Skills Inquiry In Each Section Of This Report Y

In this assignment, you will

Document and reflect on your university education and on learning experiences outside of the university;
Articulate how your upper-level coursework is an integrated and individualized curriculum built around your interests; and
Highlight the experiences, skills, and projects that show what you can do.

A successful report submission will be the product of many hours of work over several weeks.

A report earning maximum available
points will be a carefully curated and edited explanation of your work
that provides tangible evidence of—and insights into—your competencies
and capabilities over time. In each section of this report, you are (1)
telling a story about your own abilities, and (2) providing specific
examples and evidence that illustrate and support your claims.

✍ Required Report Sections

Here the sections are listed as they
must appear in your final graded submission. You’ll arrange the sections
in this order when submitting the final report BUT you won’t follow this order when writing drafts of each section. Note
that each section description contains a Pro Tip that tells you how to
proceed with the work – what to attempt first, second, and third, etc.

❖ I. Statement of Purpose ❖

Step 1. Read these four very different
Step 2. Consider the differences in tone, style, level
of detail etc. Your own statement of purpose may resemble one of these.
Indeed, writing a first draft based on an example or combination of
examples is a good idea. BUT don’t let these examples limit your
thinking or personal expression. You may want to begin with a quote from
a famous person, use a quote from your mom, or skip the quote. You may
want to discuss your personal motivations or get right down to the
facts. You may want to list your classes or discuss how your work-life
led you to this path.
Step 3. Write a rough draft – let’s call that Statement
of Purpose 1.0. Write Statement of Purpose 1.0 as quickly as you can
and then put it away until after you have completed most of the report.
Forget about Statement of Purpose 1.0 until most of your report is at
least in draft form.
Step 4. Once you have a draft of all sections of your
report, you are in a good position to revise Statement of Purpose 1. You
are ready for Step 4. Take Statement of Purpose 1.0 out its dusty vault
and hold it up to the sun. Ah. Now read your report draft and compare
it to the claims you made in Statement of Purpose 1.0. Ask yourself
these questions:
- Does Statement of Purpose 1.0. accurately introduce my report?
- Are there important ideas or representative experiences in the
  report that should be highlighted in the Statement of Purpose but
  aren’t? Remember this isn’t a treasure hunt where its your reader’s job
  to figure out what matters. It’s your job to show the reader what
  matters.
- If Statement of Purpose 1.0. isn’t the best map it can be for the
  treasures sprinkled throughout in your report, why not? How can you
  revise toward this goal?
- Does your Statement of Purpose 1.0 share any Big Ideas or Themes
  about you and your life? It should. Your reader should understand you
  (and maybe even like you) and your report better because they read your
  Statement of purpose. That is the work of a Statement of Purpose.

Be sure to review the Statement of Purpose Section Specifications Checklist and Grading Rubric before getting started.

Pro Tip: Collaborating isn’t cheating. You may want
to exchange reports with a writing buddy or two from class and then you
and your buddies can help each other to make sure that each of you has a
Statement of Purpose that gets the job done.

❖ II. Curriculum ❖

This section requires you to review your upper-level course work 2000-level and above.

Think about what classes you took and what accomplished in them. The
successful Curriculum section is about showing rather than just telling.
This is your time to show off your best work, focusing on particular
skills. For example, pick an assignment (project or paper) where you did
a particularly strong job. Fully describe your work. Prove that you can
do what you say you can do. This involves making the important
distinction AWAY from just a list of your courses and what you did in them—to who you are as a professional and a creative problem solver.

As you list and discuss your advanced course work, you’ll
give your readers a glimpse into (1) what you know, as well as what
skills you have developed (2) how you have met (or can meet) challenges,
(3) how you can help others.

Curriculum Section Examples are provided.

