Advice For Future Students

As far as the online class goes as advice for future students I would just say stay on top of the due dates. The amount of work is not overwhelming and Angie is more than helpful in making sure her students know what to do. Every Sunday when the To Do list is posted I would recommend writing all of the dates for the upcoming week in a planner or with a calendar.

Other than that, don't be afraid to email Angie and stay on top of the group work. Sometimes it's easy to let the group work go a little longer without working on it and that causes problems. Online classes can be a little imposing sometimes but the once a week meetings and the To Do lists really help.

Ethics

It seems like ethics would be something that would be easy to abide by. Apparently though it is much more difficult than that because when researching the Challenger explosion, people at NASA knew that there were problems and decided to put people's lives at stake. Again, I would assume that ethical decisions involving the lives of people would be among the easiest to follow. That assumption, however, has been disproved many times.

I was also surprised that the reports mentioned so little about the people in the disaster. In the world of major tragedy (especially those that could have been avoided) I guess it is much easier to avoid the whole idea that people were involved, at least by those who could have stopped the loss of life.

Paper vs. Web Writing

In the past I would have said writing in the paper holds more credence than writing on the Web. Now though, I feel that they are both important. I look to the Web for news and help with all sorts of problems. I will say that for long amounts of reading, writing on paper is definitely easier to read.

When transferring writing on paper to writing on the web you need to make sure you copy it exactly and provide correct documentation of the author and such. If it is your writing, I suppose it really is most important that you just copy everything correctly. If you mess something up and then post it on the web, you'll have to deal with the consequences.

Southern Politics

During my mock interview I mentioned that I am taking a class in Southern Politics. Angie said that I should write about this the next time that we had a free topic.

Southern Politics is a probe into the evolution of the politics of the south. It covers the ideas of the people of the south from roughly the revolution to present but focuses primarily on "The War" (the Civil War as it is known to other people) and the prevailing politics after it. It delves into the depths of the civil rights movement and investigates voting trends and elections throughout the south and compared to other areas of the country.

It is a very interesting class but also extremely challenging. I think that has more to do with the professor, Dr. Woodard, than the material. It's definitely worth it though; Woodard literally wrote the book on southern politics.

Lying on Your Resume

I can understand why someone would lie on their resume in desperation. It can be hard to find a job and it is extremely frustrating when a person is repeatedly turned away. However it is completely irresponsible and not exactly a smart way to get a job.

It might have been a little easier to get away with even ten years ago, before employers really started to dig into peoples' lives but like the article said, now employers really have started to figure things out.

Even small lies are inappropriate. I can understand a small mix-up on start and end dates on a job if it was a few years ago, but a resume should be updated routinely. That would prevent any date problems.

It also is completely unfair to other candidates for the job because they may be getting cheated out of a position. I'd be pretty mad if John Doe lied about having a certain degree and got the job over me when we were actually equal or I was a better candidate.

Reflection on Business Choice

Our group chose to do a real estate business for SecondLife. I really like this choice because more or less, real life ideas will play a part in the sale of SecondLife real estate. I eventually would like to get into real estate and can learn something from this project.

The start up costs are relatively cheap and have the prospect of a large turn around. As a more organized and efficient real estate management firm, the business will help both ends of the party at a profit to us. In such an inefficient and sometimes convoluted SecondLife world, ease of use will be worth much to both the buyers and the sellers.

Interview Reflection

Since I just got finished I figured I'd go ahead and reflect on the interview.

Personally, I find the SecondLife interview is much different than the in person interview. The questions and answers are about the same, but the timing effect is interesting. I felt like my answers were running long because it takes a minute to type. Also on timing, because you can think about what you are saying I felt like I was making Angie wait for an answer. In person I wouldn't want to make the interviewer wait so I might fumble an answer a bit trying to formulate ideas. Of course with proper preparation that really shouldn't happen, but it's possible.

I think the mock interview went well but I have to say I still prefer the in person interview. It all goes back to body language. I felt (for some reason) awkwardly stiff in the SL interview. Maybe it's because I was typing in full punctuation and I had the time pull every word I wanted to use out of my head. In my co-op interviews, one of the interviewers and I were more laid back. We kind of joked around through more of the interview. They ended up offering me a job, and I ended up taking it. It's just...well...different on SL.

Free Write

I don't have too much to randomly write about this week, so I'll just give a run down of what my weekend consisted of. Friday I went back home to Goose Creek to see my parents and sister. They were finishing up a new sun room on the back of the house and a rebuild of the back deck. It looks great. Saturday I went with my mom to Circuit City to look at TVs for the new room. We picked out a nice one and got a great deal on it. Of course we had to go through customer service to get the no interest financing which took about two hours to complete all the paper work because whoever runs the employees over there at Circuit City decided to schedule one woman to work the Customer Service desk in the middle of a Saturday. So after being at Circuit City for three hours or so, we finally got our brand new TV, Home Theater, and TV stand.

