Personal Mission Statement

In Week 1 you completed the College Student Inventory (CSI) to help you determine
what your strengths are as a student and what your obstacles might be. These
obstacles may have included your study skills, but you may have also included
managing multiple responsibilities and finances as obstacles. The discussion gave
you the opportunity to begin thinking about your own Personal Mission Statement
and your plan for success.

In Week 8, your final Personal Mission Statement is due. It must include the
following sections and will take the place of a formal final exam. Use this opportunity
to reflect on what you have learned about yourself as a problem solver and critical
thinker to complete this assignment. The requirements and the format for your paper
are listed below.

Section One: Your Role in your Education (30 points)

Section One should include a statement of where you are now in your educational
plan and where you would like to be in five years. This section should also include a
brief description (no more than 2-3 sentences for each) of three obstacles that may
prevent you from achieving your goals. These obstacles can cover a wide variety of
areas including academic, personal and career challenges. The most important thing
is that you are honest with yourself.

Section Two: Problem Solving for Success (60 points)

For this section, review your obstacles from Section One, choose one, and use the
problem solving process using the steps from Chapter 5 to develop a solution. For
example, many students are concerned about managing their personal finances and
use this section to develop a more concrete plan to manage their finances while they
are in school. This section must include the steps listed below. You may also use the
information from your Week 3 research assignment and the videos from the Week 3
assignment page.

1. Research and Define the Problem Using the Present State and the Desired
State

2. Determine the cause(s) of your problem. Use the What? Why? Who?
Where? When? And How Much? questions to help you determine the cause
or causes of your problem.

3. Generate solutions by brainstorming. Consider how you will manage

unexpected challenges you might encounter. What resources do you have
to fall back on? How will the problem solving steps that you learned in this
class help you to develop a plan of attack?

4. Decide on the best solution by prioritizing your needs and your wants.
Describe your final solution. In your case, you may have a number of
strategies that make up your solution.
 5. Describe your plan for implementing your solution. What steps will you
need to take to carry out your plan?

6. Evaluate your solution. What plan will you have in place to make sure
that your solution is successful?

Section Three: Your Role in Leadership (30 points)

This section should include an evaluation of you as a leader on your team project in
this course. What contributions did you make to your team? What do you need to do
to improve?

Then, describe where you are with your job now and where you would like to be in
five years. For example, in five years what would your dream job look like? What
position would you have? Think creatively! Reach for the stars!

Now that you have established your dream job, based on what you have learned in
this course, how would you define yourself as a leader in this position? What
characteristics do you think you would have? How would those who report to you
describe you?

Section Four: Personal Mission Statement (30 points)

This section is the conclusion of your paper and should be your personal mission
statement. For this assignment, you are thinking only of your educational and career
goals. Try to summarize what you have written into two or three sentences
describing where you want to be in five years and how you will get there.

However, we would hope that after this class you will refer back to this document
and incorporate other aspects of your life into it. Use what you have learned about
yourself to produce a living document that will provide you with a path for the future.