How to Get Started writing your Curriculum Section

Step 1. Hold a copy of your transcript in front of you
and highlight the classes that were most meaningful to you and the ones
where you feel you did your best work. You may be able to recall the
classes you want to discuss from memory. But most students benefit from a
careful review of their academic transcript.
Step 2. Review the examples of Curriculum sections
provided in these instructions. The writers have approached the task
with different strategies. You can use these examples to guide you and
you may also want to consider working from a more formal template.
Step 3. Here is a formal template so you can see what each entry does in sharing the story of your academic journey with readers.
- Heading: Provide the reader with an informative subheading, usually either the complete name of the course. Not this: Chem Glassblowing But this: CHM 4090L Introduction to Scientific Glassblowing OR the type of project or paper produced. EX: Spatial Ability and OCHEM Research Presentation
- Body paragraph opening sentences that provide context for what follows :
  The first sentences should summarize the course content. This
  information can be found online in the FIU course catalogue. EX: In this
  class, where the emphasis was on making and repairing of scientific
  glassware, I learned Basic glassblowing operations with glass tubing and
  rod.
- The story or example that shows why this course/project/paper
  matters to you. Here you might share insights, achievements and/or
  surprises: The next sentences should tell a story about skills
  or knowledge you acquired or shared. EX: As I worked in the glassblowing
  lab, I learned more about precision than I expected to. The way getting
  things exactly right in procedure, measurements, materials, and
  temperature matters is something I will never forget and that I will
  bring to my future work in other areas. We didn’t guess and make
  approximations. We had to get things precisely right. I worked harder
  for an A in this class than in most of the other classes I have ever
  taken, etc.
- Introduce artifacts shared in the appendix: If you are
  including an artifact from this class in your appendix, you may want to
  mention it at this point. EX: My appendix includes a picture of my final
  project for the class.
- Explain how this course/project/paper will help you to advance your plans for the future:
  Finish by explaining how you will transfer your skills and knowledge
  into other areas of your academic or professional life. EX: When I
  explain to employers and graduate program admissions officers what is
  special about me, I will tell that I am a meticulous person who notices
  and manages details, even in high-stress situations and I’ll use my
  achievements in the glassblowing class as proof.
Be sure to review the Curriculum Section Specifications Checklist and Grading Rubric before getting started.

Pro Tip: When
beginning work on this assignment start with this section. Your
Statement of Purpose is a summary of the Curriculum and Volunteer or
Work Experience sections; the Statement of Purpose ties everything
together and helps the reader to make sense of the sections that follow

❖ III. Volunteer or Work Experience ❖

In this section, discuss how your work and/or volunteer experiences
have shaped your professional goals and intellectual life. As is true
with the other sections, the usefulness of this section depends on your
planning what it is you want to say and working to be specific and clear
in sharing the most important parts of that experience with your
readers.

How to Start Writing your Volunteer or Work Experience Section

Although the course has titled this section “Volunteer or Work
Experience” there are many different activities and experiences that you
can use to write about meaningful events outside of your academic life.
Here is a list of questions that indicate possible entries for this
section: Volunteer or Work Experience Questions.

These experiences (and more traditional work and volunteer experiences)
are expanded ways to think about how you became who you are now, where
you might want to go next, and what you can contribute. As you ask
yourself these questions, you may find that this is a section where have
a lot to say.

Why this Section Matters

You may recall from the Learning Outcomes sheet that it is a good
idea to think of your accomplishments not only as credentials – “I
earned my BA at FIU in Liberal Studies” – but also in terms of skills:

❖ Inquiry

❖ Critical thinking

❖ Creative thinking

❖ Written communication

❖ Oral communication

❖ Quantitative literacy

❖ Information literacy

❖ Teamwork

❖ Problem-solving

❖ Civic knowledge and engagement – local and global

❖ Intercultural knowledge and competence

❖ Ethical reasoning

❖ Foundations and skills for lifelong learning

❖ Integrative learning

As you write this section, think about which of these skills and
attributes you developed and demonstrated outside of your academic life.

Be sure to review the Volunteer or Work Experience Specifications Checklist and Grading Rubric before getting started.

Pro Tip: many people are surprised to find that in
order to provide significant context for their experiences, they have to
research their own lives. Dude, really! Ex: If you volunteered with an
organization that provided relief to hurricane victims in Puerto Rico,
go to the organization’s webpage to read its description of the crisis
and how its team intervened. Contact friends who volunteered with you
and ask what part of the experience was meaningful to them and they
remember. Check news reports to be sure you remember the name and dates
for the storm. Biggest rookie mistake: Writing everything from memory.

❖ IV. Plan for the Future ❖

In this section, develop and reflect on your five-year goals. Think about where you want to be in 5 years.

