Monthly Archives: December 2021

In the beginning on the term, I came in hoping to learn more about the world of technical writing and research for public speaking, which I was able to learn a lot about throughout the term. Having briefly assumed technical writer roles in my previous jobs, I was very curious as to what the class could bring to my already familiarity with the subject. I thoroughly enjoyed my time with developing and creating pieces of writing that allowed me to learn more about professional development and self-marketing, especially to potential employers.

Throughout the term, I found the consistency of the assignments to be beneficial to my overall understanding of the material and the opportunity to apply my learning to my professional portfolio was also very important to me. I realized that often, the assignments from ENGL 301 were applicable to my own understanding of the industry I’m aiming to break into and they provided me with some sense of work to showcase to my potential employers. However, from the various peer review assignments I learned that I should also strategically say the specific ideas and message I’m trying to communicate to non-technical audiences and remove all personal academic and professional biases in my technical writing.

This class and the creation of this web folio allowed me to create projects and assignments that I’ll be able to utilize in the work place and demonstrate to potential employers my potential.

Finally, my skills and strengths as a student support my future career in the sense that I’ll have the technical skills to operate on specific machines and frameworks of most software engineering companies. This includes, but is not limited to, object-oriented programming, technical writing, project management, a concrete understanding of data analytics and mathematics, and the ability to utilize popular cloud services, such as Google Cloud Platform and Amazon Web Services, as well as popular website and back-end frameworks like ReactJS, TensorFlow, and MongoDB

Creating a Web Folio has taught me multiple things about the ways professional and academic presentations can help me in my search for a software engineering internship/Co-Op work placement. Some of the things I’ve learned are:

1. Web Folios are an excellent way to demonstrate a personal portfolio and snippets of one’s personality in a concise and efficient manner.
2. Academic achievements can showcase talent and technical traits to employers looking for specific skills.

During the process of creating this web folio, I found myself reflecting on the past achievements I’ve accomplished throughout the entire term. Starting in September, I was quite skeptical to the idea that a personal website would be any different from social media outlets where I’m also able to market myself to potential employers. However, I’ve come to realize that web folios can increase the scope of potential employers by demonstrating my personality and background, in addition to my technical skills.

When building and designing this folio, I laid out the structure of my site to maximize readership and efficiency. Each menu widget leads to a specific section that allows the reader to know more parts of me and my portfolio. The About Me section allows the reader to learn more about my personality and former background, the Highlights section showcases my academic technical writing abilities, the Resume section allows readers to skip ahead and see my professional achievements, and the Application Package section shows employers how I’d be able to correspond to them/respond to a job posting.

As I created this project, I began realizing some of my weaknesses and strengths in both my learning process and assignments. As a weakness, I often have many assignments due at once and have a hard time prioritizing which to do first. However, as a strength I’m able to think fast and efficiently manage my studying patterns to utilize a ‘deep-work’ technique to ensure that my assignments are done to the best of my ability. Creating this web folio allowed me to realize that my learning process is one that is visual and communicative. I learn best about subject areas and other people by visually seeing people and information, and being able to communicate to individuals.