1

Dear Professor C.C. Hendricks,

Before this semester, I wasn’t very confident with my writing skills. Though I adore

writing intensive courses and writing stories in my free time, I was very anxious to let others

read my work. I felt it was difficult to read in most places as I rambled on research topics or

couldn’t focus on one point in my stories. I was the type of writer who often found it difficult to

continue editing after the first draft, either that I couldn’t edit my work at all or overthinking

even the smallest details. But ever since I began taking ENGL 401, I really started seeing how

important the writing process is, picking up a few tips and tricks from our class discussions and

teachings of how to maneuver through it. I really adored the material we covered and would like

to share with you how I feel I’ve improved through the beginning of the course to the three big

section assignments!

In the beginning, I really started to understand what rhetoric was by doing the writer's

blog posts. I originally had problems reading through the material that we covered in them as I

took very little time to fully comprehend the reading and just skimmed. My understanding felt

limited and hindered by this figurative race to read but through engaging with you and my peers,

I learned that I shouldn’t rush myself to understand the material. When we did the class activity

of choosing posts online, my team and I were finding many ways that each subtle detail could

amount to logos, pathos, ethos, and kairos. Pointing out these points were my favorite and I

learned to value my peers' visions as they saw things I never even thought about. I may have

gotten a lower grade on the rhetorical analysis paper, but I think it was the first part of the

learning curb. As much as I would love to go by and revise it for my portfolio, I feel like I will
 2

look into my mistakes after the course ends so I can better analyse it with no time constraints and

the past comments given by you and my classmates.

The second portion of the course focused on the way of organizing the information we

learned before and putting it into a more visual format. The Infographic assignment was one I

was excited for as I am an artistic person at heart. My first draft I didn’t need to think too much

about, finding two opposing arguments about a topic that I was passionate about. I submitted the

day of and was thrilled to have Vishnu and another student take a look at it as I was admittedly

excited to show it off. They were impressed with my work with the graphics and gave very

valuable feedback that I didn’t think about. They commented on how it wasn’t very clear in the

beginning who believed what on the eviction ban, which side was for it or against it. From the

readings we didn, I learned the 5-second-rule, in which I describe someone needs to be able to

read it like they were driving past a billboard. It shouldn’t be too distracting from the original

task but should still clearly state the point. With this assignment I was determined to make it

something I could use outside of this class, as it was directly related to my work. I workshopped

it a bit more and I asked my friend Diogo, who is a graphic design major, to give me some

advice. I had never reached out to my friends about my work before and I must admit, it was

very pleasant, showing me that having fresh eyes on assignments like this is important. We

continued through class as I did get very excited during some portions and spoke up more often

with questions and concerns on the material. Eventually, I got my final results of the infographic

after discussing how clear it needed to be with it’s titles and citations, I got right onto revising it

for the portfolio. I’m really proud of my work on this one. I feel I utilized the material I was

given and was involved in class discussions by asking questions I’m sure others were wondering

about and taking in as much information as I could.

 3

The third and final portion of this course was almost a continuation of the second for me.

However, I found myself a bit inspired by outside sources to try a new formatting style for the

last research paper assignment. I felt I knew exactly what I wanted and started to gather my

sources in an organized fashion. However, as I followed through with putting the topics I wanted

to cover on the paper down, I realized how much I was reciting facts. I felt very scattered, trying

to connect an opinion to the thesis that I felt didn’t match. My argument got lost in the waves of

logical text and I didn’t know how to fish out my strong feelings about the topic in a constructive

way without rambling. Because of that I went in the wrong direction and the paper sounds more

like a recounting of the material rather than an opinion piece. When we peer reviews on this

assignment, I was hoping my partner would point out some troubling papers of the paper as I felt

there were some invisible flaws I hoped fresh eyes could spot. In the end, there were a few

problems they helped me work through, but my huge problem remained. When we spoke about

the final draft, I was more than happy with the grade and was surprised by what I could change

to fix the paper! From using more transitions rather than headings to reworking the thesis, I put a

lot of time into working through the rubric and eventually working through the issues with a

renewed mindset.

This course was a core element of my semester as I feel the use of rhetoric in everyday

readings and opening up to discussion has really opened my eyes to the possibilities of writing! I

aim to take what you’ve taught me into a more future career which I’m sure will be mostly

writing based. Thank you for all of the hardwork and dedication you have put into your course, I

enjoy writing a little more now thanks to you! I hope this portfolio proves what you taught really

holds value to me!