Week 10 Wrap-up

The most valuable skills I learned in College Composition II for the Health Care Professionals were APA formating, pre and post draft techniques, tips on editing, and peer reviewing. All of which will come in handy when I author or co-author a scientific abstract and submit it for publication. I honestly would have liked to have written more scientific papers but with only 10 weeks our time was very limited. With the final paper I felt like I was guided (I it was a much-needed guide) but I would have also liked to try writing it completely on my own. I might actually have a chance later on in a different course but this course definitely helped me prepare.

Whew…I made it!!!

I have to be honest, going into College Composition II for the Health Care Professionals I was pretty intimidated. I thought the class would be inundated with reading and writing assignments and I really wasn’t sure how I would possibly fit it into my already crazy schedule. Then when I learned we were going to write scientific papers…I nearly lost “it”. I started to panic and couldn’t really think straight. I began to think about my other class and what my responsibilities were there, my familial obligations and my anticipated travel for work – needles-to-say it was a lot all at once. I’m a perfectionist in recovery so the thought of getting anything less than an “A” in a class was still daunting to me. However, once we started working on the paper week by week as a class I was so encouraged. Each week I was getting tips and advice on areas I struggled with and it made all the difference for me. It was also encouraging to hear that students had similar struggles and were willing to offer me advice.

All-in-all I’m glad I made I through (will not completely – last day is 4/13). The skills I’ve learned from this class will stay with me throughout my career, I’m sure.

My thoughts on blogging

In my previous blogging experiences I blogged with a group of people. We would all post blogs and one another would comment on the blog. Sometimes the comments spurred new blog topics. We blogged about; culture, society, politics, stereotypes and a bunch of other topics. The blogs were public and sometimes people outside our group read and leave comments.

Initially, I was terrified of blogging and posting my crazy ideas for all to see but eventually, I began to really enjoy it. I would post controversial topics and welcome the feedback of others even if they disagreed with my views. In a non-formal way blogging made me a more confident writer and I would recommend it to anyone.
I really didn’t have expectations of high participation (in regards to reading my blog) simply because it didn’t seem like many members of the class were accustomed to blogging. I personally, did not have the time to read other’s blogs though I would have loved to.

Again, due to time constraints it’s not likely that I’ll blog anytime soon. I do however, jot down my various thoughts which may be blog topics or book chapters or just random ideas. I love writing and I never know when today’s thoughts might be useful.

New research shows that “exercise can help prevent weight gain”…duh :-/

I’m on Yahoo! daily and because my job deals with health and nutrition as well as my degree, I’m constantly scanning the web for health-related topics. Today I came across headlines that read “Exercise Can Help Prevent Weight Gain, But It Won't Be Easy”, my first thought was “duh – doesn’t everyone already know that?” Then I read the article to see what it entailed. It talked about newly released research that followed 34,000 women average age 54.2 that were not on a diet and were physically active on a regular basis and over many years – they gained less weight. What was not surprising to me was the end result, what was surprising to me was that I thought this was common knowledge. Maybe because I’m currently taking a Nutrition Management course I think things that I’m learning are things that everyone already knows. Once I snapped out of it—I thought, “this should be general knowledge, people should know that when the energy you consume exceeds the energy you burn the end result is weight gain.” If people don’t know this and aren’t being taught this how are people suppose to single-handily avoid obesity? Nutrition professionals can’t expect every citizen to have a computer and log on to www.mypyramid.gov to learn how they should be eating. If people are getting this information from a common place (i.e. school) how are they expected to know it?

I feel like there is much to be conquered in the career path I have chosen and am eager to get started.

If you are interested in reading the full article, here is the url:
http://health.yahoo.com/featured/91/exercise-can-help-prevent-weight-gain-but-it-won-t-be-easy

Erika

Adventures in writing...

Unlike a few of my classmates – I chose a topic with an overwhelmingly abundance of information. I literally have a sea of journal articles, books, reports, surveys and other helpful material to swim through as I write my final scientific paper. At times it’s both an exciting and tremendous task. I love the nuggets of information I’m learning along the way and the skills I’m acquiring by using APA source citing. I actually think that this project is causing me to desire working in public policy – maybe not as a career but as a volunteer citizen or something. I am first and foremost a Christian and I struggle with the “Separation of Church and State”. I feel that being a Christian isn’t something you can simply turn on or off when required, it’s more like a part of who you are and I don’t know how a person is suppose to separate their self from who they are…well I’m getting somewhat off topic so I’ll end there.
Back to my wonderful experiences with writing my paper…
Prior to taking this course I always felt that I would one day author a scientific paper (and hopefully it would get published) but I never considered the amount of work necessary to write the actual paper. At my job I manage our research projects and work closely with researchers. I noticed that often times the researcher has his/her PhD and their name is listed as the Principle Investigator however, it’s the graduate student that writes or prepares the initial proposal in response to the RFP (Request for Proposal) and it’s usually the same graduate student that writes the abstract which is submitted to journals and/or national conferences. I now know the benefit of having a PhD is simply that you don’t have to do all the legwork when writing a scientific paper! LOL
All-in-all it’s a great experience and hopefully one that is preparing me for my future…

Thanks for reading!
Erika

How school has influenced my life

With the start of term 4 my life has become busier than in previous terms. In this term my family joined a new church where we participate in Sunday worship weekly and Tuesday night bible study weekly, my daughter has played basketball, volleyball and is just now starting track and my oldest son is just beginning baseball. I, of course, play “taxi” for all of these events and I’m happy to do so but school is helping me to better organize my time. Before I started school I used to have somewhat of a schedule but I didn’t have to “stick” to it too much because I always had wiggle-room…not anymore. Being in school has taught me to make and keep appointments (with my homework) as well as making and keeping other appointments, whether it be doctor, or other services. I often write things down on a calendar instead of leaving it to my usually faulty memory and this is a direct influence from school.

I also attribute my scrutinizing of my kids work ethic to my being in school. I’ve learned (for the 2nd and 3rd time) that procrastination only hurts me in the end. I am now able to demonstrate proper use of time to my kids so that they can see it’s very possible and only requires discipline.

I can’t wait until I’m done with school but so far the experience of being in school has changed my life.

Why I think people should ALWAYS cite their sources...

especially if using the internet.

If you’ve ever done a “key word” search, by typing a specific word directly into your web browser, you know that the results could be numerous (some of which could be helpful to you). Usually the top results are the most relevant and typically come from reliable sources however, if few results are returned none of them can be reputable. What makes information reputable for me is whether the author listed their sources or not. Anyone can create a webpage about anything but that doesn’t make them an expert on that topic. Depending on what I’m researching, using unreliable sources could ruin my credibility (or harm my grade).

People should cite their sources so that others reading their work know where their information came from. It’s also the polite thing to do. Often times we don’t think about the amount of time it saves us when we find a book or journal article on the exact topic we (students) need to write a paper on. Citing your sources is the gift that keeps on giving – when you cite your source that person likely cited their source and the person before them and so on. This even allows the writer to do in-depth research or a literature review.

Another thing about citing sources, that I found out the hard way, is when cited incorrectly it’s difficult to track down the actual work being cited. Not only do people need to cite their sources they also need to cite them correctly.

Thanks for reading and please feel free to leave a comment or question.

Erika