WELCOME

Welcome to our Eng 100 Blog “Conversation Beyond the Classroom”! The title of this blog refers to the community of active readers & collaborative learners we are creating by sharing our academic writing for Eng 100 with each other + a larger group of students, instructors, academics, and just about anybody who chooses to follow our blog! When you write and post your reader responses here (and, later, as you write your essays for the course), I encourage you to use this audience to conceptualize who you are writing for and, most important, how to communicate your ideas so that this group of academic readers and writers can easily follow your line of thinking. Think about it this way: What do you need to explain and articulate in order for the other bloggers to understand your response to the essays we’ve read in class? What does your audience need to know about those essays and the authors who wrote them? And how can you show your readers, in writing, which ideas you add to these “conversations” that take place in the texts we study?
As students of Eng 100, you will use this blog to begin conversations with other academic writers on campus (students and instructors alike). We become active readers of each other’s writing when we comment on posts here. And, best of all, we are using this space to share ideas! I encourage you to use this blog to further think through the topics and writing strategies you will be introduced to this quarter. As always, be sure to give credit to those people whose ideas you borrow for your own thinking and writing (you should do this in the blog by commenting on their post, but you will also be required to cite what you borrow from your peers/instructors if and when it winds up in your essays. More details on that later…).
Finally, keep in mind that writing to and for this audience is a good way to prepare for the panel of readers (faculty at WCC) who will be reading and assessing your writing portfolio at the end of the quarter. We hope that as a large group of active readers, we can better prepare each other for this experience. But, in the meantime, let’s have fun with it! I am really excited see how far we can take this together!


--Mary Hammerbeck, Instructor of Eng 100

Monday, January 10, 2011

About Me: Meagan K.

Hey. My name is Meagan Kaufmann. I am originally from Los Angeles, CA but moved to Bellingham the summer before my freshman year of high school. I graduated last spring from Sehome High School and am studying to become a dental hygienist. I have been a cheerleader for four years. I traveled to Orlando, Florida twice for Competitive Cheerleading Nationals placing 9th in the nation! I also cheered on my high school team but competitive was my passion.
The last two years have been difficult. Last December, in the middle of my last competitive cheer season, I was airlifted to Seattle Children's Hospital with a diagnosis of Leukemia because my bone marrow had stopped working. After several tests, 5 blood transfusions, and talk about my life expectancy, I was re-diagnosed with a blood disorder called Hereditary Spherocytosis. Thank God for no cancer!! Since then, I had my gall bladder removed and have my blood counts tested every other week. This October, it all happened again...except this time my liver failed and I was hospitalized for 12 days. But...I made it through everything and am here today, as healthy as I can be. I am just keeping my fingers crossed that I will not have another episode.
On a good note, I have an amazing family and an amazing boyfriend who I have been seeing for 2 years. I am very excited for where my life is headed and am hopeful that my blood disorder will never hold me back.
Posted by at

1 comment:

  1. EmilyJanuary 13, 2011 at 11:58 AM

    Meagan, sitting across from you has not taken me long to recognize a strong, intelligent, and caring person. You were very open about your medical condition and now finding that you have shared with us all so honestly what you have been dealing with is courageous. Having worked in your group yesterday it is clear that any academic goal is going to be easily achieved for you! Here’s to 2011 making the absolute best for you! Katherine

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)