Final Post

This class has been a wonderful learning experience for me in numerous ways. I have not only learned things about myself, but I have also learned how to truly be a professional, what that means digitally, and how to make that transition successfully. This class has been completely different from all of my other courses throughout my entire educational career. I have always been the overachieving student that followed the detailed instructions given by a teacher or professor to a tee. I have always followed every rule, every rubric, every instruction without fail, it’s just the type of student I am. This class however, let me not only spread my wings, but also to take the assignments how I wanted and truly find my professional passion.

Mostly or all of the classes I have had in college are formulated basically the same way; we get a syllabus at the beginning of the semester outlining the content we will cover and the calendar of assignments. Some of these are weekly assignments, monthly, or just a series of essays and papers due by a certain deadline. Nevertheless they are all the same. I got to a point where I felt like I was just doing the same work over and over again but on different topics, I was a robot. Then this course came along. This course had a loosened structure where we did have certain assignments and requirements, but they were tailored to our individual passions and what professional we wanted to be. I quickly discovered that I love writing, blogging, typing, whatever the correct term for it is, I love it. I learned that my writing passion is TV, Film, and their corresponding industries. This transformed every assignment from a necessary evil, to an enjoyable task that has helped me become a professional.

Each assignment was tailored to my passion, how I wanted to interpret most of them was up to me. My final project is six contributions of my choosing and I have been writing all semester just for this assignment-I loved it. No matter what I was doing if a writing idea came to me, I stopped and wrote down a title, a few sentences, or just grabbed my laptop and wrote it out. Each and every assignment not only allowed for me to be my true creative self, but they each taught me a specific lesson.

The first assignment taught me how to put myself out there as a professional in a community of people just like me. It also taught me how to develop a network of fellow professionals via professional profiles and websites. The second assignment taught me that really thinking about what I am doing each week, each day for a not just a class, but in my journey to become a professional is a necessary task. One day I will look back at these posts and my own personal journal and remember what it took to get where I will be in my life. Each reflective post was a learning experience for me; what to write, how personal to get, and what do I say about what I am doing workwise not just for the course, but also for my blog itself. The third assignment taught me that no matter what I write, I can design a website and portfolio to better market myself. For years, I was using WordPress as a platform for my blog posts. They never had a true focus, and I think it was just me finding my place in the blogging community. The portfolio making assignment allowed me to take a step back and truly create a suitable platform for my now more focused writings. Not only did I learn more about website editing for assignment, but I also learned what I wanted my brand to put out there and how to market myself and my writings most effectively. The professional presentation allowed me to work with fellow budding professionals and present a cohesive presentation on a topic we all new, understood, and is our true passion. The final assignment that was essentially a cumulative assignment of all my progress in creating my professional contribution over the course of the semester and I worked each week throughout the semester so that in the end I had a choice of blog posts. This allowed me to truly put my best professional foot forward.

Throughout this course I learned that some skills are more valuable in my passion and in helping me complete each assignment to the fullest of my ability. Self-motivation is a key skill that is essential to success in this course. If you are not a self-motivated person then you will not be able to keep up with the coursework over the course of the entire semester, such as the reflective journal and even the portfolio content. I believe I have this skill so each assignment was afforded the necessary attention in order to complete them successfully. Another skill I believe was useful in this course is; punctuality. If you are a person that is perpetually late or turns in assignments at the last minute, then you will automatically have a hard time in this course. Due to the fact that each assignment is multifaceted and there are several different complicated elements to each assignment, completing it at the last minute is almost virtually impossible. For example, the reflective journal assignment required that 15 post be made over the course of the semester, some required, and some not able to be finished until the end. However, if you had not made a single post until April you would be in a world of hurt. Therefore punctuality is a key asset or skill in order to succeed in this course. These skills are important in life in general but I have learned over the course of the semester that these skills were especially important in order to success in this class and become a true professional.

This course changed my view of what constitutes a professional in today’s media landscape. It also challenged what I thought I was going to do in the future career wise and as far as my true passion goes. This course has taught me many skills and given me many options as far as what I will do next in my professional arena. I have learned that I thoroughly enjoy creating websites and tweaking them to fit the type of brand or person that they represent. I have also learned that in the near future I would love to work on the computer in a design capacity. This course has also taught me that even though many people in my life have said that I cannot make a career out of writing, I can and I may not even want to. I love writing and I don’t want it to be something that my job is contingent upon. I love to write what I want to write and not have a gatekeeper or a boss reading over it and saying that I am not allowed to have that opinion or say that statement. This experience has provided me with career options I had never considered before this course and its assignments. One assignment that I especially enjoyed was the social marketing strategy. I spent several hours sitting down doing research on how to effectively market in the digital realm. I then sat down and wrote a rather detailed digital marketing strategy, I loved doing this so much I have gotten an internship that is digital marketing focused. This will allow me to further explore a career option and possible passion for me in the media industry.

This course not only helps each student realize a career option and also to discover what their true passion is, but it also affects their academic future. I have one semester left of college along with a few summer classes, and this course has shaped how I will approach those classes before I graduate. This class has helped me to learn that just because an assignment has certain requirements, does not mean that I cannot direct those assignments towards something that I love. For example I have a world lit class where we had a few options for our final project, I decided to choose the option of blogging as if I were a famous writer. I enjoyed this project because I got to write or blog, but it was from the perspective of a famous writer. This course also affects what further education a student will go for after their graduate with their undergraduate degree. Before this course I was considering getting a master’s degree in journalism or digital media, now I am considering programs in digital marketing and website or graphic design. This class has allowed me to further realize my true passions through a varied group of assignments.

Overall, this course has opened not only doors for my future and career, but it has also opened my eyes on what type of student I continue to be and what type of student I will be in the future. All in all, this course was very defining for me and what becoming a professional.