Collaborative Academic Paper: Reflection on it All
Contributing as a co-author on an academic paper is stimulating, challenging, and nothing short of rewarding. The feeling of pride rushes to my cheeks every time I think about my name on an academic paper that will be used by the public to learn more about what might be able to help change the political climate that the United States finds itself in currently. The research process was a difficult and challenging one, however the expansion of my knowledge on how to create and work though it is immense. Working as a team whether individually, in small groups, or as a class will always hold different pros and cons depending on the project and people you are with. I found that the most important aspect of working collaboratively on this paper was active (and proactive) communication. Though this type of communication was only mastered towards the end of our work, I feel as though everyone will be able to use this skill going forward and making the next collaborative project they work on easier.
When thinking about the most interesting aspects of the knowledge I gained as a researcher on this project I immediately think back to the coding process. I think about watching the videos we were given about coding and thinking about how easy it will be. I think about coding myself before meeting as a group to discuss our codes and reasons for them. I think about how I assumed everyone would code the same as I did… and then I think about how that process was a train wreck waiting to happen with a mindset like that. Coding by yourself is one thing, but coding as a team takes work, disagreements, and open communication about a thought process that others need to be able to understand. The coding process we came up with was about figuring out what the major components of a response were and how four people can come to agree on what those components must be. As a researcher, coding cannot be done with any emotions or cognitive predispositions on the material, but rather a scientific process of finding value in responses.
My insights on the collaborative process in research were negative due to past experiences, and when this project began I felt as though it would stay that way. My mindset was proven wrong, again. Although I found the collaborative process to start out slow, difficult, and at some times frustrating, when our team needed to come together to polish and perfect our paper we decided at that moment that we needed to work together and lift eachother up in order to complete the task at hand. I found that any team member openly asking for help or another set of eyes on their individual part made the rest of the team want to support them and lend a hand. I found that the active communication in real time made a major difference in the timeliness and quality of the work being done.
I think that research should be collaborative, as every mind in our class had something different to offer and every thought should be questioned in order to have the most creative and unbiased paper possible. Without each member of the team this paper would not have been what it is now, and I’m not sure if any of us would have felt as accomplished as I do writing this reflection. The quote often spoken about collaborative work is “the group is only as strong as the weakest link”, and I used to think that meant that the team as a whole was weaker that originally thought, however, after researching with this particular team I think that the quote actually means that when the “weakest link” is lifted up by other group members the team is stronger.
The role of research teams in constructing public knowledge for the world is just as important as ever today. Teams of people trying to better and educate the world are made up of people who care about the world, the people in it, and the quality of the information the world has access to. I think that in today’s climate this is extraordinary. We find ourselves not knowing if we can trust sources or one another more often than not, so to know that research teams are coming together to create concrete information that can be trusted is heroic. The information collected in this research paper is so timely, and should be read by everyone. This paper attacks some of the fundamental problems we find ourselves in daily concerning law enforcement, media literacy, and academia. To better understand these problems we are facing we must learn about them, and there is no one greater to learn from than a team of researchers who care about the importance of the information they are putting out.
Overall, this project changed who I am as a student, but as a person as well. Collecting information and learning about a hot topic in society was a great chance for me to develop my skills as a researcher, working as a collaborative team member and having to figure out what makes a team work made me a better collaborator, but the most rewarding part of this project was being proven wrong. I thought that coding would be easy, and I was wrong. I thought that working as a group would only be difficult, not rewarding, and I was wrong. These times that I was wrong I had to work out why I was wrong and correct my mindset. These corrections will now follow me to my next academic project, making me second guess what will or will not be difficult making sure I am prepared for more obstacles and I will come into my next collaborative project with a new mindset that might make me a better group member from the beginning. I also now have personal research to advocate for the implication of media literacy in different aspects of society, not just in schools. I will be able to show the results from a study that I worked on and speak about how any infrastructure can benefit from learning more about media literacy. My skills as a researcher, group member, and media literacy advocate in society have developed greatly over the course of working on this academic paper.
