The completion of the Unit 4 Web Folio marks the end of the technical writing course. The course has been a challenging, yet fulfilling experience in developing robust writing techniques that are applicable in many professional writing environments. The course has helped me identify my weaknesses and strengths through challenging technical writing exercises and through the peer review process.

The several weaknesses that have been noted in my writing throughout the course includes the use of imperative verbs, incorrect document formatting, and the mix use of past or present tense. My strengths that have been noted is my use of consistent tone, thoughtful and comprehensive peer review, as well as organized writing structure. As the course progressed, I’ve made the effort to eliminate my use of imperative verbs and focus on the positive as suggested. With these small changes to my writing, I’ve noticed an improved level of persuasion and consistency in tone.

The technical writing techniques such as writing with YOU attitude, avoiding the use of imperative verbs, and understanding the peer review process has been incredibly important in improving my technical writing style. These technical writing techniques have made my constructive feedback more effective and ensures respect for my reader. These are writing techniques I will continue to practice and carry into my future career when working with future colleagues and writing technical documents.

In Unit 4, students are challenged to create an online Web Folio that is specific to our future goals, such as focusing on either highlighting academic achievements for graduate school or highlighting marketable skills for the job market.

My Web Folio has been designed to highlight my marketable skills and experiences for the job market. It consists of 6 required sections as outlined in the Web Folio assignment criteria. The main pages included are the home page, about me page, blog page, resume page, application package page, and best work page. My Web Folio also has additional information such as a detailed home page with hyperlinks and visuals, as well as a separate LinkedIn page that adds a professional appearance to the Web Folio.

My personal challenge for creating this Web Folio consists of ensuring the tone and presentation of the portfolio’s theme is consistent throughout the website. It was also a challenge formatting the Web Folio to highlight all the written works without making the Web Folio pages appear cluttered, while also ensuring that all the revised written works are presented. Another detail, was ensuring the organization of the Web Folio was intuitive for my audience to navigate. Overcoming these challenges required some experimentation with the WordPress page tools and numerous revisions. In the end, all the pages eventually came together into a neatly organized Web Folio.

In Unit 3, students were introduced to new technical writing techniques and writing formats. The first section of Unit 3 introduced us to the importance of writing with YOU attitude by writing feedback to a mock English 301 student named Evan Crisp. The second section of Unit 3 involves students drafting a formal report as a continuation of the previous assigned formal proposal and outline. The third section requires students to take what was learned in section one and two of Unit 3 and apply their knowledge into writing a peer review of a real fellow student’s formal report draft. 

Writing with the Right Attitude: YOU attitude 

The first section of Unit 3 introduces the technique of writing with “You Attitude.” This technique utilizes a reader centered approach that considers the point of view of the reader. It is a writing style that ensures that the opinion of the reader is valued by expressing appreciation from the writer and avoiding commanding or negative language that may come across as aggressive or indecisive. My written memorandum to Evan Crisp incorporated these writing strategies and avoided the use of imperatives, while focusing on highlighting the positives. I learned that avoiding the use of “you” is an important strategy to avoid a condescending tone or assigning blame to the reader. 

The Formal Report Draft 

The second section of Unit 2 is a continuation of the formal report where students are tasked with writing the draft for the formal report. We begin with incorporating the information from the written proposal, outline, and data collected towards the completion of a formal report draft. This assignment involved the task of completing a working title page, table of contents, introduction, body, and conclusion of our formal report. The challenge for this assignment is being able to adhere to the structure of writing a formal report and conveying the data collected from the surveys into a cohesive discussion and conclusion for the intended reader.  

Peer Review of Formal Report Draft 

The third section of Unit 3 requires students to partner up and peer review each other’s formal report drafts. The challenge of this assignment is being able to take the skills and techniques learned from writing with “You” attitude and applying them into providing feedback to the formal report draft from section two of Unit 2. Reviewing the techniques in the YOU attitude module and the instructor’s blog was especially helpful in ensuring that reader focused tone is consistent throughout the peer review. This assignment yielded the opportunity to review our peers’ work and allowed us to experience a different perspective on writing a formal report.  

Unit 3 has been a challenging unit that involves learning to draft a technical formal report and a new writing style and then applying it directly into peer reviewing is the most complex technical writing assignment we’ve had in the course thus far. 

Enclosure:ENGL-301-Michael-Ly-Formal-Report-Draft

Proceeding into Unit 2, students were introduced to new forms of technical writing. The first section of Unit 2 presents us with the proper procedures for writing a formal report proposal and peer review process. The second section highlights the professional networking website LinkedIn, and introduces techniques on how to create an ideal professional profile, and how to best use it to improve one’s professional network. The third section of Unit 2, tasked us with creating a formal report outline and progress report memo in preparation to complete the formal report.

