Cody Gagnon’s ENGL 301 Blog

Cody Gagnon

123 My Street

Vancouver, BC V6T 1A1

 

May 22, 2020

 

ENGL 301 98A Students

123 Your Street

Vancouver, BC V6T 1A1

 

Dear Classmates:

I am writing to apply for the position of Professional Writing Team Member, which was recently posted to the ENGL 301 98A Blog on UBC Blogs.

I am a Software Developer and a fourth-year student in the Bachelor of Computer Science (BCS) program at the University of British Columbia (UBC). This semester, I am working remotely with a team of graduate students at the Centre for Digital Media to build an educational mobile game for children. Recently, I completed an eight-month internship as a Full-Stack Software Developer with a startup software-as-a-service (SaaS) company. In my spare time, I volunteer as a Project Lead with the Code the Change Foundation. During the 2019-2020 academic year, I led a team of five developers to build a web application for a local nonprofit organization.

Prior to enrolling in the BCS program, I was a Professor in the School of Business at Centennial College where I taught business communications. In this course, I taught professional writing skills, interpersonal communication skills, public speaking and presentation skills, and the preparation of business documents. More recently, I worked as a Writing Consultant at UBC’s Centre for Writing and Scholarly Communication. In this position, I helped students to develop their writing process, offered revision-focused feedback on written drafts, and taught students practical strategies for proofreading and revising their writing. In addition, I hold a certificate in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) and an Honours Bachelor of Arts in English literature from the University of Toronto.

I approach life and learning with curiosity. I ask a lot of questions and I aim to thoroughly understand new concepts. I have a growth mindset and I believe that learning is more dependent on hard work than innate intelligence. I also believe that learning often involves failure. As a former educator, I enjoy sharing the lessons that I have learned with others.

Regarding work habits, I do my best to stay organized, manage time effectively, and communicate clearly with my teammates. I keep a weekly to-do list, I track deadlines with a four-month wall calendar, and I schedule meetings and other commitments in my Google Calendar. I enable notifications for all communication platforms on my phone and I strive to respond promptly to any messages that I receive. When communicating in writing, I strive for clarity by using complete sentences and plenty of emojis to compensate for the lack of tone, body gestures, and facial expressions. During working hours, I am always happy to chat on a video call.

I believe that I am a strong candidate for this position. Thank you in advance for your time and consideration. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

 

Respectfully,

 

Cody Gagnon

cody.gagnon@alumni.ubc.ca

 

Encl. 301 Cody Gagnon Application Letter