Here is my self assessment to start off this portfolio

I have to admit doing this project I had a hard time with instructions. I think that was an issue that I dealt with throughout this semester in this English class. The best thing that the assignment has done for me is make me go outside my comfort zone, look inside myself, and reflect on it. The first part of improving my writing was learning to be specific and clear in my writing. Since I was young when I started writing I was always able to write pretty sentences that didn’t really amount to anything. I would write a bunch of ideas with no real goal in mind except to have something down for the essay. Even though those ideas didn’t really work out in a cohesive manner I would just write paragraphs and then sort them out like a jigsaw puzzle. Coming to college and taking this class I have learned that I have to work on being focused and specific in my writing. I have improved though. I know that when I first did the project my writing was not specific enough since I did not pick a subject that was very specific. I started out by taking about graduate school and then I had to transition to law school since there are many different types of graduate schools.
What I have learned from this is how to look at the world in the perspective of the social scientist. To look at the world in an analytic perspective when observing human behavior and social interactions. I think the most important skill that I got to work on was the interview others and writing about it as well as site observations. With the interview I was forced to work on my social and conversational skills. I still need to work on how to get people to open up while having and interview with someone and to keep the conversation going. It did teach me to try to look beyond the surface and try to look for and observe the little details like expression when interviewing someone. Doing site observation forced me to go outside my comfort zone and communicate with others to schedule a meeting for observation and interviews. If it wasn’t for this assignment I would have never gone to Columbia law to get information about the law school admission process. I think another thing that site observation was the skill of note taking my observations and my reactions to them.
I feel like what I need is more knowledge. Or figure out a way to improve my critical thinking skills. Over the years I used to just spout things that I heard or read from someone else instead of fully finding more knowledge to develop my own opinions. I’ve only been looking at the surface of a subject but haven’t truly dug deep enough yet. I feel like I have a lot of internal exploring that I have to do. Like I need to find my voice and truly be able to stand behind it. I feel like just realizing that is the start of my growth. I feel like I have started to grow in my writing because I have started to think more about how to make an essay a good essay. Putting in the time and the effort to really make it shine. A writer does not just have good writing by having fancy sentences it comes by the evolution of their voice. That’s what reading Iowa 80 taught me. The reason why that essay is so well written is because the writer was able to use his voice in a meaningful way to tell the story about the people there. His vivid descriptions about the site and interactions with the people he interviewed made the reader feel like they were there with the author. Their thoughts and perspective growing with them. I’m trying to write more in depth using more facts than myself but that’s hard. I always felt like the best writing had to have the writer in it. Good writers need to be able to take themselves out of their writing as well and be able to write objectively. I want to grow even more and be a truly extraordinary writer.
Being in this class has gotten me to interact with people more. If it wasn’t for this class I would have probably not talked to the students in this class as much as I did. Doing the interview, and site observations has helped me a lot. It forced me to get out of my comfort zone and reach out to others if I want something. Since I was a kid I really hated interacting with people even though I know that a skill that you need in life. I was always afraid or assumed the worst that people wouldn’t like me or would say something mean to me. It has made me an introvert because it’s less stressful to deal with rejection or hurt when you can just avoid it. That is not how one should live life though. People need others to be able to survive. I always hated doing group critiques since I was young. I was always afraid to hear someone’s critique since I am always cynical and hard on myself when it comes to my writing. I take people’s critiques more personally than I should. At the same time when people say something nice I don’t believe it or I try not to accept it so my ego does not inflate. Hearing what people have to say though has helped me grow as a writer and without it I would not be the writer that I am today but I hope to keep getting better as I get older. While I still have a long way to go I’m glad I got my start in college.