My Thoughts on Comments

The Huffington Post's article concerning the Oklahoma SAE racism incident had comments that I evaluated in order to better understand the public's opinion and response to this news. Some of these comments were far more credible than others. All the comment snapshots come from the article that discusses the heightened scrutiny of the fraternity's chapters at other college campuses.

The Credible

This comment relates Jan's personal experience of racism in Greek Life alumni. It is frightening to see her express her discomfort over the fact that the same racism she experienced personally was still in existence "50 years later." She fears this kind of racism as is apparent in her actions to leave a sorority alumnae meeting after overhearing racially negative conversation.

She seems to have racially sensitive values, and thus she cannot accept such low values which would allow a person to view blacks as inferior. From her personal experience, her attendance at the University of Missouri and her apparently sound moral compass she held higher credibility than most others in this comment thread.

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Sharon's comment clarifies the truth that it was solely the specific OU chapter that was responsible for this act. She reasonably helped me to remember that not all of SAE is accountable for this incident. There are likely very respected and successful chapters throughout the US.

She explicitly states the wish for Greek Life to go away. Her argument shows how strongly she holds the belief that Greek Systems do hold elitist values. She logically and clearly connects her sentences.

She believably illustrates that if the wrong people hold leadership positions in an organization, the organization can begin to revolve around hatred and exclusion. With such credibility, it made me wish that something like this would never happen to my fraternity.
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The Incredible

Anthony's comment clearly expresses a fantasy where he believes that fraternities have "outlived" themselves. How long is a fraternity supposed to live? I feel that it has to do with the belief systems in place and with the social compassion that these fraternities show.

Lupica believes that  fraternities serve no usefulness and I completely disagree. My fraternity brothers are all about my success and they back me in all my academic endeavors. This has established a great environment for my college years. I am encouraged and inspired by my brothers to continue to work hard at school while building respect through heart-filled social interactions.

Because of such a shallow comment, I find Anthony to be very incredible. He is making generalities that are not backed up by fact. Some fraternities have started in the 21st century. How could they ever have "outlived" their days if they were built in a modern day society?

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Denis' social anxiety with SAE men is apparent. He clearly states it in his sweeping comment that is so rude and cynical. He clearly has a close-minded belief that every SAE member is a rich punk. He has fallen into the exact behavior that got SAE expelled from OU.

He holds a very similar, excluding and racist belief system like that of the men who started this racist chant at OU. He holds little value for those men in the SAE fraternity who might be innocent and respected for their character. This is apparent from his appalling response to this article.

I know good-hearted SAE gentlemen who are committed to helping their community and are highly focused in their academic pursuits. Because of this, I find absolutely no credibility in Denis' comment. He has done nothing to research the rest of the SAE fraternity and what it truly stands for.

It is sad to watch people involved in a fraternity that are not committed to the true vision and belief system of the organization. They mar the name of every honest fraternity man.

My Controversy

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/12/racism-sae-chapters_n_6857500.html

This Huffington Post article discusses the controversy surrounding the Sigma Alpha Epsilon Racism Incident in Oklahoma. After this incident, the entire fraternity was nationally scrutinized in an attempt to rid the organization of similar behavior. Certain Social Fraternities haze and create socially pressured environments to negatively try to build their organizations. These fraternities are causing a huge problem for college campuses and it is creating people who are racially insensitive. I chose this article because I am in a fraternity as well, and I have seen the negative social environments that unconscientious chapters can create. Being a part of a chapter with no outstanding incidents on our name, we were one of two fraternities last semester without sanctions. I want to ensure that we continue the good reputation that comes out of our strong brotherhood. I do not want to ever create a destructive social environment and I want to ensure that we are racially sensitive to the entire community around us. I want to include all people, not exclude and choose who to like, and my fraternity wants to continue to build a positive community through peaceful fellowship and a unified approach to helping others in need. 

Calendar Reflection

I have a total of 24 hours spent in class and I work for 13.5 hours each week. With this in mind, I was able to find the hours I was free from. I actually had already made an entire schedule in excel and this assignment was an opportunity to reflect on my schedule even more.

I found that Tuesdays and Thursdays are by far my busiest days. I am planning to go to bed early on Monday and Wednesday so I have an alert mind for those days.

Every day after I finish classes, I am planning to go to the gym and then immediately after I will be doing homework until around 12 (average of 5hrs/night). I want to average 7.5 hours of sleep a night and hopefully with doing homework every night after the gym I will be on top of it.

