What a kickin Timeline!!! (Assignment dos)

It all started when I was reading one of our assignments in the Supplementary Guide. It was talking about writing an Opinion Essay and gave the example in the book. After I read this I started thinking about possible subjects that I might want to write my essay on. Although I didn’t think a lot about it yet, it did make it so that during the day I would observe things and look for things that bother me. When we started talking about subjects in class I still had no idea what I wanted to write my paper on. My group asked me questions about stuff that I’m interested in trying to help me find a subject. By the end of class we had come up with the iea of child obesity and with a couple key things I could hit to write a paper on it. Although it’s a decent topic, I didn’t really care to write a paper on it. Let’s face it, an opinion essay on child obesity isn’t going to make a difference in the way that anybody thinks or make any changes.
The next day I went mountain biking with my brother and some of his friends. In the car they were asking me about school and classes. I brought up the fact that I had to write an opinion essay. After telling them what I was planning on writing on I decided that it was a stupid subject and started looking for new ideas. We started talking about the lack of bike racks on BYU campus, which gave me my new topic.
Later I was sitting around the kitchen table of my apartment with some of my roommates. We started talking about school and I told them about my paper. They all put in there two words of encouragement and seemed excited about my topic- (They all ride their bikes to campus too.). We talked about the subject for a while and they helped me brainstorm some ideas of places I could go with this paper and topic. I wrote them down and was prepared to go to town with this paper. Using the open discussion trick, shown to us by Mr. Keeley on the Google home page, I informed my group that I had changed my topic and asked for any suggestions from them.
I completed my first assignment and posted my outline for the essay. Having this outline was really helpful while I was writing my paper’s rough draft. I was able to just cut and paste a lot of it into my paper. I also conducted some research by asking the Human Resources Department about complaints around campus and observing bike racks all over campus during the week. With these three things it wasn’t hard to write my paper. I just had to find the time to sit at my computer and pound it all out.
Sarah and Rawleigh were able to review my paper and give me some suggestions. Ashley hasn’t quite gotten it back to me yet. There reviews were helpful in giving me some insight of places I can expound on and grammar errors. The meeting with Mr. Keeley was also very helpful as he also made some suggestions of where I can take my paper and how I need to answer a few questions to make it more convincing to readers. I was grateful for all of their insights and it should make it easier to complete my paper. Now all I need to do is format it correctly, and add in some more information to make my paper more convincing and full.
This paper has been a more enjoyable one to write than some of the past English assignments I’ve been given. It’s always nice to be able to write about something that you want to write about. This is the first college paper I’ve had to write, at least for an English class, and I’ve impressed myself at how much I remember on how to write correctly as far as format and grammar are concerned. – English is definitely not one of my strengths. It’s been really helpful in teaching me about rhetoric and what it is. It’s been helpful in teaching me how to better appeal to all audiences and strengths of papers; i.e: kairos, kronos, pathos. Everything in class was helpful and I didn’t have problems while writing so I don’t think I would have wasted time covering anything else as far as this paper is concerned.

Opinion Essay

My new topic: BYU needs more bike racks on campus.

I would like to submit that there are not enough bike racks to accommodate the bikes ridden to BYU campus.

This is an appropriate topic because gas prices have skyrocketed all across America. The gas prices have been especially harsh in Utah, with gas prices averaging twenty-five cents higher than any other state right now in the Continental US; including California! As a way to avoid unreasonable gas prices and to also prevent pollution many have chosen to ride a bike to BYU campus instead of drive. Due to the number of people riding their bikes to campus it has become a task to find a bike rack with adequate space to park your bike.

Thesis: Putting more bike racks on BYU campus would be a good thing because it would help provide incentive for students to ride their bikes, help prevent damage to bikes, and contribute to relieving the parking issues BYU has.

Outline

1. Intro- All bike racks on BYU campus- aside from the one just outside of the Maeser bldg. (how inconvenient)- are completely full with many people "stacking" bikes. There are a few designated bike parking areas around campus. Two solutions. Either create more parking areas, or add more bike racks to already existing areas. Riding bikes is also a healthy activity that is good for students.

2. Bike stacking makes it impossible to get your bike off the rack and a task to put new bikes on. When you have three bikes to a two foot "bike parking" space it makes it very difficult to put a bike in or take a bike out. There are so many in such a small space because it's the only place left to jam your bike and have it be locked to something stationary. Not only is there potential to damage your own and others bikes but next you have to slyly maneuver the lock to make sure you haven’t locked somebody else’s bike along with yours.

3. By putting more bike racks on campus there might be a greater incentive for people to ride their bikes to school. Parking has been a huge problem on BYU’s list for the last couple of years. With more people riding bikes it could really help with the parking problem.

4. Gas prices are ridiculous leading to more bikes. (Like any of us have money to spend on gas!)

5. "Go Green" fad has helped spike number of people riding bikes. (Help prevent pollution)

7. Conclusion- Happy solution- put more bike racks on campus. Less hastle in parking your bike leads to happy students.

Thursday was fun

chicken