Being that I was in Goose Creek and a couple of old friends were in town, we tried to find something to do. I forgot that there isn't ever anything to do in Goose Creek so we failed at finding entertainment. I ended up going to bed early.

This morning I woke up, set up my parents' new speakers in the sun room and left to come back to Clemson. The drive was long, and boring. Overall it was a pretty lazy, uneventful weekend.

Cover Letters

I think that most of the information that web site provided about cover letters was pertinent. It seems that they are saying a person should be very pushy, which I can see working in the large company world. In a small company I feel like a cover letter could be a bit more relaxed. I do agree with the idea that you cannot sit back on your hands and wait for the businesses to call you, though.

I was really not away of the idea of a cover letter at all. I went through the Co-Op process here at Clemson and have had my resume checked over a few times but they never mentioned a cover letter. That might be because there was not a formal introduction needed; the companies came to Clemson and we met in a room in Hendrix. So because of my lack of knowledge of the cover letter, I will use all the information as best as possible.

Second Life Interviews

I think that an interview in Second Life can only be considered apt in very specific situations. As a very brief introductory interview aimed at weeding out people who are purely bad for the position a SL interview would be applicable. It could also be appealing to a person looking for a position that is online, where no actual face to face interaction is needed in the job. A SL interview would be good for a tech support person because the interviewer could get an idea of how a possible employee talks and acts online.

It would be good for weeding people out because it would save time and money by not needing a possible employee to come in to the office to get an interview. If the person lived across the country an employer could get a general idea of someone's qualifications before inviting them out to be interviewed.

In the long run I think that a Second Life interview is about the same as a phone interview. It is an informal way to get a basic idea of a possible employee. I don't think it will ever reach the formality and utility of a face to face interview.

Persuasive Writing

In "Letter From Birmingham Jail" King is very persuasive by attempting to appeal to emotion. In one paragraph he speaks of the idea behind all his protest is love. He shows this in his writing by writing about all the atrocities committed by police and other white people upon black people during the Civil Rights movement. Even though it is a written letter, the reader can sense the emotion behind it. King is obviously angered by the events but does not come off in his letter as accusatory or venomous.

Being that I am a political science major I chose to look at the campaign website of Barack Obama, particularly his stance on the economy. Most of the writing on the site is not so much supported by emotion as it is fact and promise. His economic policy is mostly proposed compromises such as instating better health care and supporting small business. The web site as a whole is very different in ways of persuasion than "Letter From Birmingham Jail" because it lacks emotion. It is intended to inform and persuade a person to vote for Obama because of his stance on certain issues, not because he is emotionally and dramatically calling for change. I will note that Obama can certainly insight some emotion in people through his speeches as he is an excellent orator.

Week 3 Blog

I have quite a few goals for ten years down the road. Between now and then I would like to finish my Political Science degree here at Clemson and then move on to law school at either UGA or the Charleston School of Law (though I'm still looking for all my options). While at law school I would like to study either corporate or real estate law. Assuming I finish here at Clemson in some sort of a timely manner and don't screw around at law school too much I should finish well within 10 years from now.

After graduating I would like to live in a place like Davidson, NC and work on a law practice but that is not exactly practical right out of law school. More likely, I'll end up going where ever I can find a job which will depend on what type of law I am doing. Hopefully I'll find a job in the south because I don't care when, 10 years or 50 years from now, I refuse to leave the south.

After finding a job and settling down somewhere, I will probably find myself getting married to some girl and possibly thinking about children. That's all way too involved for me right now though, so that's all I can say about that. I'd rather say that I'll probably have a family and live comfortably in a house on a lake with a boat. And also a dog.

So all in all, in 10 years I'd like to see myself settling down with a nice lawyering job, making a fair amount of money, successful, happy, with a boat and a dog (and possibly wife and kids).

Week 2 Blog

Now, I'd like you to respond. What do you think the title of the video means? How does Web 2.0 affect someone who is ready to enter the workforce? How does it affect people who are already in the workforce? What do you think it means when it says that we will have to rethink everything?

The title of the video, The Machine is Us/ing Us, is interesting because it suggests that we and computers are becoming inseparable. Talking to my parents, I have heard them describe computers when they were in college, when they used punch cards. Information was highly restricted and hard to use. Now, I believe you would be hard pressed to find an office or home without a single computer. Web 2.0 itself affects those entering the workforce because information is readily available. Every picture posted on the web can be found, ever link visited can be monitored. It can be both good and bad. The same idea applies with those already in the workforce. Everything is monitored and can be found so one has to be very careful when posting anything to the web. We will have to rethink everything because of these ideas. A right to privacy is becoming a blurred right at best. Is information on the internet private in any sense? Not just in a negative way though, rethinking will have to be done in the ways people interact. A great example is the use of YouTube videos in the presidential debates. Questions posted by users have been used in the debates giving the question a more personal quality. As always, the future will be interesting.

Introduction

Hey guys, my name is Jason Stuber. This is my introduction post. I'm a junior from Goose Creek, SC. Nice to meet y'all.