Strange spring

Maybe the bizarre cold snap on Easter weekend has something to do with my sense of bewilderment and confusion. Or maybe I just feel disoriented because today is the very last day of class for the spring semester, which marks the conclusion of my first year of graduate school. Whatever the reason, I simply must exclaim in Holly Golightly fashion, "Quel printemps! [What a spring!]" And my, has it flown! Since I neglected to post regular installments of Aly's Adventures in Grad School this semester, I shall have to give you one big panoramic view of the whole experience. If you enjoy poring over long entries, you're about to enter pure bliss; if not, I won't ask you to torture yourself more than you can bear (unless you're into that sort of thing).

Writing (And Chatting About) Proposals
The online class, Proposal Writing, was an interesting challenge. At first I thought of nothing but how nice it would be to come home, change into pajama pants, grab some dinner and log on. But after the first session, I realized I had to trade one inconvenience for another. Although it was wonderful to attend class at home, I had to adapt to a means of communication I was unfamiliar with. Sure, I love instant messaging and emailing and all such cyber chat; but having to communicate in this format with my professor and with the students in my project group proved to be more difficult than I thought it would be.

Since I'm a visual learner, I felt as though my hands were tied behind my back without something in front of me to refer to, or someone physically present to speak with. As I wrote in my mid-semester progress report, "the lack of visual cues (facial expressions, hand gestures, etc.) and auditory cues (tone of voice, verbal fillers, etc.) really thins the texture of communication. We are also limited by the chat room interface. When there is an agenda to be addressed, time - and text - are too precious to waste. We have to type out our comments in a rapid-fire, abbreviated manner. This format has certainly forced me to practice more brevity - a quality I have to work at. [Who, me??] However, it is sometimes difficult to express an idea or opinion effectively in this text-messaging style."

As a matter of necessity, I picked up some interesting vocabulary along the way. Abbreviation was key. "Oh, def" [Oh, definitely] became one of our favorite group expressions. We used "prop" for "proposal" and "eval" for "evaluation" and referred to our professor as "Dr. W." One member coined the term "wreditor" to express our dual task of writing and editing the proposal. I just love that word! And of course, we shared many a LOL. Much humor, both intentional and unintentional, arose from the limitations of online chat. When two or more of us hit the "reply" button at once, our comments appeared on the screen like organized cheers at a pep rally; and more than once we had to say "jinx" for posting identical comments. We all learned to clone ourselves: by a strange quirk of the chat room, whenever we exited and returned to a session, the program would replicate our IDs. Behold - Aly and Aly2! (I know, creepy.)

Ultimately, my love of group collaboration saved me. I was so excited to have this rare opportunity to brainstorm and bond with peers that I put every ounce of effort I could into adapting to this strange form of communication that is oddly intimate and distant at the same time. I was thankful that at least I already knew everyone in my group. (I got to know them in my classes last semester.) Being able to picture their faces helped me overcome the lack of visuals, and being familiar with their personalities helped me connect with them across cyberspace.

And what did I learn about proposal writing? My ignorant, uneducated view was that prop writing had to be one of the driest, most boring kinds of writing; but I really didn't know anything about it until I took this class. Imagine my surprise and relief upon learning that writing a proposal is a lot like writing a book, a process I'm familiar with: research, write, revise, revise, revise. It can be tedious, but there is a satisfaction in seeing the whole document come together. Submitting a proposal is also like submitting a book: in both instances, you'd better make sure you follow the submission guidelines to a T or your baby will be dumped out the window faster than dirty bathwater. Although we did not reach this final stage in class, due to time limitations and other logistics, we got a pretty good idea of how rigorous the submission process can be.

Advertising, PR and Chapped Hands
My knowledge of writing communication plans before taking the Advertising & Public Relations class was about the same as my knowledge of proposal writing: nil. Since our major project was to develop a communication plan, guess what? I learned how to write one. This may sound like a "well, DUH!" observation, but at times I felt I was in over my head and out of my element. It was a great accomplishment, therefore, just to be able to say that I finally knew what was going on by the semester's end.

Our topic was a daunting one: pandemic flu. Yikes! Although I had heard a little of the concern buzzing around the world about the avian (bird) flu, I was completely ignorant about the concept of pandemics, or worldwide epidemics. I did not know that the real reason for the concern about avian flu was that the virus might mutate into a supervirus capable of transmitting itself from animals to humans, and because it would be a new virus, there would be no vaccinations and therefore a pandemic might break out. Many cities, schools and organizations have already developed pandemic response plans. My class had the task of developing communication plans that would raise awareness among college students - specifically, among students at our school. Cheerful subject, huh? What we finally decided on as a class, after meeting with the university's health education coordinator and hearing his perspective, was that we should focus on educating our target audience about flu prevention. By simply raising awareness about proper hygiene habits such as washing hands thoroughly and covering coughs and sneezes, we could help students be better prepared to fight the spread of flu viruses of all kinds. Still not an easy task, though - especially when I didn't even know what a communication plan really was. But I learned through the process, which is often the best way to learn.

