English is one of my favorite subjects in school. However, it was not like that a few years ago. If you asked me what my favorite class was in my freshman year of high school, I would reply saying that World Civilizations was my favorite. However, as I progressed in my journey towards becoming a writer, I learned that writing is not a simple process. Writing takes time, patience, and planning. Even as I am writing this essay, I am conscious of the various typos and grammatical errors that are present in my draft. However, that in my opinion, is the beauty of a writing class-making a masterpiece out of a mess. This idea is what really got me through this semester of Writing for the Sciences at City College. First and foremost, I have to say a big thank you to my professor. She supported me while I was bogged down with managing work and school. If I ever needed anything concerning this course, she was just an email away.

At the beginning of this course, we were given a few learning objectives:

• Explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations.
• Develop strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing.
• Recognize and practice key rhetorical terms and strategies when engaged in writing situations.
• Engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes.
• Understand and use print and digital technologies to address a range of audiences.
• Locate research sources (including academic journal articles, magazine, and newspaper articles) in the library’s databases or archives and on the Internet and evaluate them for credibility, accuracy, timeliness, and bias.
• Compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation.
• Practice systematic application of citation conventions.

Now in retrospect, I can confidently say I have achieved most of these learning objectives. I learned how to explore and analyze, in writing and reading, a variety of genres and rhetorical situations by continuous practice of analyzing articles from the New York Times almost every single day we had class. I developed strategies for reading, drafting, collaborating, revising, and editing by taking the advice given by my professor. One of my weaknesses in this area was revising. I was able to master these skills by continuous practice as well as constant proofreading and peer-reviewing.  As We had discussions and countless peer reviews, I learned how to engage socially with my peers and exchange ideas in a healthy way. Constant peer-reviewing allowed me to gain a myriad of perspectives on my topic of interest. Professor Killebrew helped me hone my skills of data research by setting up a workshop for the class with the resident librarian. In the workshop I learned how to navigate the plethora of databases to efficiently locate the desired data. The scientific controversy essay allowed me to develop a piece of writing that allowed me to implement strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation. Throughout this semester I learned how to cite sources accurately and in the correct format. Here is an example:

By doing this on a larger scale, scientists were able to develop immunity in the general population against many common illnesses that were fatal in the past:

Vaccinations have reduced disease, disability, and death from a variety of infectious diseases. For example, in the United States, children are recommended to be vaccinated against 16 diseases (1)…. All of the diseases have been reduced by more than 90% and many have either been eliminated or reductions of 99% or more have been achieved. A recent analysis of vaccines to protect against 13 diseases estimated that for a single birth cohort nearly 20 million cases of diseases were prevented, including over 40,000 deaths (4). (Orenstein, W. A., & Ahmed, R. (2017)

When I look back, my favorite assignments in this class were the weekly scientific article summaries and discussion. These weekly discussions broke the ice and enabled me to communicate more effectively with my classmates. I made some friends and enjoyed spending time to improve my reading and writing skills. The most difficult assignment for me was the second virtual field study. I was initially indecisive as to what I should choose as my topic of interest. Furthermore, I am not very creative and artistic, so it was difficult for me to make my own infographic. However, the writing part of the assignment was very straightforward.

In conclusion, this course taught me that it does not matter if you make a mess. As long as I put in the time and effort, I will be able to transform a mess into a great piece of writing. I thoroughly enjoyed this course and I encourage everyone to take it as well. Once again, it would not have been possible if I did not have an amazing professor like Professor Killebrew. Thanks for everything!