Torres 1

Jose Torres

Judith McCann

English 1302 213

30 April 2023

Final Reflection on English 1302

I struggle to find the words to describe this semester because there is nothing to discuss.

This semester straight off the bat I had confused about what to do when it came to my writing.

The last semester was really fun when it came to expressing myself but this semester seemed

very linear and straight to the point.

For the first essay, I could not understand the prompt for some reason. It wasn’t until I

saw that drop box that I finally began to understand the prompt. The idea of making my own

experiment seemed exciting and simple until I really thought about it. In my head, I wanted to

make the most perfect, or most interesting experiment possible. As the prompt was being

explained my mind would run rampant thinking of experiments to do and the types of sources

that I would have to look into. The homework that was given before the essay also gave me a

better understanding of what exactly how this essay is going to be. Then out of nowhere, the idea

popped into my head. I remembered the lessons that were given to me in psychology class and

the concept of rewards and punishments. That is when I came up with the idea of praising my

adopted brother while he does a task to measure how efficient he can become. I decided to run

with this experiment and work on it throughout the whole week. Well, half the week passed and I

had worked on zero percent of my experiment. I then mustered up the willpower to finally do the

experiment and I did. I had my baby brother stack cups up and measured the speed it took to

finish and his overall emotions during the experiment. Finally, I had done the hard part and I was
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ready to move on and do the actual essay. I was so so wrong. I did not understand the format of

the essay at all. The original first draft was a mess of words. I had so little material and a whole

essay to write. I had to figure out exactly how to format it and how to stretch it out in a way

where it would fit the word count. I had looked at the student examples that were posted and I

began to actually write my essay. For the most part, I followed the format that was used in all of

the student examples except one where it had the titles underlined. For my second draft, I had a

good word count but my formatting was still iffy. My support teacher had to point out the

imperfections in my writing and tell me exactly where to put a certain section of my writing.

With that, I was finally done with my essay. I felt disappointed. This trend of disappointment

would be the same with all the other essays that I wrote. I felt that I had done the bare minimum

and that my writing wasn’t truly me.

During this essay, I took for granted the amount of time that was given to me. I did not

realize how packed the semester was going to get until the second essay. I truly regretted going

with the flow instead of staying managed and concise. I was not ready for the amount of stress

that was going to be piled upon me after this first essay. If there was one thing I could change

from the past it would be the attitude I had for this semester. Sadly, it is almost impossible to

change that.

After that essay, I noticed a trend when it came to homework. All of the homework

seemed to repeat itself a lot. I understood that was because the professor wanted us to get a

deeper understanding of the format. I already knew how scientific journals are structured though

because I had to read them heavily while studying psychology. We had almost 2 weeks between

essays and seemed like the calm before the storm. Except this storm seemed very anti-climatic.

When I first heard the prompt I got shook by the amount of sources that we had to find before the
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essay even started. Sources have always been something that has troubled me when it came to

any sort of project. Luckily with this paper, I had chosen an easy subject to write about which

was animal conservation. You would be surprised by how much information there is out there on

that subject alone. I quickly stopped worrying when I found six sources in 30 minutes. In no time

I had found all of the sources that I needed for that essay. I had forgotten one last crucial step

though. I forgot to read what some of the sources were about. Regardless of this, I decided to

power through and write my bibliography. That bibliography was excruciating to write. It took

my full willpower and strength to muster up the energy to read and write about all of my sources.

The reading was quite interesting. There was so much that went into animal conservation that I

truly never thought of. When it comes to animal conservation I usually thought of scientists

adopting animals that needed help to survive. They did just that and more. The articles on animal

abuse were also very interesting and heavily inspired my last essay. The way the article described

how farm animals were being treated while being processed truly upset me. After reading and

finalizing my thoughts I finally began to write the essay. Like the first essay, I had trouble with

the format. I also did not get the concept of simply just describing the articles. We had already

described the articles in the annotated bibliography so why describe them now instead of writing

about my thoughts? Regardless of this, I began to write. I looked heavily into my annotated

bibliography and tried to find a way to incorporate each source into three categories. After that, I

tried to make the flow well with each other in a way where it would complement all the

