I didn't sign up for CHP 396 until mid-summer, so I don't know how early on we knew about the blogs or the format of the class. I did not find out until a few weeks before school. From the first email I received, I was most excited about blogging. I was excited to have something substantial to show the public. However, as the class continued, I realized experiencing blogging for the first time in a graded class was not the best way for me to start. I think bringing the grade component into blogging caused me to take less risks, to be less likely to talk about certain issues, and to only discuss certain topics rather than free flowing stream of consciousness. Looking back, I wish I would have taken more risks. I wish I would have strayed from the given topic more often. I am glad that we had this opportunity to blog, even though I will admit, it was not the easiest thing for me to do. I do plan to continue blogging on random topics, although possibly under a different name for a fresh start.
The first week, I was pretty anxious to write about my class expectations. I'm choosing this post not because I think it is some of my best work, but because I think it is very expressive of the course and it's beginnings. I touch on learning as a student. Much of what we discussed in the middle of the course was how learning occurs, why some students are disengaged, and how we can improve this. The Business Honors Project I mention is one way in which we can help engage students by providing my resources. Reading this over, I also realize that many honors students are engaged because they feel like they are making a difference, invoking change. We feel that we are a part of something special and that we have the ability to affect others. Maybe those that are disengaged don't feel this way because they don't get as much attention as honors students. I also touched on professional responsibility, tipping points, management, and feedback which were clear topics of the class. I thought this post was a good overview.
In the fourth week, we were asked to do a "taking stock" post on how we felt blogging was going for us. In this week, I talked more about the Expert Mind article. This is actually one of the articles that interested me the most. The only Psychology class I've taken is AP in high school, but I think my argument for the self-serving bias is quite applicable. Many of us end of majoring in the subjects that we are successful in, and only if we are strong enough to understand our personal mission and achieve our shared vision do we move away from that compliance. This, of course, ties into our later course theme of personal mastery. I know that something I struggled on was bringing myself into the posts, and I wish I would have done that more here. I think the reason I feel the way I do about the Expert Mind article is because it took a lot for me to go against what I was good at to do what I enjoyed. I was naturally gifted at tumbling and just had a build suited for gymnastics when I was young. I competed and did well without as much practice as other girls. But one of the things that I could never overcome in gymnastics was fear---every time I did a new combination it was because someone told me they were spotting me and then moved their hand. I sprained my wrist doing my first back flip because I kept twisting around to see the ground before reaching it---even though that is not supposed to happen in a back flip. I enjoyed winning and I enjoyed being able to do combinations that girls my age were not able to do. But I did not enjoy going to lessons. I did not enjoy the anxiety that I felt. When I started playing tennis at 9 years old, I was already behind many of girls my age (you know, those that started from the womb apparently). Going to tennis lessons was slightly dreadful for me because the people in my class were all younger and I consistently felt embarrassed, but I still enjoyed playing the sport. I enjoyed the game and the mentality of it much more than gymnastics. In a few months, my parents told me that they could no longer handle paying for lessons for both gymnastics and tennis, so I had to make the decision to quit gymnastics. I'm not sure they thought it was the smartest decision at the time, and I'm not sure I do because I could have become a much better gymnast than I am a tennis player. Yet, the enjoyment that I received from playing tennis was so much greater. This is why intrinsic motivation and shared vision, not compliance, is necessary for personal mastery. I became a successful tennis player in high school, qualifying for state 3/4 years, but it took work and following what I enjoyed to take that step.
Side note- I also like the way I tied the article into the topic of blogging and taking stock.
Among my favorite posts is "Profiting from Non Profit Work". It was one of the first posts that I tried to come up with a title for and I do think that was helpful in narrowing my focus. I think extrinsic motivation does come forth when people do not have a personal connection, and sometimes it is this extrinsic motivation that brings on the intrinsic (as I described in a post titled Personal Motivations (not part of my portfolio)"). I like this post because I bring it full circle with the businesses and back to the students. I think this post is something that we can all relate to.
My last post is "We can change the unchangeable". I thought it was a nice summary of the class and made points that were relevant to the future. Also, I think I was able to tie in my experiences to the blog better than I had in the past. It was also the first time that I completely strayed from the topic at hand. I think that is a sign of growth and risk taking from me that allowed me to write about something I was more passionate about.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Change for better or for worse
This is edited for the last slide and has the song credits added in. I should have done that earlier, I apologize.
What a football game today---guess we couldn't have two great wins in the same week.
What a football game today---guess we couldn't have two great wins in the same week.
Chp 396 Project 2 Final
View more presentations from twchan2.
Friday, December 4, 2009
We can change the unchangeable
My media project was done on change, and how change doesn't necessarily turn into something better. I did try to narrow my approach to change that is designed, not caused by external factors. For example, one of my examples was the creation of calculators that inhibits learning, not global warming. But as I was thinking all of this through, I kept considering all the external factors. In my first blog post, I wondered if we could ever really design change to be effective, because there are so many external factors that go into it---the environment, the type of people it affects, how these people react to the change, etc. It goes on and on.
After reading Tipping Point, I feel the same way. The book discusses three major factors that affect whether a trend will have a "tipping point". With a tipping point, effective change can then occur. These three "rules of tipping points" are: The Law of the Few, The Stickiness Factor, and the Power of Context.