Your Submission for this Section should have Three Elements:

Clear and specific statement of your 5-year goal(s). This assignment
isn’t a contract with the universe or anyone else; you may refine or
completely change your goals in the coming years. So, that means you
shouldn’t twist your mind into knots trying to uncover and articulate
the “perfect” goal. The point of this exercise is to imagine the
concrete steps that someone might take to reach a desired outcome.
- This: In 5 years, I want to be a country Desk Officer
  for the United States Department of State, Bureau of Western Hemisphere
  Affairs.
- Not This: My goal is to work as a diplomat or something international. I just love traveling.
Discuss the tools you’ll need for success. What skills, personal
attributes, certifications, credentials, experiences, and/or connections
will you need to reach your stated goal(s)?
- This: To reach this goal, I will probably need a
  master’s degree in International Relations and also some entry-level
  experience. I am looking into an internship or entry-level job with
  non-profit organizations that partner with the State Department. One of
  my professors mentioned the Foreign Service Officer test. I suspect that
  I will need that too.
- Not This: Getting to be a diplomat is a tough and
  competitive but I know I can distinguish myself because I am a hard
  worker who gets along well with other people.
In your discussion of the tools you’ll need for success, clearly
state how you know what you know. In other words, you will need clear
and specific references to the research and/or networking activities
that you used to inform your thinking.
- This: In researching this career, I studied several
  Desk Officer biographies on the State Department webpage and observed
  that most people in the field of diplomacy have advanced degrees, often
  studying International Relations. I also asked the FIU’s Career and
  Talent Development office for help in finding Florida organizations that
  are involved in international diplomacy. Working together, we found
  Global Ties Miami, an organization that works with the U.S. State
  Department’s professional exchange program. I have written to the
  director of Global Ties Miami to share my long-term goals and to ask
  about volunteer opportunities. I have also located the State
  Department’s information page for the Foreign Service Officer test. I
  still have lots of questions but I now I also have some answers too.

What to Avoid:

Here are some common mistakes and how to avoid them:

People who defined their goals in terms of salary often struggle
with this section. People who think about their careers as a way to make
a meaningful contribution to their communities, country, humanity,
other living things or to planetary health, find that their thoughts
flow more easily and they have more to think about and to say.
People who try to write this section without networking or research
often find that even their best ideas seem superficial and vague when
they try to write them down. Sometimes we get a notion (a vague
information-less idea) from movies or television shows that suggests a
career path to us. Or out of sense of romance, we connect two things
that might not be as connected as they seem.
- Joe saw a movie about a stock trader and now tells everyone he’s
  headed to Wall Street. But Joe knows very little about what college
  degrees most traders have or what actual traders do all day. He also
  hasn’t kept up with technological advancements; he has no idea, for
  example, about how algorithmic trading might change his prospects.
- Linda loves dogs – old ones, puppies, big ones, little ones. Since
  junior high, she’s been telling everyone that she wants to be a
  veterinarian. But she doesn’t know how long people study to have that
  career or even if there are veterinary schools near her parents’ home.
  She’d like to stay in South Florida and raise her children near their
  grandparents, aunts, and cousins. How much student loan debt do most
  veterinarians carry. And mostly she has no idea what veterinarians do
  all day. What percentage of each day is spent on accounting, draining
  infected boils, euthanizing or sterilizing animals, cuddling cute
  puppies, and so on?

In both cases, Joe and Linda need more information.

People who wait until the fourth or fifth week of the semester to
start work on this section often find that networking opportunities take
time to set up and that research can lead to a dead end or to more
questions. People who start late, sometimes imagine that this work can
be effectively started and completed over one weekend or even one night.
Although, you are only required to produce 300-400 words, this
assignment will take most people several hour-long sessions to complete.
That is because each sentence must convey a deep and informed
understanding of your goal and how to reach it.

How to Get Started

Step 1: Here are three scenarios. Read each one and then imagine how this person might write his or her Plan for the Future section. Plan for the Future Section Examples.

Step 2: After you read the three scenarios, think about
your own story. You might even try writing down your own story and
printing it out. Then go back to the three required elements for this
section of the report. Compare your story to the elements you’ll need to
include for this section.

Be sure to review the Plan for the Future Section Specifications Checklist and Grading Rubric before getting started.

Pro Tip: Many students use thinking about and
writing this section as an opportunity to network or investigate
graduate programs. Things you might do: Using the internet, personal
contacts or the FIU directory, locate someone who has already achieved
your goal. Read their biography or informally interview them about the
path they took to reach the goal. For example, if you are thinking of a
career in video game story design, research which universities offer
advanced training for this career; go to the library to locate books
about it; talk your friends; visit your professors during office hours.

❖ V. Appendix ❖

In this section, attach your CV and any artifacts: papers, images,
presentations, group projects, digital media (video and audio), creative
artwork, links, internship reflections etc. Each artifact must be
labeled.

