My thoughts on Comp 106

Since we're at the end of this class, I figured I'd discuss what I thought about it.

During the beginning, I was a little skeptical of what the syllabus said that we were going to be doing. Not necessarily intimidating, but just curious as to how the events would play out. Overall, I am rather happy with how I handled some of the subjects, and I recommend that it continues to stay this way. I learned a lot about some of the things in my community and I seriously doubt I would ever have known about it without this class.

The blogs I probably could have done without, and maybe replaced with free writing or some smaller essay papers. However, the concept is rather interesting, having an online journal where we are able to write about whatever we want. I think that the blog should be much more concrete in the material that we should report on here, regardless I know that this is supposed to be a medium where we can express how we're feeling. I'd suggest making that optional and recommended, but not one of the mandatory writings.

The CCC readings were nice, in a way. It gave several different perspectives on issues and then we were able to discuss our own views along with the author's in class. I thought that this was handled rather well, although I noticed that it kind of fizzled out towards the end due to the schedule needing more time to focus on the larger projects. I think the pacing should be equally distributed throughout the semester, not so heavy towards the end.

That's all I can think of at the moment, I may edit this later.

Summer Plans

So it doesn't look like that I will be relaxing much this summer. I plan on taking two courses for the Spring half of the summer semester.

This isn't too bad, however, the increased speed at which we learn the material is pretty hectic. Last summer I took Calc 3 in the summer and it was pretty intense. Maybe it was the material combined with the speed at which we were learning it, but I was surprised that I made it out alive. When you're in that class for over 2 hours, your brain starts to drift away from talking about 3-dimensional objects and planes.

At least the one's I'm taking this summer are going to be a bit easier. Psych 170 and Physics 100. I dunno what's going to be going in the physics class, but it was a science class that I could take that doesn't involve a lab as well.

So, oh well, we'll see how it goes. The only thing that bothers me is the driving, but I guess that will be better now that the roads are all dry and I'm able to accurately predict how long it will take to drive here.

Jack Thompson's VT response

Since I seemed to rant about this guy's stance on violence in media, specifically video games, here's what he had to say to Fox News about what happened on Monday.

Something new I heard

In our second paper, the profile on a community member, I had done my focus on Sue Figurski, the head coordinator at the Macomb Food Pantry.

In my paper, I had made a point to emphasize some of the development in charity events over the past few years, and the biggest one that I had mentioned was the L.E.T.S. E.A.T. program, headed by Pete Randazzo.

Well, just about a week ago we got a flier in the mail regarding this years charity event. It's come to be that the L.E.T.S. E.A.T. program is cancelled for the year due to economic difficulties.

This was a surprise to me, but then again, it really shouldn't be. Pete Randazzo is the owner of Randazzo Heating & Cooling, and from what I hear, they're taking a beating in business along with everyone else in Metro Detroit.

Hopefully things will turn around next year and everything will be back to normal.

Tentative Thesis

For my final paper, my thesis at the moment is somewhere along the lines of: "the current situation with new construction is having a major negative impact upon a large range of working individuals, ranging from the higher ups to the working family man".

In class searching for articles, I came up with: this link which is a brief discussion about Pulte Homes, which was mentioned in my photo essay. They talk about the decline in new construction, etc.

The majority of my sources at the moment include interviews via phone/email that I'm setting up for the next week. I plan on receiving information from a former builder/lawyer in the Oakland-Macomb area, a currently working real-estate agent, an employee working in a wholesale warehouse, and possibly one of my family members. Also, a different wholesaler has said they could provide charts or graphs detailing the progress of the past few years in terms of sales.

I plan on going to the library tomorrow or Wednesday and looking up a few more article sources from the Free Press. They had a few titles that caught my interest about my topic.

If you like art,

you might like this then.

Almost there...

So, April is finally here.

Not too much longer until this semester is over, and honestly, I can't wait. The only problem is that I'm registering for summer classes because I'm a bit behind on credits.

Even though I have another couple months of school to look forward too, I still want to get these few classes over with. I always enjoy starting new things. In the summer, I plan on getting one of my early reqs out of the way, Psych 170, which I've neglected for awhile. Other than that, I'm looking for a non-lab science class to fulfill a category. Environmental science maybe, or a physics class.

The summer schedule is a little rough though. I took Calc 3 last summer and with the shortened time schedule they try to beat a lot of information into your head in a short period of time. 3 hours a day 2 days a week. I thought I was going brain dead.

Hopefully I'll be able to adjust for this summer.