As a writer, I am always looking for comparisons, for connections between seemingly disparate things; and although I thought proposal writing and communication planning must be as different as two things can be, I was surprised to learn that they share a number of similarities. First, both involve a lot of planning. This is obvious with communication planning, as the word "planning" indicates; but even the "simple" (hahaha, my group would laugh)project my group had to write a proposal for - establishing a scholarship for our technical communication program - required us to carefully think through not only what objectives the project was going to accomplish, but also how it was going to accomplish these objectives, and why the project was necessary. (I could also say that a communication plan is a kind of proposal, since it proposes ideas for reaching a target audience.) Interestingly, grant proposals and communication plans contain a lot of similar items: both types of documents call for statements of objectives and tasks, and both call for evaluation and budget plans. Another similarity between prop writing and communication planning is that both require continuous research and revision. If you sit down and write a proposal or a communication plan in one go, you're probably missing something. I ended up being very glad that I was taking Proposal Writing and Advertising/PR in the same sememster, because drawing comparisons between the two subjects helped me make sense of all the jumble.

A significant contrast between the two classes was that while the proposal writing class met almost entirely online, all the students worked in groups; and while the adv/PR class met in person, nearly all the students worked on individual plans. We had the option of partnering with one other person in the class, but I decided that although the task of doing everything myself seemed daunting, it would be easier in the end. I was learning in the prop writing class that collaboration creates just as much extra work as it saves. And I was very proud when at last I managed to pull together all my scattered research and thoughts into one well-organized plan. Throughout the semester I kept thinking my plan was going to be horribly mediocre because I had no background in advertising or PR; but what happened instead was that my lack of experience prompted me to spread my creative wings. Once I got up the courage to soar, I felt like I was back in my element, playing on my home turf.

Since I wrote a communication plan about flu prevention, you may be wondering, do I now practice what I preach? You bet! Although I had to learn the hard way that there is such a thing as overwashing your hands. For a while, I became so obsessive that the skin on my hands began to look more reptilian than human, and I had to use exorbitant amounts of body butter, hand cream and first aid ointment to restore the proper balance of moisture. Ouch! (If I make a pun about hands-on experience, I know that will only be more painful. So I won't. Oh, wait a minute - I just did.)

As a special bonus, I even got to live the subject: the day before the rough draft of my flu prevention plan was due, I came down with a virus! I couldn't help reflecting on the irony of the situation; I had become so fastidious about washing my hands and coughing into my sleeve (even though I still think that's kind of disgusting), and yet I couldn't avoid getting sick. However, I realized that just because I was trying to practice good hygiene didn't mean everyone else was. I could have gotten that virus anywhere, from an elevator button to a door handle to a shopping basket. Who knows. Considering the subject of our project, my professor was very gracious and gave me an extra day to work on the rough draft. And thankfully, this virus was fairly benevolent - I mean, benign. In a couple of days I was able to return to work and school.

Semester in a Snapshot
What is most ironic in looking back is how easy I thought this semester was going to be, in contrast to the reality - which turned out to be very different. I felt much relieved at the start of the spring semester, knowing that I would not have to go to the south campus or crash at my parents' motel two nights a week as I did last semester. I soon found out, however, that this semester was no stroll in the park; it was more like a skate park, with all the loops and jumps that required me to stay constantly alert. Which is not a bad thing if you like skate parks. I've never been to one, but I do like the mental equivalent - the ongoing challenge of looking ahead and preparing for your next move, executing it with as much skill and precision as you can muster and then quickly recovering for another.

After focusing on theory last semester, it was exciting to get hands-on experience in both classes this semester. I also liked having just one major, semester-long project to work on for each class. In a way, this made things much simpler, as I prefer focusing on one long-term project rather than dispersing my attention among several smaller projects. However, I had to do a lot more independent research and planning, which somehow kept me busier than the weekly writing responses I had to turn in last semester. But this was a very good experience for me, and I couldn't help feeling a thrill at taking on more individual responsibility in my studies. And once again, I learned I'm capable of more than I ever imagined. That's always a great self-esteem booster.