Dear Future Engl 210 students,
This course will allow you to achieve several learning outcomes. I, for one, found myself achieving almost all, if not all of the outcomes and gaining a much better understanding of what writing means to an engineer. Right now you may not have a complete understanding of the rhetorical elements. I know I didn’t. The fact is that it’s a lot more important than you think. For example, the Audience. You have to appeal to the audience you are aiming your writing toward, and that’s one thing that I didn’t think too much about in the past. Your audience can depict a lot in your writing. My perception has changed in regard to how much I consider my audience, purpose, media, etc. In my memo assignment, my purpose was to improve online resources such as cuny first and blackboard. As a result, I made sure to not only express the problem but also a possible solution. I also knew my audience had the tools to put the solution into play. Learning to understand and think about the rhetorical elements while writing made me a better writer than I was prior to taking this class. Rhetorical elements are important because they all affect how you are writing. If you change one rhetorical element, it can have an effect on the other rhetorical elements. For instance, If you’re creating a PowerPoint, you might not go into as much detail and include as much information as you would in a research paper or lab report. After gaining more knowledge of each of the rhetorical elements in this course, you too will become a greater writer.
Bryan Ramos
City College of New York