My Goal Grade
| A Work | B Work | C Work |
-Misses one class or less, or completes make-up work for excused absences -Annotates all readings thoroughly -Makes substantive comments in discussions -Completes all assignments on time (or has an approved extension request) -Work demonstrates intellectual engagement, care, effort, and growth in response to feedback -Collaborates substantially, contributes to vision, works equally with peers | -Misses two classes or less, or completes make-up work for excused absences -Annotates readings -Often participates in discussion -Completes all major assignments on time (or has an approved extension request) -Completes most SAs on time -Work demonstrates care, effort and growth in response to feedback -Collaborates equally, completes required work | -Misses three classes or less, or completes make-up work for excused absences -Completes most readings -Sometimes adds to discussion -Completes all major assignments on time (or has an approved extension request) -Completes at least four SAs -Meets minimal expectations on assignments; shows limited growth in response to feedback -Completes required collaborative work |
First-Week Introduction
This semester I am focusing in on a plethora of skills I’d like to improve on. They include collaboration, reading, quantitative literacy, oral communication, and intercultural knowledge and competence. I want to learn how to communicate efficiently and effectively. This semester we are going to be honing in on the specifics of our wicked problem, so looking at quantitative data and putting it into easy to read conclusions will be vital.
I am excited for the surveys and labs. We have been talking a lot about what our problem is, who it affects, and what we want to do, but I am looking forward to taking action and looking at results. I love my group and can’t wait to see what amazing things we accomplish. We didn’t do labs last semester, so I am intrigued, to say the least. I am nervous to go into the community. I want everyone to participate, but people these days are ruthless.
Last semester I waited until the last second to do things and I regretted it deeply. This semester I want to at least get a start on assignments when they are first assigned, so I don’t have to cram everything in the night before. My New Years resolution was to stay clean and organized, inside and outside of the classroom. This includes keeping my assignments orderly, but also keeping my car and bedroom clean. I know you’re tired of hearing it, but NEW YEAR NEW ME!
Midterm Introduction
This semester has been very engaging. I have enjoyed all of my assignments, and classes are starting to hone in on what I want to learn about. Developing our survey and looking at those results starting to come in has been huge. I love numbers and interpreting data. Although we have just started getting responses from our survey, I am looking forward to drawing conclusions from their responses and figuring out our next steps.
I have done a good job at keeping up with my workload and putting my all into my assignments for this class. I want to keep up with our communication strategies and organization skills. My group and I have been working beautifully, and I can’t wait to see what the rest of this semester and coming semesters have for us!
I am excited to work with faculty from the STEM center, and relaying our findings with JJK. I hope to take some weight off of JJK and help them better prepare for their new school. We are looking into the different kinds of curriculum and what has and hasn’t been successful for neighboring communities.
Final Introduction
This semester made me realize I am in this for the long haul. At first, I wasn’t sure what our goals were as freshmen in CODES and I wasn’t too worried about water equity and conservation. Now I am invested deeply in enhancing our project and ultimately making a difference. This semester I worked extremely hard, making sure to perfect my class work so that it would reflect on my ePortfolio.
I have spent most of the semester focusing on collaboration. We proudly gained another teammate, Justin, and we couldn’t be happier. We all mesh so well together and complement each others’ strengths and weaknesses. We have our system down-pat: Alexandra makes our shared docs separated with tabs for each of us to work on and puts them into our joint Google folder. Sonia is the brains when it comes to making a good presentation or sprucing up our lab reports. Justin brings the creativity and liveliness. Marques is always first to get his work done and gives feedback to others. And lastly, I am good at keeping us organized and on track, time wise.
Overall, I had a great time this semester. Everything is fitting well together, especially with JJK. I am so excited to see what the coming semesters will look like when we are more hands-on with the kids at JJK Academy while collaborating with Zach and Kurly.
Course Goals
Goal 1: Collaboration (30%)
Facilitates collaborators’ contributions by building upon their contributions and noticing when someone is not participating and inviting them to engage.
| What will you do to learn the content/ develop the skill? | What examples will you add to the portfolio to demonstrate your learning? | What characteristics of the chosen examples demonstrate you have met your goal? |
| I will make myself available for communication and open to accepting criticism. | Group charter(s) Email/text messages Cohesive presentations Zotero | Work with my group mates on a deeper level, ensuring we are all on the same page and giving feedback as much as possible. |
Below is our group charter. I collaborated with Alexandra, Marques, and Sonia to set some ground rules for the semester. We made sure to be specific and thorough in these rules to ensure smooth sailing throughout this course. So far, it has been working great for us! Especially the file we made so we have only one place where all of our documents are.
Next is our Zotero. We make sure to add articles we read/find to this. After meeting with Professor Kamper in the library, we feel better prepared to conduct more research. Zotero is a great resource, especially since it will generate citations for us! Early in the semester, it was fairly research-heavy. We wanted to see what kinds of activities were working for other communities and how we can tweak them to work with the kids at JJK. Also after meeting with Dr. Dexheimer in the STEM Center, we were able to find lesson plans and add them to our Zotero.
Here are some of our collaboration documents we have used thus far:
This was our outline for our discussion lead on Source Analysis #1. We color coded who wanted to talk about which points, which worked great. The next page consists of information we gathered from our peers during the discussion. We were able to get together and prepare thoroughly for our presentation.