Review each section of your report. In many places, you will have
made a claim about something you have accomplished. Here, in this
section, you will provide the proof of your claim by attaching evidence.

If in the Curriculum section you discuss a course where you and your
team made an effective video (Prezi, PowerPoint presentation etc.),
include a link to the video in your appendix.
If in the Curriculum section you discuss a course where you wrote a
paper or annotated bibliography that shows your research and critical
thinking skills, include a copy of the paper in your appendix.
If in the Volunteer section you tell of a trip where you studied
abroad in France, include pictures from the trip in your appendix.
If for the Plan for the Future section you interviewed a local business leader, include a photo of your meeting notes.

Appendix Grading:

An Appendix that earns all the Section V points will include:

CV with a file name that makes it easy for the reader to know at a glance which CV goes with which report.
- This file name: MartinezTM CV Spring 2019.docx (Author’s last name and first initials, type of document, month and year created)
- Not this file name: CV.docx
- Not this file name: CV IDS Capstone.docx
Imagine you are an instructor with 50 students. Which file name
would be most helpful to you? Suppose 20 of your students label their CV
as CV.docx. How do you easily tell one CV from the other? The
clear-labeling requirement is a good rule to follow when applying for
jobs. The recruiter or boss may have a stack of electronic files to
review; don’t make her search to find yours.
In addition to the CV, include at least three different artifacts,
each with a file name that makes it easy for the reader to know at a
glance which artifacts go with which report. Three is the minimum but
you may want to include far more. Remember: No orphan artifacts. Each
artifact in the appendix must be referenced clearly somewhere in the
report.
An appendix that is missing artifacts, has mislabeled or deceptive
artifacts, or in any other way does not follow these directions, will
sacrifice points accordingly.

⚠ Important

Imagine that your reader may know
far less than you about the areas where you are developing expertise. At
any point in the Report, you may want (need!) to insert an explanation
that provides context for your interests, accomplishments, and goals.
Ex: If you are excited by the ways that data collection might prepare
our society for climate change, you will have to devote
time and intellectual energy to helping your reader to understand
systems that collect data, typical uses for collected data, and how your
ideas depart from or add to the ongoing data-collection conversation
between experts and stakeholders that are taking place around you.

Dos and Don’ts

✔ DO carefully balance a personal approach with professionalism (but not too personal)

✔ DO explore a blend of academics AND action

✔ DO more showing than telling, but both are necessary

✘ DON’T include everything you have done—only those samples and artifacts that best represent your work

✘ DON’T retell your academic history; think about the skills and knowledge that are a part of your work at the university.

Rubric

Capstone Report Rubric Fall 2019

Criteria

Ratings

Pts

This criterion is linked to a Learning Outcome
Content

200.0
to >100.0 pts
Excellent work

Satisfies each element on the specifications check list AND appears to be the product of at least two drafts.
Section is thoughtful, specific, and carefully follows the instruction sheet.

100.0
to >50.0 pts
Almost there

Satisfies
each element on the specifications check list but may have been hastily
written. Reads like a first draft: Choppy organization, rather than a
series of careful ideas, flowing one to the next. Repetition or
vagueness undermine the submission’s power.

50.0
to >0 pts
Insufficient investment of time

Misses
one or more elements from the specifications check list. Reads like a
first draft: Choppy organization, rather than a series of careful ideas,
flowing one to the next. Repetition or vagueness undermine the
submission’s power.

200.0 pts

This criterion is linked to a Learning Outcome
Document specs

200.0
to >100.0 pts
Excellent work

Satisfies each element on the specifications check list.

100.0
to >50.0 pts
Almost there

Misses one element on the specifications check list.

50.0
to >0 pts
Insufficient investment of time

Misses more than one element on the specifications check list.

200.0 pts

This criterion is linked to a Learning Outcome
Proofreading

100.0
to >70.0 pts
Excellent work

Demonstrates sufficient self-review to avoid careless errors.

70.0
to >40.0 pts
Almost there

Contains one or two careless errors that the writer could have caught by reviewing the work more carefully.

40.0
to >0 pts
Insufficient investment of time

Contains
more than two errors that the writer could have caught by reviewing the
work more carefully. Work that sacrifices points here often contains
misspelling that Spellcheck flagged, sentences that don’t make sense
because of missing words, proper nouns that haven’t been capitalized.
(Ex: florida International University).

100.0 pts

Total Points:
500.0