Scientific Controversy Reflection
When I first saw this scientific controversy assignment I was first confused because I have never done an assignment like this before. But after reading through the assignment, I was eager to locate a scientific controversy issue on which to write. When I was looking for a theme, I wanted to tackle something that a lot of people talk about. As someone who enjoys makeup, I’ve heard numerous beauty companies claim that they don’t test on animals. This sparked my curiosity in learning about what researchers utilize animal experimentation for and what other individuals think about the subject. I started by researching what people who support animal testing believe, and then I identified some materials that indicate what those who oppose animal testing believe.
One of the goals I set for myself while writing this paper was to ensure that I found the appropriate sources for my paper. There were a lot of sources on the internet about them, and I wanted to be sure I selected the appropriate one. After locating the materials I desired, I devised a strategy for writing my paper and made notes on what needed to be included by consulting the scientific debate assignment guidelines. Another goal I set while writing this paper is making sure I understood what I had to talk about. At first, I wasn’t sure if my paper had to bias or a non-bias paper. I found out that my paper had to be non-opinated and not my opinion. One of my strengths when preparing this paper was time management. I was able to complete this assignment on time because I planned ahead of time and worked hard to finish before the deadline. After gathering all the research I picked important research data that seemed important for both controversies. After doing so I wrote my paper. The professor’s assignment of completing the first draft a week before the due date made it much easier for me to complete my assignment on time and improve the issues I had on my paper.
During the editing process, I was able to identify the issues with my paper that needed to be addressed. For example, in my paper, I did not use any text-based quoted sources. When reading my work, it was difficult to tell if the information I provided was in my own words rather than the source I was referring to. I had a few grammatical errors, and instead of speaking in the past tense by using the phrase “had,” I had to use the present tense, for example, “have.” I also needed to work on my conclusion and acknowledge my sources correctly, which I accomplished for my final copy.I believe I performed to the best of my ability while writing this paper. Perhaps I could have done a better job if I had more time to write the paper. I believe I needed to improve how I quoted my sources and perhaps clarify my sources after citing them rather than quoting them and leaving it at that. I also believe I could have done a better job of describing the data table I included in my article and connecting it to the controversy surrounding my topic.
After completing this paper I learned a lot about animal testing. I learned a lot about why people do animal testing. For example, researchers use animals as test subjects to research for understanding the causes, diagnosis, and remedies of disease and suffering in humans and animals. I also learned that there are many ways people can stop doing animal testing which is by raising public awareness about what it involves or assisting students and instructors in ending classroom dissection, sponsoring ethical non-animal research, and lobbying health charities not to invest in dead-end animal experiments. I also learned more about how to format a scientific controversy paper and cite my sources properly. At first I didn’t cite my sources properly and had just the link of the website provided and not on the specific format my professor wanted. After realizing my error I was able to fix the issue and cite my sources the write way.
Literature Review Reflection
When I first heard about this assignment I was first confused because I never heard about what a literature review was. I had never written a literature review before so I wasn’t sure how to do it. When the Professor went over what a literature review was I was still confused because I was so used to writing a basic essay or research paper and not a literature review because the concept is so different compared to a regular essay. When finding topics I wanted to find a topic that was really talked about in society and that was the impact of smoking because smoking is a very common thing that many people do throughout the day and as everybody knows smoking is not safe for the body and has a lot of impacts on one’s health. That was the reason why I decided to choose this topic when doing my literature review. When finding sources I tried my best to find sources that were accredited and had more information about what smoking dust of the body with evidence to prove their claim. It took me a few days to find the right source because there are so many sources on the database. What really helped me the most to write this paper was the small assignments that I had to do for this class. It really helped writing the first and final draft less stressful for me to do.
Some goals I set myself in planning this essay were to make sure that I found the right sources for my paper, make sure I find the right themes for my paper, make sure I had enough evidence to support my themes for my paper, and make sure I understood how to synthesize a source. What helped me the most was the professor’s resources and small assignments that helped me write a literature review. What also help was when the professor went over examples of how to write literature reviews and worksheets that provided tips and tricks to write literature reviews and ways to not write literature reviews. What I struggled with the most while writing this paper was making sure I wasn’t summarizing each source that I was talking about and making sure I was synthesizing enough. Another struggle that I had was comparing and contrasting each source to more than just the evidence that they have provided. I overcame these obstacles by attending the writing center and looking at more examples of literature reviews that students in the past have done and watching YouTube videos to help learn more about how to write a literature review.
The revision process really helped me understand the problems that I had in my paper and also allowed me to learn more about how to write a literature review in the right way. The professor’s suggestions for my paper really helped me understand what I needed to do when writing my literature review and learn more about how to synthesize my sources. If roles were reversed I would have not given myself a better grade while writing this paper because I feel like I could’ve done better, but I did try my best of my abilities to write this paper. One thing I learned while writing this assignment was that when comparing and contrasting sources there is so much more to it than just comparing what each source says because an author’s writing could also play a big role in the research that is done in the articles. I was also able to learn more about the impact of smoking and have more knowledge about it. Something that interested me the most about the research I did on my paper was what happens when a pregnant woman smokes cigarettes. I didn’t know how many problems could occur if a woman smokes when they’re pregnant.
