Theory of Writing Essay
Muhammad Hussain
Writing for Engineering
City College of New York
Julianne Davidow
5/22/24
Throughout my life, I had always hated writing, seeing it as busy work that I had no choice but to do. From childhood, I was always capable of writing well enough to get good grades in all of my English classes, though I had always found it to be exhausting, and boring. I had never understood the significance of writing and had always tried to avoid doing any kind of writing activity whenever I could, as I always believed that it would be far easier to physically give or show the argument you want to make to others through conversations, presentations, or infographics. But as I developed, I understood that while expressing or demonstrating is a good way to communicate, expressing or demonstrating is only in the moment, but writing can last forever. However, even after coming to this realization, I still found writing to be tiresome, especially as, even though I knew now that writing was important, I still never found it very important to me. This was also heightened by the fact that most of the topics I wrote about were on subjects I didn’t find particularly interesting. However, a particular class quickly caused my view on writing to change. And because of that specific class, writing became something that was no longer just a difficult task, but something much more.
Throughout all of high school, I hated writing, most of my assignments seemed like nothing more than busy work, put in place to make sure that we students were able to read and write on an “acceptable level”. Most of the topics we were made to write about had no meaning to us, for instance, one of my high school papers was about the Electoral College, something which I did not, and still do not care about. This all had dampened my writing capabilities, as I had put virtually no effort into such essays. This all changed when I got to college. Writing, which so far had seemed more like a chore than a luxury, and as a prospective Mechanical Engineer, I had pretty much written off writing as something unimportant for my career. But that had all changed and writing became something that I could enjoy for the first time, in a certain class. This class, my previous English class, FIQWS 10008/FIQWS 10108, had given me several assignments, which for the first time in an English class, I enjoyed. Because of this, I had started to see writing as something more than a chore, as something which could be enjoyable to do. This class, Writing for Engineering, furthered that for me, and further showed me that within writing, possibilities are limitless. Within this class, we accomplished three big assignments, the Technical Description, the Position Paper, and the Technical Innovation. Each project was enjoyable in its own way, and that was on topics, that for the most part gave us some creative freedom, and were important to our very own lives. By the end of the project, I was able to accomplish three things: enhance strategies for reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment, develop and engage in the collaborative and social aspects of writing processes, and finally practice using various library resources, online databases, and the Internet to locate sources appropriate to your writing projects. These three course objectives were achieved through weeks of trial and error, and a lot of effort.
Our first major assignment in this class was a Technical Description. I had never made a Technical Description before this, and I was somewhat excited to do it. I wanted to see what I could learn from the project and get hindsight into what it is that I would be doing as an engineer. How I would describe the machinery that I invent or modify in descriptions such like the one I did. I did my technical description on the Computer Keyboard and thus, had to learn the functions and components of a keyboard. I was able to do research I had never done and never found interesting to do in my past. Some parts of the research were strenuous, as it was difficult to find information about all of the working parts of a keyboard. While some websites would tell me about the basic components of the Keyboard such as the PCB or the Case for the keyboard, they would not provide much information about the ins and outs of keyboards, such as the different kinds of materials used for keycaps or the certain kinds of switches used in the keyboard. After undergoing excessive research in the online databases and in different websites, I was eventually able to find all of the necessary information. Thus, while in my draft, I kept most of the information about the difference in keyboards to a minimum and mostly had information about the history of the keyboard. But, in my final draft, I was able to give more detailed information, including information about the different sizes of keyboards, and the different foams used in the keyboard, used for a more enjoyable typing experience. For instance, in my Technical Description, I said “Keyboards come in various shapes depending upon the materials used to build it, and size or percent, whether it is a 100%, 96%, 80%, 75%, 65%, or 60% keyboard.” Before this assignment, I did not know that keyboards came in so many sizes, as I was only used to 100% keyboards, which come with a number pad on the side, and 75% keyboards, which look exactly like 100% keyboards, but without the number pad on the side. The excessive research and use of online databases taught me how to perform similar research for other papers, this is especially helpful to me in the Mechanical Engineering field where I would spend a good amount of my time looking for information, to help me in any project that I would be working on. Thus, I was able to gain certain hindsight in writing and how to make my writing better through this assignment.
Our second assignment, the Position Paper, was much more similar to what I was used to from High School, as most of my essays from High School were either Position Papers or Personal Narratives. Though this paper, unlike my essays from High School, I actually enjoyed. I had a good bit of leeway with this paper and was mostly able to create my own topic for the essay, the only restrictions being that it had to be about sustainability and had to apply to New York. I had written about how Nuclear energy is better for the environment, and how New York should pivot towards using Nuclear Energy. This is a topic I have always wondered about, as I had always known Nuclear was better for the environment, and never understood why we never geared towards Nuclear Energy. The research I had done provided me with a good understanding of why Nuclear Energy wasn’t as widespread as it should be, this is because many people have safety concerns with Nuclear Power Plants, and as I had written in my paper, “Although safety concerns about nuclear power are often brought up as a counterargument, they are frequently exaggerated and misinterpreted”. Through this assignment, where I had to do the process of reading, drafting, revising, editing, and self-assessment, I was able to better my writing and research capabilities.
The last project we did, the Technical Innovation proposal, was our most strenuous and complicated. We had to use the limited knowledge we had in our fields of study, and use it to “build an invention”, figure out the mechanics of it, and make up educated expenses for it. Fortunately, we were able to have group members who specialized in the same field, and in my case group members that were able to each help out with the proposal in their own way. We did a proposal on a better version of a railway barrier, compared to the one used currently in NY subway systems, which was the Platform Screen Door (PSD). Researching each component of the PSD and finding costs/materials was difficult and time-consuming. However, the end project was spectacular. Our proposal was well thought out, and descriptive; and I am very proud of it. Creating the proposal, while it was time-consuming and difficult, was amazing, and was my first true look into the kind of work I would be doing in my field. While I am not an individual who is accustomed to working in groups and has always preferred working alone, I am grateful for my group members. In our assignment, my group member, Steven, was very good at getting all of us into our own jobs for the assignment and was great when giving out ideas for each of our parts of the work. He was wonderful as a group leader and peer. Thus, more than writing, this project taught me group work and helped me to appreciate the work and effort my group members put into our work.
What is writing? A year ago, if you had asked me this same question, I would have said that writing is using words to have some sort of an impact. If you were to ask what that impact was, I wouldn’t have been able to give you an answer. But now I can state with confidence that writing is language that has the power to influence learning and inspire creativity in any field. It can be used to entertain, it also can be used to explain ideas to others that someone might find difficult to grasp on their own. In the technical description, I learned that each machine, regardless of how small, is composed of several parts that each have a function. In the Position Paper, I learned that research is mandatory to solve any kind of question you may have. Finally, in the proposal, I learned that with adequate group effort, an amazing end result is possible. Furthermore, I learned to make time and put in effort to collaborate with my peers to make this result happen. Writing has helped me realize that I do want a career in the Mechanical Engineering field and that I hope to be able to inspire and help others to comprehend that which others may not understand themselves.
