An assignment to be proud of:

A research paper, for me at least, has always been prompted within certain guidelines. Recently, in my English 201 class, this mundane approach teachers have on the normal research project was changed. Our prompt was to engage a topic in public discourse in an interesting and effective way by any means necessary.

I meet with my cohort to go over possible ideas and after a couple of minutes sitting and joking, due to our bewilderment over the freedom that was given, we began throwing idea after idea onto the table. However, this swell and range of possible topics brought us to our first problem. We needed to boil down our collected ideas and come to a common ground on one issue, a task not as easy as it sounds. Luckily, toward the end of our meeting, one idea stuck. Recently, teachers have been reluctant to teach the kids of illegal immigrants. Being the son of a Hispanic mother, who is a Spanish translator and frequently involved in the Latino community, this issue struck home. Teachers who are unwilling to teach certain kids is something many people are unaware of and a perfect opportunity for our group to research and inform the public on an important and concerning issue.

Once we had a topic that we all were interested in the next problem arose. Since we have freedom to present this research paper however we want, my group and I needed to decide how to reach the most people. A popular forum for reaching the masses is the Internet, however, our inexperience in website construction and because youtube wouldn’t exactly attract a proactive audience, the possibility was shut down. The answer to this problem came at the best possible time, during a slow and painful defeat in Monday Night Football. Annie, a member of my cohort, called and told me how she had a phone conversation with our teacher and presented the idea of a radio show. This would allow us to interview people and their thoughts on this issue. With a little bit of luck and hard work we plan on getting a spot on a university sponsored radio show, reaching anyone listening and whoever they talk to about it.

Due to the limitless opportunities our class was provided with, my cohort and I are on the fringe of a research paper that will test a lot more than just our ability to follow instructions. Our goal will not be easy to meet, to say the least, but the rewards for succeeding will mean more than a grade ever could.