Tuesday, May 5, 2009

My Web Portfolio

Finally after hours and hours of trying to figure out how to upload this website onto the internet here is the url http://community.wvu.edu/~amb068/

Reflection of Internship Experience

For the Spring 2009 semester, I was a Professional Writing and Editing Intern at the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Morgantown. At the RMHC, I was responsible for editing and re-designing the Volunteer Handbook and Donor Program Flier. I used Microsoft Word Track Changes to edit the Handbook and Adobe InDesign to re-design the Handbook. For the fliers, I used Adobe InDesign, Microsoft Publisher, and Mac Pages.

While interning at the RMHC, I learned a great deal of information about how non-profit organizations are organized. Additionally, I taught myself how to use all the document creation software programs. This experience was very rewarding because I learned how to use software that will be very useful to me in the future. I can now put on my resume that I know how to use InDesign, Mac Pages, and Microsoft Publisher. Also, this can be beneficial to me in setting my self apart from other recent college graduates who are competing for the same job. Now, I have an edge on the competition because of my knowledge of document creation software.

I decided to include the Volunteer Handbook and the Donor Fliers not only because these documents fulfill the 20 page requirement but also because I put a lot of time and effort in creating the best working document. With each document, I kept the audience in mind. I wanted to make sure that the purpose was clear in each document, as well as the audience needs. In this case, the audience for the Volunteer Handbook would be the new volunteers at the RMHC and the audience for the Donor Programs fliers would be people who want to donate to the RMHC. With the revisions, I made sure that the document was appealing to the audience's eye, which in turn would make the volunteers and donors want to read the documents.In order to make the documents more visual appealing, I added color to each document as well as images. These images eliminated unnecessary white space without being irrelevant.

While I was editing and re-designing each document, I kept the purpose and the audience of the documents in mind. I learned from this professional writing and editing internship that good professional is essential in editing and re-designing documents. Additionally, I learned that when creating these documents, a professional writing has to think in terms of the audience needs and the importance of paying attention to detail and providing the best presentation of the documents. I incorporated all of these important elements into the Volunteer Handbook and Donor Program Fliers.

Monday, May 4, 2009

My Personal Statement

As long as I can remember, I have always had a love and passion for sports. Growing up, I remember watching the Pittsburgh Steelers play on Sundays with my family; playing basketball with my cousins and siblings in our backyard basketball court; and attending my cousin, Veronica’s AAU tournaments at Carlow University. In middle school, I played basketball and softball. I remember in 8th grade I was the staring pitcher for the Milliones Lady Vikings softball team. In 7th and 8th grade, I was the starting point guard for my basketball team. Upon entering high school, I never really wanted to pursue basketball or softball on a collegiate level. I played softball all 4 years of high school because I enjoyed it. I knew that attending college would be the key to my success.

The first semester of my freshman year at West Virginia University I majored in Athletic Training. I quickly found out that this major was not the best fit for me. I knew that I wanted to work in the athletic field, but I was unsure about which career path best suited me. At the time, I was unaware of the Sports Management program, so I decided to change my major to English in order to strengthen my writing, oral and communications skills.

During my sophomore year I started to work with the Sports Communications office at West Virginia University. It was at this job that I finally found my calling on a career. At the Sports Communications office, I was able to become more familiar with what goes on behind the scenes of collegiate athletics. At the office I assisted in sending out media guides, cutting and copying all newspaper articles concerning WVU athletics, generating news summaries every week on WVU sports teams, filing newspaper articles in individual player files, and fulfilling WVU fan requests for media publications. Also, I worked at football, men’s and women’s basketball games as a game day worker. As a game day worker, my responsibilities were to generate and distribute statistical packets to the media during the games.

Since I do not have a lot of experience in sports writing, I want to obtain a internship with media relations or community relations with a sports organization in Pittsburgh, PA. Additionally, following the completion of my undergraduate degree in English I am planning to enroll immediately into graduate school for Journalism and Mass Communications/Media Arts. In the future, after many years of working in the field of sports, I aspire to become an athletic director for a Division I university.