Conference Prep Sheet 

~ ​Cover Letter ~

26 April 2020

Erik Santos
California State University Student
English/Comparative Literature Major
2317 Daphne Pl.
Fullerton, CA 92833

Greetings Dr. Bruce,

I am writing this letter to you for the sole purpose of outlining and depicting the best
work I have had the pleasure of writing this Spring semester in your classroom. An online
portfolio will be created by me on weebly that will characterize the Student Learning Outcomes
(SLO’s) that I have utilized and mastered throughout my writing.The documents that are to be
discussed include a journal entry from my Scholar’s Notebook, a Blog Post review I wrote for a
classmate, the collaborative Psychoanalytic Analysis poster, a collaborative team charter, and my
assigned conference homework (Storyboard) from our conference week appointments. These
documents will be presented in order of increasing personal significance and effectiveness
towards my writing. These documents are presented in this order to show you the improvements
in my writing throughout the semester as well as my mastery of the SLOs.
The first document is a collaborative team charter, used to prepare for a face-to-face
conference with yourself. This was a major source of SLO #6 since the collaboration between
yourself and my team resulted in an improvement of one’s own writing through critique and
assessment of texts; the text being the team charter. I believe the team charter was useful in
setting different types of realistic goals in addition to planning out solutions we might encounter
working in a group, like if a group member was guilty of project tardiness, lack of participation,
or providing unacceptable work. It is also a useful strategy for establishing the groundwork for
future collaborative work groups in any situation.
The second document is also a collaborative assignment, is a flyer that my team and I
created which describes the psychoanalytic criticism lens and how it pertains to ​Frankenstein​.
SLOs 4 & 5 were essential in order to complete this group assignment since organization, design,
and academic language were crucial to defining psychoanalytic criticism in a 1-page flyer. This
simple assignment helped my team and I identify and remove any unnecessary information
which diluted our explanation of the critique. Additionally, this group assignment is one that my
group and I are particularly proud of due to the simple, yet organized structure of our flyer which
turned out to be more efficient than we anticipated. Although it might seem perfect to us, there is
always room for improvement within the context.
The third document is a Storyboard pre-writing strategy that was assigned to me at the
end of our face-to-face meeting to practice as homework. With this strategy, a person writes a
separate topic or section of the assignment on the top of separate pieces of paper. You then write
supporting ideas and evidence on Post-It Notes and stick them to what you think is the
appropriate page of paper. This strategy has proved invaluable towards my writing and
organizational skills throughout most, if not all, writing assignments. I believe this is a superb
example of SLO #4; Organization and Focus. In the second-to-last page on my weebly I will
include pictures of a completed Storyboard pre-write which received much positive feedback.
The fourth document is a blog review for a classmate that submitted their final lit blog
post on Feb 19th, which provides insight and suggestions as to how to improve their post to
make it more appealing. In order to do this, the peer-reviewer (me) would have had to analyze
the rhetorical situation of a given writing task so as to provide the most efficient
advice/suggestions possible, which is a product of SLO #4. Furthermore, this activity expressed
collaborative aspects that were useful in improving our posts. On my website page titled ‘Blog
Review(s)’ I will attach the original review I posted for my classmate, and then I will post a
revised, more specific version of the review which can be used as a template to check papers and
assignments of my future high school students.
The fifth and final document that you will encounter is an entry from my Scholar’s
Notebook dated Feb 17th, 2020. This entry focuses on the credibility of Frankenstein
infographics and which types of sources would be most beneficial and useful to us as writers.
The reason this post is memorable is because we spent almost the entirety of the class analyzing
sources whilst judging their validity which is a practice of SLO #2; ethical research. This was a
lesson that permeated throughout all my other courses since it taught me how interpret and assess
different sources that which can adhere to different audiences which is a practice of SLO #3;
persuasion.
My ambition with this letter is to present my progress as a writer and as a student willing
to learn new writing techniques. Hopefully this work rightfully reflects the standards that the
SLOs intend to reflect on college-level writing. My strengths and weaknesses as a writer are duly
noted and they will be continually fine-tuned for the remainder of my time as a student and an
educator.