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Jaime Mothershead

Prof. Lynn Raymond

UWRT 1102-013

26 April 2016

Reflection Letter

I learned a few things that I needed to work on during the time I spent in UWRT this

semester. One of the things is that I need to be more engaged in group work. I didn’t like the idea

of doing work together at first, and I’m still a bit hesitant to do it, but it makes it easier for all the

group members and myself. Participating and engaging eliminates the feelings of disliking that I

had. It was hard at first because I wanted to work at my own pace without another person, but

towards the end, and a little late, I started to enjoy it and had some fun. I didn’t meet with Steven

a lot until the last few weeks to work on our project, but after meeting more frequently we both

enjoyed going to the library and figuring out what we needed to do. Each day we would make

progress, get organized, and come back again with an update of what we had done and what we

had left to do. For me, this is definitely the most meaningful thing that I learned from this class. I

guess in high school it was easier because we are always paired with people who we’ve known

for years and are comfortable with. College is a new experience where you don’t know anyone

and you have to make new friends. Even if it’s only for a project, you have to really relate to the

other people and work together in order to succeed.

My biggest struggle over the semester was finding the enthusiasm to go to and participate

in class. I didn’t like class at all at the beginning, maybe because I had more hours and more

work to deal with and didn’t want to go to such a “simple class.” However, I was wrong about

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this. The daily writings and writing prompts were easy, but gathering it all together cohesively

was more than strenuous. Coupled with working on the semester-long project and other work

outside of this class, I really underestimated my abilities in the class and it showed. My clear

feeling of not wanting to be there and distaste was evident, and I regret that. Now, at the end, I

wish I would have enjoyed the class more because my classmates are all great and funny people.

For the research product, Steven and I only made a few changes. It was really in terms of

where we were to include some of our information and how we could discuss it without giving

too much or too little useless information.

For me, the class taught me how to work with others and that I need to work on my time

management. I also learned that my writing could improve in terms of my energy and critical

thinking. I was lethargic in some of my writing prompts and kind of just put something together

in a matter of minutes. I didn’t take enough time to really think about what I should write about.

I also need to work on my critical thinking when it comes to thinking about concepts like what I

really think about something instead of just talking an easy way and writing something basic and

without too much thought.

I consider my best work in the class to be the greenway project. Reiterating, I learned that

working with another person is crucial and beneficial in order to do well in a course such as this.

Not only that, but because of the amount of time and resources that it took to put together, I was

pleased. When Steven and I started out we were down to only a few things that we wanted to

include like who uses greenways, what they can do for the environment, and the economic

benefits. After talking for a while and meeting with Prof. Raymond, we came up with new ideas

that we were both excited to implement. Namely, the in-person interviews. This came from the

economic benefits portion. I thought that it would be interesting to meet with a local running

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store and see what they thought. After this, we expanded even more and decided that it would be

even better to interview people who actually live on the greenway because they’re built so close

to people’s homes. Along with that, we wanted to make sure that people know the proper safety

guidelines. The animal and design portion was my favorite part of it because I see so many

animals out when I run. The design portion sprouted from this because there are so many routes

within the greenway system. I thought that the heavy focus that Mecklenburg county put in

flooding and floodplains was really interesting because that seemed to be their biggest focus.

Overall, I don’t think that my writing skills improved that much, but my research skills

and ability to work with others improved vastly. I wish that I hadn’t been so indifferent with the

course in the beginning of the semester, and it might have even attributed to how I wrote some of

my daily writings and writing prompts. It took some time, but I enjoyed the course and the

people that I got to share it with.