Lastly, here are some text messages from our Youth Education group chat. This shows that we are all working together to get things done. This is just one of very many conversations we have had over the semester. We now text daily sometimes for class and sometimes for fun 🙂
Goal 2: Reading (20%)
Evaluates texts’ scholarly significance to apply reading to other contexts or issues.
| What will you do to learn the content/ develop the skill? | What examples will you add to the portfolio to demonstrate your learning? | What characteristics of the chosen examples demonstrate you have met your goal? |
| Annotate readings thoroughly, apply the CRAAP test to ensure sources are legit, and show correlation in Source Analyses. | Source Analyses (#1-4) Annotations/notes Notes from others’ source analysis presentations Lab result analyses | I will be able to reiterate research into easily digestible information, vital for presenting to our community partners. |
I completed 2 different papers for Source Analysis #1. One of them was the true source analysis and the other was more annotations and questions I had while reading the article. This shows that I want to get a deeper understanding of the reading and apply it to our wicked problem. Here are the annotations:
Reading was a big part in this semester. I completed 4 source analyses, all of which can contribute to this goal. At the end of each reading, you can see that I explained how this would be helpful to our project, even if the article was targeted for the other group. You can find source analyses under the source analyses tab. Below is one article we read for a source analysis. I took it upon myself to annotate and highlight as I read through the article. This shows that I take class readings seriously and relate them back to the problem at hand.
This can also be said for Lab #2. When we met with Dr. Dexheimer, she introduced us to teaching techniques and also the backbone of finding good lesson plans. We were writing notes and soaking in all of her advice. This was helpful for us to present to our friends at JJK, but will also be helpful next semester when we (hopefully) get to use some of these with the kids at the academy. Below are some notes I took while listening to Dr. Dexheimer:
Goal 3: Quantitative Literacy (20%)
Uses quantitative analysis of data as the basis for deep and thoughtful judgments, drawing insightful, carefully qualified conclusions.
| What will you do to learn the content/ develop the skill? | What examples will you add to the portfolio to demonstrate your learning? | What characteristics of the chosen examples demonstrate you have met your goal? |
| I want to take data and interpret it into words. | Lab result analyses Tables/Charts from labs Examine patterns between Labs (#1-3) Final project | Use these interpretations to draw conclusions and apply them to our wicked problem. |
This goal was the main chunk of the semester. We were constantly reviewing material and drawing conclusions from it. Even things we talked about in Dr. Bradley’s class related back to what we were doing in our research teams. There was even a section of our reflections that asked us to explain how this pertains back to our wicked problem in our research team. All of this comes together for our final project. This can be said for all members of our group, but we worked extremely hard to pull together this final project without leaving out any details. We worked our butts off to make strides during the semester that would ultimately relate back to this final showcase.
My role in Lab #1 was to analyze the data we collected from our survey. I took time to carefully analyze these charts and relate them back to the problem we are working on. (See labs)
Next, on our final project, I worked on summarizing our work on Lab #3. I was able to address what we accomplished on our visit to JJK Academy, while also talking a little bit about the previous labs and what we want to do in the future.
Goal 4: Oral Communication (20%)
Uses compelling, appropriate delivery techniques.
| What will you do to learn the content/ develop the skill? | What examples will you add to the portfolio to demonstrate your learning? | What characteristics of the chosen examples demonstrate you have met your goal? |
| I want to outline my speeches/projects so that people want to listen to me present instead of looking at it like a chore. | Scrollytelling preparation Final project preparation Lab results Group project outlines Discussion led SA | I want to incorporate engaging attention grabbers, questions, and overall just easy to comprehend speeches. |
When it came to preparing for our discussion lead on a Source Analysis, we made sure we were prepared. We made outlines, and FaceTimed for 2 hours to ensure we could present cohesively. On my part, I knew I wanted to use this article the second I read it. I had already done a source analysis on this last semester, so I wrote more notes on it with questions so I had enough to talk about. (See Reading Goal)
Below is our document to prepare for our final presentation. We made a document with different tabs so everyone could have their own space to prepare what to say but also make sure it flows well with the rest of us. We practiced in class and also made plans to meet the day before to polish our presentation.
Lastly, throughout the semester I practiced my oral communication skills by effectively communicating during class and to Dr. Martinez. I was always the one to speak up during our meetings with Zach and Kurly and ask plenty of questions. I am always volunteering to be the spokesperson. Although this was not during this class, I spent 6 hours at the Illinois State Capitol explaining to legislators what our group in CODES was doing. I created a poster that attracted many legislators and even the President of the SIU System.
Goal 5: Intercultural Knowledge and Competence (10%)
Suspends judgment in interactions with people culturally different than themselves.
| What will you do to learn the content/ develop the skill? | What examples will you add to the portfolio to demonstrate your learning? | What characteristics of the chosen examples demonstrate you have met your goal? |
| I want to go into these surveys and source analyses with an open mind. Being white and trying to understand underrepresentation, racially is tough. | Surveys Source Analysis (tied into race & culture) Ethnographies Interviews/sampling | I want to have a better understanding of what minorities go through and how we can combat that. I want to think deeper into ethics. Collaborating with my classmates on this wicked problem will also show this. |
Being a part of CODES has led me to see how people interact differently. I am a white woman surrounded by peers who come from all different backgrounds. As I interact with them, it makes me realize what an advantage I have to other college students because I get to experience diversity everyday.
Observing and interacting with the kids at Jackie Joyner-Kersee Academy was an amazing experience. It opened my eyes to see what and who we are putting in all this work for.
During our interview, Zach brought to light that he would like to incorporate learning about East Saint Louis into these after school programs. Not only learning about water quality and conservation, but how that affects where these kids live and where they come from.