In recent years, the honor society that I am president of has a survey for general members to voice their opinions. Tonight we had our reevaluation meeting to go over the responses we got. We do this so that we can change the society for the better and react to everyone's viewpoints, not just our own. This is a very big honor society of around 5000 members on campus, so when we consider any type of change it's important that we consider everyone and really think about the society's mission (promoting academic excellence in freshmen and making a difference in our campus and community). We've done a lot in the past 2 years that I have been on the executive board, and when I think back on all of the major changes in the honor society I realize how much they fit in place with the three factors.
About 8 years ago, the society at the U of I campus was not active at all. This is difficult to imagine because in the last 2 semesters, we have received an award from TIS for Most Outstanding RSO and an award from the Dad's Association for Most Outstanding Organization, both based on impact and differences made on campus. The change happened when the executive board 8 years ago realized that the society was not accomplishing anything since it was so large. By creating a point system for members to receive honor cords at graduation, the participation rate went to about 150 members, with about 10 members receiving enough points to graduate with honor cords the first few years it was instilled. Now, we have about 40 honor cord graduates, with about 300 active members. We are still growing, but I think there will come a point when we are limited by the number of members motivated to get an honor cord, and thus to participate in service events and make an impact on the community. Receiving an honor cord today sounds appealing because you would be one of 5000 members to receive one; you also get enough attention at events since chairs still have time to ensure you are accountable for attending, etc. The Power of Context says that when you make people accountable for their actions, the tipping point can happen. The group 8 years ago made a large organization that did nothing into essentially a "smaller organization" by creating the divide between active and inactive members. This is the Power of Context. It also tells me that some day we will be limited by the same rule.
Since I have joined the executive board, one of our goals has been to incorporate a social dynamic into the honor society. This is to facilitate member to member interaction. When members become friends and have someone to go to events with, they are more likely to participate. In the last 2 years, we have had a social committee. As of tonight, we voted a new social coordinator to the executive board to begin in 2010-2011. Perhaps that is the reason that I am writing this blog tonight. I think it's a very exciting change for us to have, and will help to make our message even "stickier". Having people do service events or tutoring students with their friends makes the event seem more appealing, and thus the events will be more likely to stick with members.
With all of these changes, I feel that we are really growing in participation. Perhaps one day, getting more members to participate will no longer be a goal of ours. Instead, we can move onto another of the rule of epidemics---the law of the few perhaps by being even more selective in our committee chairs and then eventually exec members which we are already pretty selective in.
Maybe we can't stop global warming or swine flu, but we can reinvent things to help slow the destructiveness down. We can go green; we create vaccines. Doing these things may seem small for change that happens on such a large level. But small things make a difference. We can make large organizations seem smaller if the cause of ineffectiveness is the size. There are things that we cannot change, and then, there are things that we can.
After reading Tipping Point, I feel the same way. The book discusses three major factors that affect whether a trend will have a "tipping point". With a tipping point, effective change can then occur. These three "rules of tipping points" are: The Law of the Few, The Stickiness Factor, and the Power of Context.
In recent years, the honor society that I am president of has a survey for general members to voice their opinions. Tonight we had our reevaluation meeting to go over the responses we got. We do this so that we can change the society for the better and react to everyone's viewpoints, not just our own. This is a very big honor society of around 5000 members on campus, so when we consider any type of change it's important that we consider everyone and really think about the society's mission (promoting academic excellence in freshmen and making a difference in our campus and community). We've done a lot in the past 2 years that I have been on the executive board, and when I think back on all of the major changes in the honor society I realize how much they fit in place with the three factors.
About 8 years ago, the society at the U of I campus was not active at all. This is difficult to imagine because in the last 2 semesters, we have received an award from TIS for Most Outstanding RSO and an award from the Dad's Association for Most Outstanding Organization, both based on impact and differences made on campus. The change happened when the executive board 8 years ago realized that the society was not accomplishing anything since it was so large. By creating a point system for members to receive honor cords at graduation, the participation rate went to about 150 members, with about 10 members receiving enough points to graduate with honor cords the first few years it was instilled. Now, we have about 40 honor cord graduates, with about 300 active members. We are still growing, but I think there will come a point when we are limited by the number of members motivated to get an honor cord, and thus to participate in service events and make an impact on the community. Receiving an honor cord today sounds appealing because you would be one of 5000 members to receive one; you also get enough attention at events since chairs still have time to ensure you are accountable for attending, etc. The Power of Context says that when you make people accountable for their actions, the tipping point can happen. The group 8 years ago made a large organization that did nothing into essentially a "smaller organization" by creating the divide between active and inactive members. This is the Power of Context. It also tells me that some day we will be limited by the same rule.
Since I have joined the executive board, one of our goals has been to incorporate a social dynamic into the honor society. This is to facilitate member to member interaction. When members become friends and have someone to go to events with, they are more likely to participate. In the last 2 years, we have had a social committee. As of tonight, we voted a new social coordinator to the executive board to begin in 2010-2011. Perhaps that is the reason that I am writing this blog tonight. I think it's a very exciting change for us to have, and will help to make our message even "stickier". Having people do service events or tutoring students with their friends makes the event seem more appealing, and thus the events will be more likely to stick with members.
With all of these changes, I feel that we are really growing in participation. Perhaps one day, getting more members to participate will no longer be a goal of ours. Instead, we can move onto another of the rule of epidemics---the law of the few perhaps by being even more selective in our committee chairs and then eventually exec members which we are already pretty selective in.
Maybe we can't stop global warming or swine flu, but we can reinvent things to help slow the destructiveness down. We can go green; we create vaccines. Doing these things may seem small for change that happens on such a large level. But small things make a difference. We can make large organizations seem smaller if the cause of ineffectiveness is the size. There are things that we cannot change, and then, there are things that we can.
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