UMUC WRTG293 All Weeks Discussions Latest 2019 April Question # 00601634 Subject: Education Due on: 05/25/2019 Posted On: 05/25/2019 06:01 AM Tutorials: 1 Rating: 4.8/5

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 1
Discussion

DQ1 joining Career Quest at UMUC

Please access the Career Services website
at the following url:

https://www.umuc.edu/current-students/career-services/

Then access the CareerQuest website by
selecting the option indicated at the right:

careerquest

Then select CareerQuest for Students, as
indicated by the red arrow below:

carqueststudents

Proceed through the interface to join the
CareerQuest community as a student and complete your profile.

Explore the various options in CareerQuest,
including recently posted jobs and other resources and online tools. Joining the CareerQuest community will help
you complete various upcoming tasks and assignments in this class.

For this discussion topic, please write a
few sentences to your fellow classmates about anything interesting you found
through CareerQuest.

Please note that you will not be able to
see other students’ responses to this discussion topic until you post your
response.

DQ2 Career Planning

In week 1, one of the resources provided
for you is a video that introduces you to UMUC’s Career Services. In this discussion topic, you will consider
some of the advice that the Career Services unit provides on career
planning. This information will help as
you pursue the first writing assignments in the class.

To start, please access the Career Services
website at UMUC.

You will see the following list of items:

careerserv2

Select Career Planning, as indicated by the
red arrow above. After you select this
link, when you scroll down, you will see the following three sections, outlined
in blue in the image below:

Choosing a Major

Strategies for Career Goals

Career Insider by Vault

careerserv3

Please select at least one of the
sections. Peruse the information. Write one paragraph of 125-200 words
describing what you found when you examined this information.

Please note that you will not be able to
see other students’ responses to this discussion topic until you post your
response.

DQ3 locating a professional conference in
your field

This discussion topic is designed to help
you prepare for writing assignment #1, the report on the professional
organization and conference.

Please access the writing assignment
instructions by selecting Assignments in the top menu and selecting WA1 –
report on professional organization and conference.

Read through the instructions. Then locate
a conference sponsored by a professional organization in your field.

In responding to this discussion topic,
please post the following:

The name of the organization

The url of the conference it sponsors (this
can be the most recent conference or the upcoming conference)

A few sentences about why you picked this
conference for writing assignment #1

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 2
Discussion

DQ1 Resume and cover-letter tips

Please access “Get Tips for Crafting
Your Resume and Cover Letter” from Career Services UMUC.

Peruse the resources and tutorials offered.

In responding to this discussion topic,
share three strategies you learned from the resources on either resumes or
cover letters or both. Try not to duplicate a strategy given by another
classmate. When this discussion is
completed, we might have a plethora of tips and strategies that are very
useful.

Please note that you will not be able to
see other students’ responses to this discussion topic until you post your
response.

DQ2 sample resume walk-through

Please access the following url:

https://www.careeronestop.org/ResumeGuide/SampleResumeWalkThrough.aspx

You will see the following interface.

Please click on the various sections of the
sample resume walk-through, as pointed to by the red arrows below. Read through the various pieces of advice
given.

sccap of resume walkthrough

Please write three pieces of advice you
found from the website.

Please note that you will not be able to
see other students’ responses to this discussion topic until you post your
response.

DQ3 post a rough draft of your resume here

This discussion topic is designed to help
you get started on writing assignment #2, the resume and cover letter.

For this discussion topic, please complete
the following:

1. Post a resume for yourself that you have
on file now. You can post it as an
attachment in Word, PDF, or RTF format.

If you do not have a resume on file now,
you can use the tips and strategies from this week’s resources to help you
create a draft of a resume.

Please note that this is a draft of a
resume. You don’t need to post a
polished, perfect resume to this discussion topic.

2. Respond to at least two other students
on their resumes. Try to give at least
one area that could use improvement.
You might draw upon the tips given in the Resume Tutorial that was given
in Content for week 2 or from the Resume and Cover Letter tips page that was
given in Content for week 2. You can
also draw from the sample resume walk-through that was linked to in this week’s
activities.

