase of their skills In a modality that allows for tailoring of presentation, thus the ability to create a compelling website is a valuable skill to learn for a modern job-seeker. I found this project especially useful by providing an onus for me to dip my feet into such an essential skill, especially in the political field, which I am majoring in. My creative process when deciding the design for my website allowed me to gain a familiarity with the capabilities of the web design platform I have used. Furthermore, the process gave me several ideas for how I could present my personal work to enhance my professional brand.

While the process of designing the portfolio itself was rather simple, with clear instructions and an achievable goal, I found the extent of reflection required to be a bit tiresome. I believe that the contents of a student’s writing should be sufficient to display their grasp of the learning outcomes and given that multiple articles are repeated throughout the portfolio, penning novel thoughts in each reflection was difficult. Despite the repetitive nature of this process, I enjoyed the ability to compare and contrast different genres and styles of writing. While the variety of styles I had the chance to employ were limited by the condensed length of this course, describing the genre differences between distinct articles of writing demonstrates my achievement of the learning outcomes. Furthermore, identifying the rhetorical choices I made throughout my pieces gave me a chance to examine my strengths and weaknesses as a writer. Knowing where I need to improve in the future will be an essential part of my amateur writing career, that I hope will prepare me in the event I decide to attend law school.

Reflection on Research Paper

While I was writing my research paper, I was very interested in discovering the limits of the AGI music that I had only seen before in humorous contexts. Unlike most people, I did not have any presupposed bias about the capabilities of AGI music generators, and although they are very technically impressive, AGI music lacks the emotive elements that contribute to truly great musical performance. With such a broad topic that I was so interested in, the research process was challenging for me. Ironically, I actually had too much information about my topic, and my lack of specificity in my research led to a disjointed effort of a draft paper. The positive of this wide net that I cast in research, however, is that I was free to improvise about how exactly I wanted to frame my topic, and due to my indecisive style of writing, having additional options for discussion made completing the assignment significantly easier.

Due to the issues I faced narrowing down my topic during the research and drafting stages, the revision period was extremely helpful for me. Having the first opportunity to truly look back at my work in such a fast-paced course allowed me to realize the issues within my argument, and that I needed to explicitly mention the comparison between past and present within my thesis. Additionally, having the opportunity to expose myself to different topics and arguments from my classmates opened my mind to taking a less technical tone with the reader, which lends better to the argument about the emotional affectivity of music, and how it cannot be replicated by AI. Having the opportunity to discuss my ideas aloud was also extremely helpful for me, as oftentimes the less regimented structure of a conversation will open my mind to better, more digestible means of presenting my topic.