552 University Rd

Santa Barbara, CA 93106

December 9th, 2022

UCSB Writing Program Headquarters

South Hall 3400 Suite
Santa Barbara, CA 93106

Dear Alanna,

I can say, without a doubt, that this writing course is unlike any other writing-related
class I have taken in my life. It definitely resonates in my brain as portraying a very realistic
outlook on writing and communication, which I found to be challenging but enjoyable at the
same time. I also would like to add that your method of revision and discussion is very effective,
and I am grateful for participating in these activities. Not just the peer reviews, but in-class
discussions can be very effective in solidifying and reconstructing certain ideas. Our
conversations as a class and in peer review groups have helped me create the best possible ideas
and writing pieces, as it creates a positive and encouraging environment for both my peers and
myself.

After all I have learned throughout this quarter, the main thing I want to pursue in the
future is how I can utilize discourse communities outside of writing or discussions. For example,
if I work a job following university, what kind of discourse communities are in the workplace? I
think about who I want to surround myself with at not only a job, but in my private life as well.
What kind of discourse communities do I fall under? How can I identify these communities in
everyday aspects of life? It often makes me contemplate if I am happy being in a discourse
community, or if I find that a certain community is not particularly to my liking; Is it best to find
other passions involving discourse? I love to think about how I can implement these ideas in my
very near future.

On the topic of our writing projects, I tried to focus on revising the overall flow of my
works. I wanted the reader to finish my work and be able to say, “That was a good read!”. Some
of the ideas I tried to revise were my word choice, transitioning, and extension of ideas. When
discussing the actual revisions that I made, I considered quite a few. On WP1, my first focus was
on how I could improve my letter. Based on the feedback you gave me, I realized that I needed to
improve my course idea that I presented to the writing administrators. I made it more plausible
by providing a more in-depth explanation of how the course could be implemented, specifically
how the Department of Computer Science as well as Computer Engineering could assist with the
process. The information I added fell under the topic of interdisciplinarity. I tried to be as
conscientious as possible about the administrative elements. Moving on to my WP1 Reflection,
my main focus here was to make the reader more understanding of why I personally chose to do
the letter genre. I added information about my personal experiences with letter writing, and how
that influenced my decision of genre. An additional focus of mine was the review of my peer
edits. I made an additional paragraph as to how exactly I interpreted the ideas of my peers, and
what I did to implement that into my revised final draft.
 Following my revisions of WP1, it is only natural to address my edits for WP2, which I
felt needed a lot more work. In my conversation piece for WP2, I decided to rework almost the
entire thing. My initial piece involved me overhearing a conversation, which I elaborated on for
a podcast I created. Since I was the only voice of the podcast, I essentially listed what I had
heard for the entirety of the episode. This made my podcast sound very monotonous, robotic, and
almost uninteresting entirely. Following our meeting, I felt the best way to combat this issue
would be to actually have each scholar on my podcast, that way the episode can sound more
diversified and unpredictable. I was very happy with my rework, so I have you to thank for that.
Moving on to my WP2 Reflection, I also made a number of revisions. My first focus here was to
summarize less of what I did, and talk more about the challenges I faced during the process, as
well as my key takeaways. I cut about a full page of blatant, uninteresting summary writing that
contributed almost nothing to my piece. This left room for me to add information about the
difficulties I faced with creating my podcast, as well as the utilization of each scholar’s ideas.
Writing about these ideas set me up for a takeaway paragraph, which I finalized as the last
portion of my reflection. I also rephrased some of my words when discussing individuals with
mental disabilities, to ensure it sounded as appropriate as possible. With this came an additional
focus of mine, which revolved around the specificity of mental disabilities, rather than
disabilities as a whole. Looking at the revisions I had made for my WP2, I was extremely
thankful for our meeting on this topic.

When revising for my final portfolio, I received very good feedback from you. I really
liked how you essentially told me something that was interesting, while also concluding with an
idea that you believe I should improve on. The ideas and feedback that were most helpful to me
revolved around the specific content you believed I could adjust. I found it to be extremely
useful when you would give me a topic that I needed to work on, which was then followed by a
specific idea that I could either add in or edit. This extra piece of specifics was what made your
feedback so useful. I have had countless teachers give me feedback of very broad ideas, with
zero specifics on what I could do. I always found this to make revisions difficult, but with your
feedback, I was able to pinpoint the exact edits I needed to make with your specific revision
advice.

Looking at my portfolio as a whole, I was very proud of the revisions I made in WP2.
After our meeting, I almost felt embarrassed with the foolish mistakes I made with the format
and grammar of my initial project. I spent a lot of time revising my second writing project, and
created a final version for my portfolio that I felt adequately fulfilled the desired revisions. Even
if it is not as complete as you might think, I am very proud of my revision, and I only have you
to thank for that.

A main idea that I would really love to improve on is my own editing skills. The majority
of edits I make are very lazy, as I have a bad habit of feeling like my first copy is my best copy. I
would love to improve on being more thorough with my revisions, and not only adjust format
and ideas, but maybe the essay as a whole. I am very appreciative of the feedback I got from my
peers and yourself, but I would love to be able to recognize a few of those ideas prior to getting
my paper revised. I feel that being able to take one more step in my edits can give my peers the
chance to catch more complex details that I may have missed.
 My portfolio has reflected what I learned this quarter through three main ideas. I believe
that these ideas are genre, discourse communities, and the importance of revisions. I can
accurately portray a single piece of information in countless different methods. I specifically
chose the genre of a letter, but I am confident I could translate that information in genres
following ideas like social media, websites, or even television. On the idea of genre, I found the
topic of discourse communities to be extremely useful when creating a piece of writing. The
evidence from articles generated from discourse communities is all linked in some way shape or
form, which makes connecting pieces of evidence very fluid and smooth. Lastly, revisions have
played a special role in my development as a writer, and I am very grateful to you for teaching
me how essential peer and teacher feedback can be when finalizing a piece of work.

As I approach new projects in the future, the main ideas that I will take from this course
are the ability to pull fluid and common evidence from discourse communities, as well as the
importance of multiple revisions for a piece of work. Discourse communities have passion for a
common topic, and their ideas can be utilized as a strong form of evidence and reasoning in a
piece of writing. For example, using Google Scholar to link various authors to the same cause
can give me different perspectives on a certain matter. In addition to discourse communities, I
will once again emphasize on the essentiality of revision. I cannot describe how lost I would
have been without your and my peer’s revisions. In future projects, I will most definitely get
additional looks at my piece of work, preferably individuals from different writing backgrounds
and perspectives. From a finalizing standpoint, I am very appreciative of you and this course for
providing me with so many useful tools in the future, while also enjoying myself in the process.

Sincerely,

John Hagedorn