This is my reflective self-assessment of my work in helping to produce the Pick Your Brains Seminar: Dawn of The Digital.
Contribution and Collaboration:
My role for the seminar was to be in charge of inviting the guest speakers, organising cards/gifts for them, and being in constant contact with them - updating them with the theme of the seminar and answering any of their questions. I held this role with Danielle, and we decided to divide the guests between us so that we were in charge of two each.
Due to work commitments, I was unable to attend many of the group meetings on Friday mornings. I tried to compensate for this by updating my progress on our Facebook group page and the BaseCamp project page. I was in communication with Danielle most of the time, however there were a couple of miscommunications that needed to be ironed out over the course of the organisation. Initially, I suggested a few names of people who I thought might suit our seminar, however it became apparent that there were other students with stronger opinions on who would suit. It was then simply my task to invite them, and provide them with enough information to be prepared for the day. I was prompt and diligent with inviting the guests that we wanted to speak, and due to several hopeful guests being unable to attend, it became quite a hard task to follow up suggestions made by potential guests and track down other suitable speakers. During the last few weeks, I felt that the group really solidified and worked well together.
75/100
Proactive Learning:
I didn't do much beyond my assigned role of handling all that was necessary for the guests to arrive and feel ready and comfortable with the seminar situation. I was proactive with checking the Facebook group and BaseCamp regaularly for any updates and to update the group with any news from my end. I suppose I have had a little experience with arranging and organising photoshoots (inviting people, coordinating etc), so it wasn't out of my realm of comfort to invite and arrange the guests for the day. It goes towards improving communication skills.
75/100
Participation:
As I said earlier, there was a really unfortunate time clash for me on Friday's which made attending class really difficult. However, I feel that when I was there, I participated and involved myself in the discussion as best I could. I participated heavily in keeping group members up to date with news on the Facebook and BaseCamp pages, and never withheld any information. Danielle and I took a while to figure out how we would best complete our tasks together, but by the end we had come to a good situation in which we worked well together.
70/100
Connections and Intersections:
The best part about this aspect of MI2 has been that I have come to realise how often it is that industry professionals will respond to you if you simply ask. I was often hesitant to label myself as a student when talking with the professionals in my field of interest because I have had experiences in the past when I have been dismissed because I am still a student. People often associate that word was 'amateur', which I suppose is justified. But what I found when talking to the potential guests was that they were all very interested in helping me, maybe because they appreciate the need for well educated and informed media graduates to enter the work force. I received very little prejudice in response to my emails, mostly potential guests were flattered and interested that I had found them and decided that they were worthy of speaking at the seminar.
I feel that having the connection with Misha from The Conversation and Christopher from The ABC can only be beneficial to my interest in getting involved with journalism and writing. The entire experience of helping to arrange the seminar has sort of helped to crystallise what I have learnt during my years at RMIT. It was a complete experience from beginning to end, putting the collective skills of my group to use in the production of the day as well as post production. The entire experience felt very professional.
78/100
298/400 = 74% Distinction
No comments:
Post a Comment