This profile assignment was our last article for the Intro to Journalism class with Professor Miller, and I have learned a lot especially looking back on the beginning of my journalism experience. I have become more confident in my journalistic writing skills, while I still have a lot to learn about it. I can definitely see improvement from the beginning to now. Comparing my workshops from my first feature creature draft to my last profile draft, there were less edits that people were making because I had figured out how to correctly quote people, make a nut graph, and the structure of an article. This project had me reaching out to upperclassmen who I never would have even tried to talk to before, and that helped me get out of my comfort zone and even make connections that could be helpful in the future. As a writer with this project, I had to understand that I had to highlight Professor Siegel’s strengths and how his students view him. As an editor on other peoples profiles it helped me understand things that I could be doing by comparing my profile to theirs. For example, looking at Sydney’s profile helped me realize that my quotes should be more in depth and I do not need to elaborate after every quote and to let them speak for themselves. One of my biggest struggles with this assignment was trying to figure out times to schedule interviews with people, especially Professor Siegel towards the end of the semester, and unfortunately I was not able to. That was definitely the biggest fault of this assignment was not getting quotes from Siegel himself, and he was unfortunately not willing to do it over email either which I struggled with. Overall, this assignment was a struggle but it made me a better writer because even if you can’t get everything you need for an article there is still a way you can make it work and end up with a solid piece of writing.