Formal Report Proposal

The beginning of Unit 2 introduces the concept of the formal report proposal. This section of Unit 2 required us to draw on our own personal work or community experiences to determine an inefficiency or deficiency within that setting. With this inefficiency in mind, we were tasked to investigate, analyze, and recommend an action plan based on our own independent investigation. My experience as a community pharmacist, I noticed that more and more patients have been reporting that they are unaware of where to properly store and dispose of old and unused medications. Based on this experience, I decided to write a feasibility study to investigate whether there would be a need for a medication waste handling campaign to educate the public and introduce dedicated medication waste containers that can be provided by local pharmacies to the public.

Peer Review

The peer review process involved us partnering up with a team member from our team to review each other’s formal report proposal. For this task, we helped each other identify different areas for improvement within our writing. Based on feedback provided by Angie, I was able to recognize that there is a need for more focus and consistency for my proposed method of data collection. Her feedback also helped me recognize that I need to determine whether injectable devices will be investigated as part of the study as a separate category to medications. Her feedback and suggestions have allowed me to critically evaluate my own writing and thought process on how I should next approach my formal report.

LinkedIn Best Practices

The second major component of Unit 2, consisted of us researching and proposing techniques for best practices for using the professional networking platform LinkedIn. This unit helped highlight techniques to create an ideal profile, such as using a proper profile picture and creating an engaging personal summary. It also made me aware of the importance of actively making an effort to join professional groups and create connections with industry professionals. I have had experience in creating a LinkedIn profile in the past, but have not recognized how powerful it can be as a platform for generating new professional opportunities. This research assignment made me realize that I can better utilize LinkedIn as a networking platform by joining professional groups and making more connections with industry professionals, as well as, creating a more engaging personal profile that tells a story as opposed to just a list of past experiences. In regards to the writing component for this assignment, I recognized the need to avoid using imperative verbs to make my writing more reader friendly to change my writing from a command to suggestive tone.

Formal Report Outline and Memo

The third section of Unit 2 is an extension of the formal report. In this section we were tasked to write a formal report outline and progress report memo. This section introduced structure to the formal report and challenged us to think about the questions that we want to ask our population of interest. The challenge for this section was ensuring that the questions designed for the survey do not ask personal questions that would have the participant reflect on any personal issues and to avoid introducing leading questions that can negatively frame the question. The instructor’s blog proved to be a valuable resource for completing the questions for the survey and ensuring they followed these rules.

In conclusion, Unit 2 has introduced new challenging forms of technical writing and has made me aware of areas in my own writing that I can improve upon. With that in mind, I am excited to proceed to the final units of the course and continue to strengthen my technical writing abilities.

301 Michael Ly Formal Proposal (Revised)

Angie’s 301 Peer Review of Proposal

In Unit One Assignment 1.3, our tasks were divided into three main phases.  The first phase involved us writing three different types of definitions (parenthetical, sentence, expanded). Once completed, we progress to the second phase where we assigned ourselves into pairs to review each other’s work. Then the last phase involved us revising our work based on the feedback of our partner.

I selected the term “akathisia,” because of how common this condition is in patients who take certain anti-psychotics. Initially during the process of writing the definition, I found difficulty explaining the term concisely to an individual without any technical knowledge. This knowledge constraint reduced the vocabulary I could use. However, once I began to understand how to use the different methods of the expanded definition, I realized that it allowed me to simplify my explanations without losing the meaning. I learned that the use of the expanded definition methods are very powerful in breaking down complex terminology into parts that almost any individual can understand. I decided to use the methods of etymology, history, comparison, and visual for my expanded definition. Because akathisia defines a type of movement disorder, I had difficulty finding a visual image to portray it, so I decided instead to create a visual diagram to assist the audience in understanding the cause and effect of akathisia.

In the peer review phase of the exercise, I reviewed the definition for functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). This section was an intimidating experience for me, since I do not have extensive peer reviewing and technical writing experience. This phase of the exercise forced me to reflect on what I know and what feedback I can offer to elevate my partner’s technical writing. It also allowed me to appreciate the effective writing strategies that my partner incorporates into her writing and what strategies I could use to incorporate into my own writing. Through this process, I learned to carefully consider how to structure my document for a peer review and how to provide written feedback without using pronouns.

In the editing process, I reviewed my writing partner’s feedback and found it extremely helpful. The feedback helped me make revisions to my writing, such as fixing a run on sentence, improving the structure of my definitions, and adding an additional image to improve audience understanding. My writing partner pointed out that I could improve my compare and contrast method section by selecting a more specific condition that had its own characteristics that I could compare “akathisia” with rather than generally with conditions like anxiety and agitation. The feedback allowed me to revise the section using the term “Restless Leg Syndrome,” which greatly improved its clarity. Considering I do not have extensive technical writing experience, another aspect of this exercise I found challenging was ensuring that the document was well structured, organized, and satisfied all APA style guidelines. With the help of my writing partner, she was able to provide feedback that really helped me correct my APA style implementation such as reformatting my figure to APA style and reorganizing the order of my references.

