My writing for the class 21003 K “Writing for social sciences” has been a journey for me. I’ve learned a lot regarding writing styles and how to sort out evidence. To start, my writing was awful for writing for science class because I only knew how to cite readings the “normal” way as I did in high school. I had no idea it would be this difficult to write an essay in college. I also didn’t know how to get information from the campus library online; neither did I even know how to use it.  This class has honestly made me struggle a lot because I had no idea what I was doing, and that was all on me because I confuse myself a lot with citations. 

Finding websites and readings I can cite off was difficult because it could not be just any website you see on Google’s topic. It had to be a legit site that was either government, medical, or the topic you were writing on. I learned from Professor Conroy that we should use resources available to us, such as the CCNY library. This was helpful because they had readings on every topic you can think of. After I found readings and placed a quote of it into my own writing, I was poorly critiqued because I didn’t cite them in the correct APA format. For example, in my literary review, I mentioned websites like this: “As stated in the article by CDC, “Babies are at increased risk for bacterial meningitis compared to people in other age groups. However, people of any age can develop bacterial meningitis. See section above for which bacteria more commonly affect which age groups.”. And I didn’t put the author or institution a the end like it is supposed to be. Instead, I just state the article name at the beginning of the quote, which is wrong. Through my peer reviews, I also learned that I was not explaining my selections as I should be. For example, in my rhetorical analysis paper, I quoted: “In the article, it states, “More than 30 different viruses and subtypes have been shown to cause acute meningitis; however, enteroviruses and their subtypes are the leading etiologic agents and cause 85% to 95% of cases.” This quote from the article provides us with a better understanding of how many smaller viruses can create subtypes which can then affect the already established meningitis as well as make it to be stronger.” This quote really was just reworded rather than actually explaining it deeply in my thoughts and how I portrayed it. This was in issue, but by the next paper, I understood how my explanations need more work in them and how I should elaborate my thoughts more. 

Overall out of all the course learning outcomes, I definitely overcame number two, which is “enhance strategies for reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment.” And number six, “formulate and articulate as stance through and in your writing.” Both these obstacles have been overcome. For number two, I can say my quotes have been more elaborate since the first time. For example, this quote and explanation I provided in the literary analysis paper have been far more analyzed than the first quote I provided in this paper: In the article “Meningitis”, it says, “Acute bacterial meningitis must be treated immediately with intravenous antibiotics and sometimes corticosteroids. This helps to ensure recovery and reduce the risk of complications, such as brain swelling and seizures.”(Mayoclinic)  It is important to quickly treat acute bacterial meningitis with intravenous antibiotics and sometimes corticosteroids. Chronic meningitis medication is based on the core cause. Corticosteroids, which is a medication known to decrease the swelling inside your body, are also known to treat non-infectious meningitis. Fungal meningitis is treated through antifungal drugs, and tuberculous meningitis may also be treated by a combination of specific antibiotics. These antibiotics can, nonetheless, have serious side effects, so the treatment may be disrupted until it can be determined by a physician. As you can see, the explanation I provided after this quote was far more detailed than the previous ones I provided. Through several critiques by me fellow peer members and professor, I learned that I should pull out information not from just one quote but from the words said in the quotes for a better understanding. And as for number six the writings from the beginning of this paper till this last quote I provided shows how much I have improved in this class through various critiques and media’s provided by developing my papers through my revising and drafting. 

In this class, I learned that being collaborative is also essential. This is because we collaborated by peer reviews. A section from a peer review that I gave to a fellow peer stated that I wanted her to focus on her grammar and vocabulary as well as explain a quote of hers more. This helped her by making her have a more elaborate explanation, which would have made her paper way better. A peer review I once received said that I should definitely include a different point of view from someone in a different stance from me, like a public audience, because it would create a contrast and a different perspective. And this really helped me a lot because it helps my readers understand how others can be viewed differently by everyone. The public audience helped create different aspects to be taken into consideration.

To sum it up, I think I improved in this class. And I can say this because embarrassingly enough, my first paper for this class received an F (bummer), but my last assignment in this class received a b, which shows the vast improvement I had in this class. And this is all thanks to my professor and peer members in my PAC group. I really enjoyed this class a lot, and I will definitely be able to use this knowledge outside in my other courses as well.