Your suggestions for improvement can be a
short paragraph. You don’t have to write a whole essay noting to your classmate
how to improve the resume.

Please be professional and encouraging as
you give advice to your classmates on their resumes.

The resume should be posted by Sunday. Your advice to two other classmates is due
next Wednesday.

(Of
course, please feel free to post your resume before Sunday and your advice
before next Wednesday.)

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 3
Discussion

DQ1 Using VMock to get feedback on your
resume

This discussion topic is designed to help
you write writing assignment #2, the resume and cover letter.

In week 2, you viewed a video tutorial on
VMock.

In this discussion topic, please answer the
following questions:

1. What category did you chose when you
submitted your resume to VMock—Entry-Level/Career Changer, Experienced/Career
Advancer, or Federal?

2. Give one piece of advice that VMock
provided you for Impact.

3. Give one piece of advice that VMock
provided you for Presentation.

4. Give one piece of advice that VMock
provided you for Competencies.

5. At the top of the interface, VMock has
the following:

You can increase your score by ___
points. See how.

When
you clicked see how, what advice did VMock give you?

DQ2 using Resunate to get feedback on your
resume

In week 2, you viewed a video tutorial on
Resunate.

In this discussion topic, please answer the
following questions after you have submitted your resume to Resunate and have
worked through the interface to improve your resume.

1. Were you able to increase your Job Focus
score? If so, how did you increase it?

2. Give one piece of advice that Resunate
suggested to you to improve your resume.

DQ3 post a second draft of your resume for
your fellow students to see

In week 2, you submitted a rough draft of
your resume to a discussion topic.

In this discussion topic, please do the
following:

1. Respond to this discussion topic and
attach your updated resume to your response.
Your updated resume can be as a Word, PDF, or RTF file.

2. In the actual discussion topic response,
please write a short paragraph describing some of the changes you have made to
the resume since week 2, when you posted the first, rough draft of the resume.

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 4
Discussion

DQ1 your experience in practicing an
interview with Quinncia

In week 3, you viewed a video tutorial on
Quinncia.

For this discussion topic, follow the steps
in the video tutorial to upload your resume and then take a practice interview.

Then answer the following questions:

1.
When you uploaded your resume, did you receive any additional feedback
from Quinncia that you had not received by using our previous tools?

2. List three pieces of advice that
Quinncia gave you during this practice interview. As you can see from the tutorial, Quinncia
gives advice after you answer each question. You can choose three pieces of
advice that you received after some specific questions if you would like.

DQ2 examining a set of poorly written
instructions

Before you start, you will want to read the
following. These readings are provided
for you in Content for week 4.

Scenario: Anderson College (Part I)

Jay Williams’ Ineffective Instructions

D.A. Jameson, “Management consulting
and teaching: Lessons learned teaching professionals to control tone in writing

Also in week 4 of Content, please become
familar with the content and advice at these websites:

David McMurrey, “Instructions: Tell
Them How to Do It!”

Wikibooks — Writing Instructions

Instructions: How to Write Guides for Busy,
Grouchy People — Jerz’s Literacy Weblog

Then answer the following question in
responding to this discussion topic:

As you can see from the scenario, a former
student worker at Anderson College wrote a set of instructions for Anderwson
college that are not well written and are not professional enough to distribute
to the faculty members and students of the college.

As you peruse the McMurrey, Wikibooks, and
Jerz resources on how to write instructions., and as you examine the set of
poorly written instructions, please list at least three problems with the instructions,
using the these three resources as a guide.
Your response can be a few sentences.

DQ3 an email message to the student worker

Before you start, you will want to read the
following. These readings are provided
for you in Content for week 4.

Scenario: Anderson College (Part I)

Jay Williams’ Ineffective Instructions

D.A. Jameson, “Management consulting
and teaching: Lessons learned teaching professionals to control tone in writing

video — “Using a Holistic Approach to
Writing Business Emails”

After reading the scenario, the set of
instructions written by Jay Williams, and the Jameson article, please complete
the following:

Imagine that you are Dr. Richard Johnson,
Dean of the Undergraduate School at Anderson College. You will write an email message to Jay
Williams, the student worker, informing him that his instructions are not
suitable to be distributed to the students and faculty at Anderson College.

