Reflecting on Clear Intentions
Sometimes I can’t get out of my own way. Generally speaking, this only applies when doing something for myself rather than for others. I am confronted with a challenge and rather than stepping back to consider the options and identifying a clear path to completion, I add layers of difficulty. I’m not sure that I can explain how this happens, but when approaching the final project for this course, I was deep in the process when I also found myself in the middle of multiple health and family issues. So, when work suddenly seemed to be in a bit of a crisis mode, you would think that would add more trouble. Instead, I found myself able to push everything else aside and move in a single direction with purpose.
Rather than focusing my project on my personal struggles with digital authorship, I was able to find something that would require that I continue to take risks, restructure my own work as well as that of my department in order to allow more opportunities to engage with digital authorship, and support my colleagues and the local community to do the same. The struggle is real, but it doesn’t have to be the main character in my story.
I enjoyed the freedom (with some parameters) allowed by my organization to reorganize the way that the department functions and communicates its purpose. Reviewing both previous and current work, it was very clear that both digital literacy and authorship are at the center of most things that we do. However, we have not been communicating this intention clearly. This purpose and the idea of service to others definitely helped me to confront my fears and move past the roadblocks that I had built for myself.
Below is a link to a folder containing the six documents that I created as a part of this process: Mission Statement, Job Descriptions (3), Interview Questions, Professional Development, Partnerships and Projects, and Education Services Programs. I acknowledge that this is just the beginning of a process that will not have an end and look forward to engaging with more of my colleagues along the way.