I have a couple of hour breaks where I could plan out approaches to my assignments while I eat. These breaks will allow me to be totally focused when I start my homework at night. With this organization, I plan to have a very successful semester.

REFLECTION:

After reading Isaak's post, I realized that I had not quite set as many specific goals to stay on track with my class work. Thus I added more academic time and rescheduled some of the time I wanted to spend with my fraternity. I really wish I could say I had more free time like Casey said she had in her schedule. Her post made me realize that I seriously have to stay focused this semester if I want to be successful and still have fun while I am working hard to learn. I have to keep school as my priority to maintain my scholarship, but I must not let my studies drive me crazy. Helping out the community with my fraternity will help prevent such insanity. I am really glad that I can relate to everyone with their time commitment challenges. Understanding each person's schedule has given me insight into how to respect others and the frustrations they may have.

My Writing Process

In an attempt to better understand myself, I have spent time reflecting on my writing process. In this reflection, I found parts of my process that affect my writing ability positively and negatively. Surprisingly, I learned about how I logically address my subject matter and how I support my ideas through concrete evidence.

While reading the Student Guide, I began to consider what writer archetype I most identified with:

• The description of the Heavy Planner and the Sequential Composer best fit my writing process. The approaches that these archetypes use are very similar to my own approaches.


• I begin by roughly outlining in my head how I want to respond and convey information. I quickly identify my purpose and my main arguments.


• I consistently revisit sources I am drawing on. These revisits serve as a chance for me to take notes and gather ideas on how I am going to continue to form my draft.


• My notes are inspired by what I read and the ideas, internal responses, and reflection that this reading brings about.


• I love to write down my immediate impressions on the sources I use to aid in my arguments, and this allows me to write from my heart. It also allows me to establish direction.



Jim. "No Hay Problema."6/02/2007 via Flickr. Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic



• I slowly move through each paragraph and focus on the formation of my arguments and subject matter I express. I ensure that I connect my points back to my thesis or purpose. This way my draft is organized around the original inspiration I had for writing it.


• As I draft, I constantly try to simplify my writing, and I reread what I have so that it flows well together.


• I do tend to only have one draft and this draft is generally close to being a final draft.


• I work for a long period of time when I draft and generally finish it in one sitting.


• I then spend time revising and finalizing what I say. From this process, I clarify my purpose and understand what I truly want to say.


• I attach a conclusion or reflection at the end of most of my pieces so as to share what I have gained through the writing process.


• I find my writing process to be very successful. However, I also have some weaknesses to my approaches.




•  I have been commended by past teachers for my clarity of argument because I am consistently writing from my unique purpose and relating back to it with each sentence.


• As my senior year teacher Mr. Hodara wrote on my final senior paper: "You are, clear, directed, and relentless in pursuit of your thesis....Thanks Nic, for your intense focus and great heart."


• I spend so long planning sometimes that it can lead me to struggle in my drafting process.
• While planning as I go works, often times I can lose focus on what I was originally trying to argue.


• I also have to make sure I use solid points to support my argument. I cannot use too many points, as this would lead my readers to lose the purpose of my argument in the jumble of defenses I give for my point of view. 


• My drafts are almost always a final draft, and this can lead me to not revise enough. I might not give enough time to make sure I said what I wanted to say with my current drafting process.


• I believe that from this analysis of my writing process, I could benefit from using a few new conventions throughout my process.




• I need to give myself more time when drafting. I need to space out my drafting into smaller chunks. This will give me more time to reflect and polish


• With more drafting comes more potential for creating a truly perfect work. I find that if I produced more drafts I could revise the ideas in one draft, the grammar in another.


• I need to spend more time each day writing instead of leaving huge chunks of it for the few days before the deadline.

REFLECTION:

I was very interested in what Bri had to say about handling procrastination by setting up a new due date. This idea is quite clever and I do not know why I never thought about that as a way to solve this problem. I plan to implement this plan throughout this semester. I need to revise more throughout my process, and I need to worry less about what I am writing down so that I can get it all down on paper. This will allow me to be able to start revising the paper as an entire unit rather than separated parts. I could totally relate with Elliot about how I spend more time planning than writing the paper. With more time spent actually writing, I will improve my ability to communicate my ideas. Thus, I want to try planning a little less this semester as I am really strong at that. With this improvement in mind, I want to move forward. I wish to continue to improve my writing so as to have more people understand what I am saying. Through writing I hope to have more people discover who I am and what I truly believe in. All of this will be possible through a continued desire to learn and better who I am and how I correspond with others.