Dear Sophia,

When I first entered UWP I was not entirely sure what I was going to get from the class. To be

perfectly honest, I was actually dreading it. I have previously enrolled and dropped the class five times,

making this my sixth attempt. While yes, I had to take the class this quarter so that I could graduate this

year, your presentation of the class and material made it not only manageable, but also enjoyable; this

is the first writing class where I feel like I really got something out of it and didnt just get told I was

doing it wrong. Throughout the readings and in class discussions I have learned about many aspects of

writing that I have previously never known. I learned about the fake rules that have been passed along,

I learned how to properly use a quotation, and probably most importantly I learned how to revise

papers. Through this class, I have learned about rhetorical knowledge, ensuring that I write to my

intended audience and conveying my intended purpose. I have learned knowledge of writing

conventions, how to maintain the proper tone and apply aspects of rhetorical knowledge. While I have

spent a lot of time previously doing independent research, I have learned to properly integrate that

research into papers, how to properly cite and quote primary and secondary sources, and how to

compile all of these to make a supported and coherent argument. Finally, this class has taught me about

metacognition and the process of revision. These are all skills that I felt that I was lacking going into this

class, so while I was very hesitant to take the class and very nervous in the beginning, I am exiting the

class with what I feel is a much better understanding of writing, and feeling like I grew as a writer.

While writing the original literacy narrative it was an essay just speaking about myself, and my

own personal experiences. It helped me lay out my ideas, and reintroduce me to writing; I havent taken

a writing class in nearly ten years at this point. I have had to write in other classes at Davis, however

never in a proper writing class, just an essay about a research topic. I felt like that draft was rough, and

clumsily assembled. Contrasting that paper with my second literacy place narrative, I felt like I already

could see a big improvement. I also enjoyed integrating in a second perspective from a classmate that
also experienced the anatomy lab at UC Davis. It allowed me to build on what I wrote in the first literacy

place narrative and utilize a fellow anatomy students experiences. I actually really enjoyed writing the

second literacy place narrative and the integrating the interview that I conducted. I think the second

draft of the second literacy place narrative, which you reviewed, was a vast improvement over my

second draft of the first literacy place narrative. I think my final draft, including the quotation fixes and

elaborating further on the final paragraph will be an even bigger improvement. In the second literary

place narrative I feel like I addressed my intended audience well, conveying a clear purpose. I initially

incorrectly used quotations, giving many armadillo roadkill type quotations, however in the final draft

I have fixed these as well. My tone was intended to be more casual, I wanted to build interest as if

addressing a friend rather than trying to be a very formal essay. The revisions I made are visible

throughout. I introduced my character in the beginning, and modified all of the quotations to better

include a sense of reference. I went back and added further detail in the fourth paragraph to further

build on the feelings experienced and the description of the room. Incorporating these revisions and

ideas, I was able to build my paper around a main argument utilizing the skills I have learned in this class

rather than just revising for grammatical errors and sentence flow.

In the discourse community project I had a little bit of a more difficult time at first. I had an idea

of what I wanted to write about. I enjoyed doing the research on the topic, and learning about how

technology has changed a discourse community. Having an audience assigned versus being able to write

a paper to an audience of your choice was difficult, however good practice, especially because of the

career path I want to go down. While generally I am assuming most of the papers I publish will be

published to peers within my field, there may be some articles that I have to write to a different

audience. I did fulfill my intended purpose by questioning whether technology has improved doctor

patient communication. I did this by showing some of the short comings initially experienced, but the

overall positive impact that people within the field have experienced, and contrasting articles from
when the new technology was implemented versus how it was perceived after ten years of adaptation.

This paper was the main paper that showed my ability to find and utilize primary and secondary sources.

While the second literacy narrative had a slight introduction to primary source use, this paper relied

upon it much more heavily. I had to form my entire argument based upon the readings I did in

secondary sources and the interview with the head of nursing at Dignity Health in Woodland. While this

paper was more difficult to write at first because I was compiling outside information to build an

argument, it may have been the most useful paper for my future writings. When writing a grant about a

new area of research, it requires reading of a lot of secondary sources, and compiling these sources to

form arguments and make assumptions. Conducting literature reviews also requires a similar set of

skills. By writing this paper on an area I had an idea about, however was not part of, I began to

understand how to effectively write such papers. Finally, the revisions I made in this paper were more

extensive than those I made in the Literacy Place Narrative 2.0. I reworked my thesis, and in doing so,

reworked the entire paper with regards to my new argument. I also reworked my conclusion, providing

a potential path forward, incorporating analysis from throughout the paper. I also went back through

the paper and broke up a paragraph on EMRs into several paragraphs, focusing on the introduction to

EMRs, positives and negatives. I analyzed the ideas of the positives and negatives in relation to the

doctor community, and utilized secondary resources to support these arguments.

While in the beginning of this class I was quite nervous about how the class would go, by the

end I would say it was the most enjoyable writing class I have taken to date. It was the first class that

addressed a lot of the rules that have been constructed over the years, and debunked a lot of the rules

that werent real. It taught me how to revise my own papers, which is one skill I have never been taught

over the years. I learned how to properly integrate quotations from primary and secondary sources

which will make future writings flow more easily. Through learning about rhetorical knowledge, tones,

and audiences I feel that I am now much better equipped to construct essays. This class is the first
writing class that I feel has really taught me how to write rather than fulfilling a basic template that

allows me to explore three ideas, with an introduction and a conclusion.

Thank you for a great quarter and providing me with the groundwork to improve my writing,

Matthew Hvasta