Keep in mind the Jameson article. You want to maintain proper tone and
professionalism. While the instructions
that Jay wrote are not professional and would be embarrassing to send to the
students and faculty members, you do not want to seem unprofessional in your
message to Jay. In addition, he is a
student worker. You don’t want to overly criticize him in your message.

In responding to this discussion topic,
write the following:

the subject line of the email message you
write

the body of the email message.

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 5
Discussion

DQ1 writing a memo to the faculty members
at Anderson College

This discussion topic will also involve the
following readings. They are provided in
week 4 of Content.

Scenario: Anderson College (Part I)

Jay Williams’ Ineffective Instructions

D.A. Jameson, “Management consulting
and teaching: Lessons learned teaching professionals to control tone in writing

In week 4, you identified some of the
problems with a poorly written set of instructions. You also rewrote the set of instructions.

In this discussion topic, please complete
the following:

Write a memo to the faculty members at
Anderson College informing them of the revised instructions and where they can
access them.

Please follow the advice provided in the
resources in week 4 of Content about writing a memo. In addition, you can be creative in directing
the faculty members to where they can access the new set of instructions. You can make up the name of a folder on
Google drive or some other folder on the cloud.

This is an internal memo. However, some
faculty members might not remember the details about the instructions that the
previous student worker wrote. For this
reason, you will want to introduce the memo with some level of detail of the
history of the instructions, let them know that the instructions have been
revised, and let them know where they can access them. Of course, you will want to provide them with
your contact information in case they have additional questions.

This is a discussion topic. You will want to reply to this discussion
topic and write your memo in the discussion text box.

DQ2 a problem in your workplace or
community

Please consider a problem in your workplace
or community that you would like to solve.
The problem you identify should be focused and solvable.

Some examples might be the following:

Your workplace should use texting to
communicate among employees for some situations, rather than email

The alley behind your townhouse community
has trash and debris building up. It
should be cleaned up.

An intersection in your community should
have a traffic light.

Your company now uses Google mail. You feel it should switch to Outlook.

The printer in your department is networked
to every computer in your department.
Employees waste valuable time walking to the printers to pick up their
printouts. Each office should have its
own printer.

The library in your community does not have
enough books. The library has a policy
of disregarding books that are not checked out within a year. This results in many potentially popular
books being eliminated.

A sidewalk in your community is in
significant disrepair. It should be
broken up and redone.

The staff members at your place of work
should have a person to confide in to complain or blow the whistle on other
employees who are not performing well or who misbehave. There is no Human Resources unit to which an
employee can share reports in confidence.
You need this type of HR unit or person.

The football field at your local high
school has items that need to be repaired.
Perhaps the scoreboard, the bleachers, or the field itself have problems
that need to be addressed.

Please take some time to consider a problem
in your workplace or community, one that can be solved by an individual (e.g.,
a manager, owner, department head, etc.) or a group of individuals (e.g., a
board of directors).

Respond to this discussion topic by stating
the following:

whether the problem you have identified is
a community problem or a workplace problem

what the problem is

how it can be solved or at least addressed

who can implement this solution

You can write one or two sentences for each
of the four items above.

DQ3 how you will demonstrate the problem

Please consider a problem in your workplace
or community that you identified in the previous discussion topic.

Then respond to this discussion topic by
stating the following:

what evidence is there to show that this
problem exists?

how will you demonstrate this evidence to
your decision-maker?

Some examples could be the following:

If you are writing about an intersection
that needs a traffic light, you might show pictures of the intersection, or
even show a brief video of the intersection showing its precariousness. You might also interview 3-4 people who live
near or drive through the intersection.

If you are writing about the need for
repairing the local football field, you might show pictures of the items in
disrepair. You might also interview 3-4
people who have experienced the problem.

If you are writing about a need to move
from Google mail to Outlook, you might show screen captures of what the Google
mail interface looks like alongside screen captures of what the Outlook
interface looks like.

Please note that, in this discussion topic,
you do not have to show the pictures, interviews, videos, or screen
captures. You simply need to state the
ways in which you could demonstrate the problem.

