Ryan McClung

RC 2001 Writing Across Curriculum

Dr. Kevin Young

4 April, 2022

Reflection Letter

Over the course of RC 2001 I realized more than I would have about my major if I didn’t take

this course. In college I started off as a physics major because I enjoyed it but it got insanely

challenging. After that I really didn’t know what to change it to so I went with accounting

because I thought I would be good at it but I ended up not liking it very much. Around the same

time earlier this semester however, I became interested in project and construction

management because I would get to work more with my hands and I felt I would be good at it.

This interest however came with consequences which I realized when taking RC 2001. I found

out the number of additional classes I would have to take and the result put me well over

graduating in 4 years. Luckily though, I landed on business sciences at the end of this semester

which opened my eyes to many more possibilities after college and I wouldn’t have to spend an

additional 3 years in college. As of now I am very confident in my major which I actually

declared not too long after speaking with my advisor. Although I am very confident in my current

major, I still wonder sometimes what life would be like if I became a construction manager.

The most important takeaway lesson I encountered through the interview project was

how people business owners really feel about their jobs and their work ethic. The owner of the

business I chose ran it herself for 10 years before actually making a living from it and she talked

to me about the amount of stress that comes along with it and the number of hours she had to

work. During our interview I was not super surprised by anything but what did catch me off

guard was the method she used to obtain her products. She owns a vintage thrift store and

although she has an eye for picking valuable things out to resell, I was also informed that she
bought hundreds of pounds of clothes at a time without knowing what she was going to get and

then picked through them for the ones she decided to resell. Another thing that caught my eye

was the fact that she was recently pregnant while still working and continues to work, although

it's of course less hours after she had her child. Overall this interview didn’t really change my

desire to become a business owner because I knew it would come with a lot of time, stress, and

energy.

The specific field I studied for my research project was budgeting problems with scope

creep in project management. At first I was overwhelmed by the amount of information the

internet had to offer because it was all so similar yet I didn’t know what to actually take in.

Luckily however, after a couple of days of research I put the pieces together that budgeting a

project with scope creep occurring entails endless information in so many different ways so I

began understanding it better. I also learned how prominent scope creep was in projects and

how costly it is in real life scenarios. I found out that scope creep affects 52% of all projects

today. While making the video presentation I was kind of nervous because of the technical side

of it and editing which I am not very good at. I was checking out the different websites and apps

that we could use to create it but I had trouble choosing one and sticking with it. I am satisfied

with how it turned out. I know others did a much better job editing and bringing it all together but

I think I had some good information and points to bring to the table. I also believe my

presentation could teach most people about project management budgeting problems with

scope creep which makes me happy.

I had a pretty cool experience working on the cross-disciplinary project with my group

because it helped my communication skills and I thought it was fun working with people I’ve

never seen or talked to before. I also enjoyed this project because I feel like I gained an

additional amount of knowledge on the creation of websites which I feel could be very useful in

my future. Although we communicated effectively, I feel we could have done a better job all

agreeing on certain aspects of our business. For instance one of my group members thought it
would be a good idea to take care of infants 0 years old all the way up to 10. I on the other hand

thought it out a little more and understood how taking care of infants would take more one on

one time which would take away time from the other kids or cause us to spend more money on

hiring caretakers. A benefit of projects like this in the future on the other hand is going to be able

to work at our own pace and kind of add on to what other people were thinking or writing down

because we are all going to have the right idea about what our project is going to look like.