information that was being presented. I decided to first write about the animal conservation part

of helping animals. This is a side of conservation that is well known to the public due to its wide

publicity in commercials and media. This side of animal conservation was really easy to write

about when it came to the overall methods that were being used. The data though was quite
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confusing to read. I then further moved on to the animals that seem to get less attention from the

general public. These are the animals that we depend on for food and nutrients. Farm animals are

the forgotten group that seems to never get any good recognition when it came to animal

conservation. While yes, some of these animals were raised to slaughter, there is always a better

alternative. Factory farming and animal abuse is not a great solution when it comes to feeding

the population A big inspiration for my point of view was the documentary Food Inc. Although

the documentary was outdated by today's standards it still pointed me in the right direction. With

this essay and the inspiration I got from that documentary I was able to have a smooth transition

into the third essay.

After finishing the second essay I was extremely relieved. I truly thought that somehow I

wouldn't be able to cut it at all. I had not used many of the sources that were included in my

bibliography and I felt that I still had more to say. What was done was done though and I was

ready for whatever would hit me after. Once more the prompt was being explained but this time I

had a better understanding of what I had to do. There was a big week of library days though so I

had time to work on my essay. I already knew exactly what I wanted to talk about.

For the third essay, I felt ready almost too ready even. If you don’t know this just from

reading my writing, I tend to not have the best thoughts when it comes to big organizations. Big

companies like Nestle and Amazon are at the pinnacle of greed. I believe that these organizations

get away with a lot of shady stuff which is why for this essay I question the true motives of

companies. I did not name specific companies because I wanted the readers to find their own

evidence and come up with their own points of view. I want the reader to question the norm of

their society and be more conscious of the way they contribute to everything. With this sort of

mindset, I began to find sources. It was very hard to find sources that were against GMOs. Most
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of the sources that I found were about how GMOs were not actually harmful. Luckily I was able

to find some articles that would support my point. Then I found articles focusing on livestock. I

was able to use a couple of sources from my other essay and I found some other journals on

factory farms. One journal, in particular, showed me how some articles don’t point out the

obvious. This article talked about how big factory farms are working on new technology to

detect fecal contamination. The title of the article seemed quite scientific. But then you realize

for what reason would there be a need for new technology to detect fecal matter. The fact that

there is no guarantee that the poultry we eat does not have some sort of waste on it was

infuriating to me. Instead of solving the problem of over housing livestock, they fund ways to

piece together a solution so they can keep on doing what they do. Instead of strategizing and

finding ways to properly house animals, big companies see it as a major profit loss. Livestock

need lots of land in order to live properly but that is the cost that we must take in order to provide

sustainable food for the millions. When I sat down and thought about how they treated the

animals I realized that they are not the only ones who fall victim to big companies. I then

researched how many workers were treated working in slaughterhouses. What I found was just

horrible. It was an article on how horribly a certain company treated immigrants. This one hit

close to home for me. These were people speaking my own language and that was just trying to

make a living in the united states. These were immigrants who came to the US in order to better

the lives of themselves and their families. I greatly related to this because my father is also an

immigrant from Mexico. These individuals were treated horribly in their jobs and were seen

merely as machines. They talked about how their lives mattered less than profits and how they

were mistreated while working at that said slaughterhouse. This was the world I was trying to

expose while writing this. A world that is never seen when you are shopping and is something
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that happens everywhere around the world. In order to provide ourselves with cheap goods we

must walk on the backs of those who are not as fortunate. After reading these articles it was clear

that I wanted to show this reality and send a message.

After the essay immediately began with my portfolio. By the end of my third essay, I had

felt miserable. I felt that no matter how much work I put in it would never be worth anything.

This whole semester was too much for me. I wanted to convey that emotion in my portfolio.

Nothing seemed to convey this emotion at all. At first, I looked for images that would spark

some sort of depression. I would look at black and white images of nature but even that didn’t

seem enough. It was there that I remembered one of my favorite pieces of art by Alexandre

Cabanel, the fallen angel. The feeling of anger and grief is all that I felt when I looked at this

painting. Instead of natural sights, I decided to decorate my portfolio with art that would invoke

that same feeling. This semester was something else but I am glad that is all over.