This exercise has made me understand and appreciate the importance of peer reviewing in technical writing. It required me to think hard about audience comprehension and allowed me to work on my peer reviewing skills, while also reflecting on my own technical writing strengths and weaknesses.

Link to Revised Definition:

https://blogs.ubc.ca/engl30199c2022w2/2023/02/13/assignment-1-3-revised-definition-of-akathisia/

Link to Peer Review:

https://blogs.ubc.ca/engl30199c2022w2/2023/02/12/assignment-1-3-peer-review-for-functional-magnetic-resonance-imaging-fmri-definition/

Dear Amy,

I have reviewed your application letter to become a member of an English 301 professional technical writing team and would like to invite you to be part of our team. As a registered pharmacist and computer science student, I can relate with you on experiences in healthcare and what it is like to be pursuing a second degree in a different field.

Your experience writing formal reports, peer reviewing documents and policy will greatly complement our technical writing team considering I do not come from an extensive background in technical writing. I believe that your communication skills and experience in providing feedback will be invaluable to our team as we proceed through our technical writing journey.

If you would like to accept this invitation or have any questions or concerns please do hesitate to reach out to me by email.

Sincerely,

Michael Ly
English 301 Student

Application Letter:
301 Michael Ly Application Letter-1

Dear Emilyn,

My name is Michael and I have reviewed your application for a position in a professional writing team. The skills you have gained in your previous studies in Communications and past experience as an Events Assistant would greatly complement our writing team. Your experience maintaining professional relationships as a member of the Board of Directors for CJSF Radio proves your capabilities as a communicator and collaborator, skills that I believe are a must for an effective team. As a fellow computer science student, I also aspire to make my work more concise and agree with your learning philosophy to stay open to constructive criticism.

Please let me know if you are interested in collaborating as a member of our technical writing team and do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,

Michael Ly
English 301 Student

Application Letter:
301 Michael Ly Application Letter-1

Dear Angie,

I have read your letter of application seeking a professional writing team. I find that your writing strengths indicated by your experience in research projects, proposals and formal reports would make you an incredibly strong member of a professional writing team. Your experience in research, professional interests, and learning philosophy really resonate with me and I believe compliments my background in pharmacy and my own learning philosophy.

It would be a pleasure to be able to connect with you and learn more about your writing style and work with you to become better technical writers. 

Please let me know if you are interested in forming a technical writing team and do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have any questions or concerns.

Sincerely,

Michael Ly
Letter of Application:
301 Michael Ly Application Letter-1

To: Dr. Erika Paterson, English 301 Instructor

From: Michael Ly, English 301 Student <michael.ly239@gmail.com>

Date: January 23, 2023

Subject: Letter of Application

As indicated for Unit 1 Week Two, I have posted my application letter on my blog to be viewed by my prospective writing team as an attached Word document. Please see below for the summary of my application letter.

Application Letter Summary:

• My professional interest as a software developer
• My previous professional work experience and activities
• My strengths and weaknesses in writing and communication
• My learning philosophy

Thank you for taking the time to read my application letter. If you require any additional information please reach me by email at michael.ly239@gmail.com.

Sincerely,

Michael Ly

Encl. Letter of Application

301 Michael Ly Application Letter-1

Michael Ly
2366 Main Mall
Vancouver, BC
Canada V6T 1Z4
michael.ly239@gmail.com

January 23, 2023

The University of British Columbia
2329 West Mall
Vancouver, BC
Canada V6T 1Z4

Dear English 301,

Please consider my application to be a member of your English 301 professional writing team. I am a computer science student and aspiring software developer with a non-traditional background in pharmaceutical science who is looking to be a collaborative member of your professional writing team.

With nearly 5 years of work experience as a practicing pharmacist, I have extensive experience communicating using medical terminology with medical professionals in both verbal and written documentation. In addition, I have mentored high school students, been a pharmacy student preceptor, and trained new pharmacy graduates. I often communicate using email correspondence and have worked on team based projects in both my academic experience as well as in the industry. These experiences have helped me appreciate the need for effective collaboration and communication.

I do not come from a background with frequent work involving technical writing and do not have any formal project proposal writing experience, but I hope that I can still provide reliable feedback and improve on that as we proceed through the semester. My experience working as a health professional and mentor have prepared me to be detail oriented and accountable for the quality of my work and the work of my team. You can trust me to meet project deadlines and provide assistance when necessary. My goal as a member of your English 301 team is to be someone who you can rely on to provide some quality feedback with learning objectives in mind.

I would describe myself as being a tactile learner, who learns best from completing tasks. I also find that it is best to learn from experience and accept making mistakes along the way.  I hope to be able to share my own learning perspectives with my prospective English 301 writing team and support their learning throughout the rest of the semester.

I look forward to being able to speak with you and improve my technical writing skills within your professional writing team. If you would like to reach me, please contact me by email at michael.ly239@gmail.com.

Sincerely,

Michael Ly

Encl. Letter of Application

301 Michael Ly Application Letter-1