PAC Reflection
Aleena Bilal
PAC Individual Essay
ENG 21003
May 3rd, 2022
We had to come up with some topics to discuss for the collaborative research project that had a real impact on society. My group and I were working on a public awareness campaign and came to the conclusion that some good topics to make a campaign about would be cannabis, nicotine, cocaine, and alcohol addiction. We chose alcohol, nicotine, cannabis, and caffeine because many people use these products on a daily basis and are unaware of the effects they can have on your body over time. As a result, we decided as a group that these topics would be appropriate to discuss on our public awareness campaign website.
One pro when doing this assignment was that as a group we all agreed on the topic of talking about alcohol, cannabis, caffeine, and nicotine. We also agreed that these issues are a very important topic to talk about because they are used a lot in many people’s daily lives. When picking the topics we all chose topics that we thought fit our strengths. We also picked roles to do based on what we were interested in more. Michael and Anita were responsible for the home page to talk about drugs and alcohol. Elizabeth was responsible for the government letter. Cassandra and Fatima were responsible for the advertisement and Yareliz was responsible for the additional information page. I decided to do the fundraiser for our topics because I was interested in learning more about how fundraising works and wanted to see how creative I could be in doing it. This was a nice thing that I and my group members did because we were able to do what we liked in the project and learn more about our topics in a certain way. When doing this assignment I was able to learn a lot about what nicotine, caffeine, alcohol, and cannabis addiction do to the body. For example, when someone drinks too much alcohol from one through the time some health effects would include liver disease, high blood pressure, heart disease, stomach ulcers, and more. Also, many people think smoking cannabis is fine because it’s not nicotine but it still causes a lot of harm to people for example aspergillus, a fungal that can cause lung problems, is another possible concern to persons with low immune systems. It can develop on marijuana, which exposes the lungs to the fungus when smoked. Caffeine is also something everyone drinks daily to keep them up for a long period of time but some risks of drinking it for a long period of time will make your body get used to it and later on you won’t be able to stop because your body gets used to it like any other addiction. Nicotine which people smoke a lot for a long period of time can lead to lung cancer, emphysema, chronic bronchitis, and other diseases.
When coming up with ideas to make a fundraiser I wasn’t sure where to start because the topics I had was very broad topics and picking a fundraiser for each was difficult. I first needed to find my target audience. My target audience for this fundraiser is doctors, psychologists, people who suffer from nicotine, alcohol, cannabis, and caffeine addiction, philanthropists to help support the funds, and everyday people. The reason why everyday people are one of my target audiences is that if they didn’t know what was going on with people who are addicted to these drugs they are able to learn more and make a good cause if they donated money to the NACC organization. When I realized that each topic was an addiction I decided to do some research on what people who have addictions go through. I saw that what all the addictions had in common was not a lot of people treat their addictions and rehab is very costly for people who can’t afford it to go to. With all this information know I came up with the idea that I should make a fundraiser organization that donated money to make sure people who suffer from addiction to any substance get the help they need. As a group, we are called the organization NACC. The goal of the NACC fundraiser was to help fund money for those who can’t afford the help they need to fight their addictions. The easiest part of writing this fundraiser was getting the sources. Because addiction to drugs, alcohol, and caffeine is a pretty big topic, finding sources to help answer my questions wasn’t hard. The only hard part was how was I going to format it in a way that was easier to read to my target audience.
Because of our school schedules and work classroom, we didn’t have a lot of time outside of class to meet, but we were still able to communicate through text to help come up with ideas for our project even if we didn’t meet as often as we should’ve. Another disadvantage was having to figure out how to use the website. Because we were having technical issues with the website, we decided to create a Google Doc with all of the information that we wanted to put on the website, and then we assigned two people to upload the assignment because that was the limit of the website browser gave us. We also did this because of the technical issues that we were going through while doing the assignment.
Pathos was the rhetorical move that we used. Our group’s goal was to persuade the audience, which included regular people, doctors, and others, that nicotine, alcohol, cannabis, and caffeine addiction have negative effects on one’s health and that doing so is bad for the body and should be avoided. Pathos was used by the NACC fundraiser to persuade people to donate money to help build rehab facilities for people who cannot afford the addictions that they discussed. For example, my group’s fundraiser page states some cost expenses for rehab facilities. For example, for inpatient rehab “if the patient requires 60 to 90 days of treatment, the total cost of the procedure could range from $12,000 to $60,000.”
For work effort, we all did our best as a group to come up with the information needed for our project. Overall, we were able to complete all of our tasks on time and post all of the information that we had planned for the website. This assignment was a lot of fun to do because it allowed me to learn more about alcohol, cannabis, caffeine, and nicotine while also allowing me to work as a team with my group to complete everything.
