I Never Thought I'd Have to Use One of These Again...

What is your prospective major?

I plan on majoring in Chemistry – Biochemistry at San Diego State University. After graduating, I plan on going to medical school in the Philippines.

Have you ever used the terms “claims” and “evidence” in a class?  If so, what was the class and how did you use them?

There was heavy use of the terms “claims” and “evidence” in my 12^th grade English class. The class was taught by a former SDSU professor, Tim McNamara. He taught RWS 100 and 200, as well as a few other English courses. I got along with him quite well during my four years at my former high school.

That’s beside the point. Mr. McNamara would give us readings with a certain amount of difficulty and cynical humor. He would ask us to identify claims made by the writer and the evidence used to prove his claim.

These kinds of assignments were given to us at least twice a week.

What writing activities do you enjoy outside of school (blogging, tweeting, journaling, etc.)?  What do you write about and how often do you do it? How do you feel about yourself as a writer? 

I don’t write often outside of school. There may have been a small journal (or two) that I would write in for a day or two and completely forget about. I don’t feel confident in my writing, but I’m not ashamed of it either. My high school writing was shoddy at best; but I feel like that improved once 12^th grade rolled around. I’ve been able to produce rather “interesting” pieces of work; akin to the works of David Foster Wallace.

Should my [written] opinions offend anyone, it wouldn’t be an issue for me if I were to not write in my current style; though it would be hard for me to do so. Of course, in the case of lab reports and other “non-expressive pieces of writing”, I wouldn’t use my particular writing style; I would just go by the book on how to write such pieces