There is always that one teacher that expects you to do a huge group project during the semester. And in said group, there’s always one person you have to pick up the slack for. Let’s just say I don’t jump up and down with excitement when I am handed a group project. However, this semester I have the convenience of living with someone that is in the same class as me that we have this big project. There’s always that moment when you look around the room as soon as the teacher says, “you’ll get to pick 2 people to work with on this project.” It’s the look that says, “wanna be my partner?” And thats the deal. There’s no hand shake, just a look. My roommate and I had that look as soon as our professor handed out the assignments. We knew we would work really well together because she is very technical and I am very creative. It would be a perfect match for this project. Then the professor said we needed one more person in our group. So we found a third wheel.
As the project progressed, we found ourselves working on the project a lot more than the third person. However, we ended up having a lot of fun with the project. The goal was to create a grant proposal as a group. We have to write the proposal, give a pitch to the “funding company” and figure out all the details of our proposed idea. To put it simply, it’s been a lot of trial and error. Through our readings for class and workshopping our proposal piece by piece in class, we were able to piece together a professional looking grant proposal. Now comes the time to present our ideas.
We decided to use the online resource, Prezi to create our presentation. Our professor requested animation and special effects to be in our presentation. To do this we had to raise the stakes using the technology available. Prezi may be the coolest thing I have ever used to make slide shows. The features on it are absolutely fantastic and really make your presentation top-notch. I took care of the creativity in the presentation and my roommate took care of the technical revisions in the actual proposal and I think we have pulled together a pretty awesome project! I am really excited to present it next week and my hope is that we will succeed in getting the fictional $3,000 grant (because that means we receive an even better grade!)
This inventive project has been a great opportunity to use the skills we read about in a hands on environment and I feel completely comfortable using this skill set now that I have had the experience actually putting a grant together. Part of the liberal arts experience is not only to explore different areas of study, but also to perfect all the skills you learn in classes in a way that helps you feel comfortable using them in a professional setting. If I ever end up working for a nonprofit organization, I feel like I have all the tools necessary in my tool belt.
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