I’ll be teaching a 5-week online summer course. More details to come, however:

• JOURN 299x/001c, Soc Med News, 3 credit hours (REF#: 23952)
• Offered first summer session
• Students must register at the Registrar’s office in Lucina Hall

If you’re interested, please sign up. Or pass this along.

While you’re off on break, I want you to keep this in mind (re: your site). It’s time to stop thinking and start doing.

Think Cluetrain!

Be authentic with your voice. Don’t worry about mistakes and mis-steps. You can’t have a community until you get out and start creating it. It will change, evolve, turn. You can’t — I repeat, you CAN’T — control it completely so don’t expect to.

What you CAN do is start making. Start commenting. Start finding other groups with similar interests.

It is time!

Here are some stories you have written.

• Ambria Martin on snowboarding.
• Matt Holden on David Dallas.
• Megan Capinegro on Matt Whitlock.

I just want to commend you all for what has been the most pleasant week I’ve had at Ball State. Week 7 is particularly tough in (some of) my classes. It’s the week the lectures begin to mesh with practical application in a way that is – at times – uncomfortable.

Add to that Spring Break is looming.

It’s worth noting that despite the stresses, this week felt — on the whole — to be particularly productive. So kudos.

This, however, is not license to relax. You will do that one week from today.

I was impressed with the format of your presentations. You seem to have a grasp over the basics. The next 9 weeks, we will begin to delve more deeply into each of the sections (normatives, defintions, foundations) to allow you a greater flexibility in the class.

I have added a section to the WIKI called “Good Papers from Class.” These are the A and B papers submitted by your classmates for reference.

Also, links I discussed in class today. Congress and Nobody Knows What the F*$# They Are Doing.

As much as I try to impart upon you that grades don’t matter, I know my message oftentimes falls of deaf ears. Lest you think I am the only one who believes this, I offer this:

No One Knows What the F*$# They are Doing

The most inspiring — and inspired — piece of writing about the meaning of life.

The symposium encompasses various genres of student work, including traditional research studies, multimedia projects, and immersion projects.

In case you are wondering, I have not posted the edits from your first papers because there are so many major errors that I feel like I need to address this directly in class tomorrow.

I am completely aghast that the format I have described in class was ignored so routinely, so often. We will fix this tomorrow.

Also: please do not pad your writing with unnecessary words and phrases. This does not make your argument stronger. Poor writing defeats the purpose of logical reasoning.

When you ramble using grammatically unsound structures (and sometimes incomprehensible constructions), please understand I will spend little time on your work. If you chose not to edit your work, please don’t expect me to try to guess what you mean.

This is a JOU course. Writing matters.

I offer this basic critique as a point of reference for tomorrow, not to embarrass you. Simply to inform you as to why you have not received comments as of yet.

I can’t control how much effort YOU put into this class; however, I can control the instruction that you receive. Tomorrow, we will focus on the second.