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 6
Discussion

DQ1 rewriting the instructions from Jay
Williams (response to 2 other students required)

This discussion topic will also involve the
following readings. They are provided in
week 4 of Content.

Scenario: Anderson College (Part II)

Jay Williams’ Ineffective Instructions

In week 4, you identified some of the
problems with a poorly written set of instructions written by Jay Williams, the
student worker.

In this discussion topic, you, as the new
student worker, will rewrite thise set of instructions. In this discussion topic, please complete the
following:

1. Download the poorly written instructions
on how to adjust the discussion settings in LEO.

2. Rewrite the instructions using the same
graphics that are in the poorly written set of instructions. Please read part II of the Anderson College
scenario to

3. Attach your rewritten instructions to
this discussion topic.

4. Respond to at least two other students’
rewritten instructions and give them one or two pieces of advice or
encouragement.

DQ2 a piece of primary research for your
short report

In last week’s discussions, you determined
a problem that you want to write about, and you have considered some ways that
you can demonstrate that problem.

In this discussion topic, please post one
example of primary research you have found to help you persuade your
decision-maker of the problem.

Some examples are the following:

If you are writing about an intersection
that needs a traffic light, you can attach a . jpg file with a picture that
shows the intersection.

If you are writing about the need for
repairing the local football field, you can attach a jpg file with a picture that
shows items in disrepair.

If you are writing about the need for
repairing the local football field, you can attach interview questions you
asked of a local resident and the answers that the resident gave.

If you are writing about a need to move
from Google mail to Outlook, you can attach a .jpg file with a picture that
shows how Outlook looks.

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 7
Discussion

Vasquez: the differences between academic
and business writing

To complete this discussion topic, you will
access the article by Felix S. Vasquez, “Differences between Academic and
Business Writing.” The article is
available in the e-reserves for this class.

To access the article, please take the
following steps:

select Content in the top menu bar of LEO.

select Class Resources

select eReserves

click on the eReserves icon on the
interface

locate the article among the list of
eReserves articles available.

Professor Vasquez is writing about teaching
writing skills in Spanish to students for whom Spanish is not a native
language. However, that issue is not the
focus of our discussion here. His
analysis of business writing and academic writing is the focus of this
discussion.

Please answer all of the following
questions based on what Vasquez writes in his article, not based on your own
understanding. In addition, please do
not simply copy text from the article.
Please summarize what Vasquez writes in the article, and use quotation
marks for occasional quotes from the article if you would like to.

According to Vasquez, what are the
similiarities between academic writing and business writing? Try to come up with at least three of
them. Please write a paragraph or two in
posting your answer.

According to Vasquez, what are the
differences between academic writing and business writing? Try to come up with at least three of
them. Please write a paragraph or two in
posting your answer.

Reflect on three experiences in this
course. You can choose from among the
writing assignments and from among the discussion topics. What differences have you noticed between the
writing that you have done in this course and the writing you completed in a
composition course (e.g., freshman composition, or something of that nature)?

Your answers can be a brief paragraph.

WRTG293 Introduction
to Professional Writing

Week 8
Discussion

DQ1 Setting goals

Please watch the following video. Then answer the questions below.

1. Please share a goal you have developed
and, if possible, share how you applied the SMART strategy outlined in this
video.

3. Please comment on any tools or resources
from Career Services that might help you reach one of your goals as you
complete WRTG 293.

DQ2 post a draft of your report for your
classmates

1. Respond to this discussion topic and
attach a draft of writing assignment #5, your short report to the
decision-maker, to your response. When
you respond, you might indicate to your fellow classmates the status of this
rough draft. Perhaps it is a complete
report. Perhaps you have half of it
completed and are working on the other half.
Perhaps you can attach only a couple of sections of it. Overall, this is a rough draft, and it is
understood that what you are attaching to this discussion topic is not your
final, polished, report to the decision-maker.

2. Please provide feedback to at least one
other student’s report. In your
feedback, you can offer suggestions for how to make a section clearer, you can
ask questions about a point being made, you can suggest ways of persuading the
decision-maker, etc.

When selecting a peer to whom to provide
feedback, please select someone who has not been given feedback on the paper
yet.