In reading the self-assessment packet, I was expecting to have to type a letter where I do what I do best. That being, tearing myself down so bad that nobody is better at it than me. I was thinking that this was going to be yet another brief paper on how mediocre my work is. However, I was intrigued that there was more here than giving myself a letter grade. And to start off, I like that idea. So, let me introduce myself. My name is Ethan Gunther, I am a freshman and to be honest, the above might be one of the best descriptions of me. But let me elaborate some more. Yes, we got that I am hard on myself and that Ethan Gunther is the arch nemesis of Ethan Gunther. But what else am I? I’d say I’m a hard worker, none of my work is considered done, especially when it is my creative work. This is because my vision is set to see the flaws in everything I do. So yes, I’m my worst enemy, but for strategic reasons. If I want to be the best I can, I need to be hard on myself like that. As for how my personality is displayed in my work, I can again say read the above again. It’s pretty hard for me to be formal in my writing. If it’s about my thoughts, how can I express them in a way they’re not? I don’t like to write formally because to me that’s boring. Personally, I think that all formal writing sounds the same. With all its functions and guidelines, there’s no room for personality in the end. So if I’m writing about me, I’m going to put my personality in the paper like it’s riding first class.

I mentioned one of my great skills before, my self critically tuned eyes. But there is more to me. My great sense of creativity is probably the thing I would like to be known for. I use this skill pretty much every day. From working on my personal artwork, to planning out how to respond to rejection. In addition to my creativity, there is also my work ethic. I am one of the hardest working people I know. I can never be satisfied with what I do, until it is exactly what it was in my mind. Another one of my signature skills is over thinking things to the highest degree, to be prepared for any possible outcome of a decision I make. Nobody likes bad surprises, so I make sure I’m prepared to encounter one. During my time in class, I had the great opportunity to work on some of my skills. During our Peer Interview and Field Observation assignments, I strengthened my detail-oriented mindset. Those two assignments rally helped my to better analyze people and places.

Looking back on the work I have done; I of course cannot say I am satisfied. I know I could have put in more effort. If I am comparing this assignment to others, I have probably put in the most effort here, as this personal and has been most intriguing for me. If I thought back to the work, I did last semester, I could say I’ve improved. I had learned to put more of myself into what I am writing and now I have gotten pretty good at it. I think I have definitely challenged myself to write more formally. In addition to not finding it an attractive writing style, I know it is important. And to be honest, I find it difficult to write like that. This is probably because I don’t usually talk and think like that. Some of the challenges I have encountered so far was fine tuning my writing voice. I know I mentioned above that I don’t like to write formally, but there is a balance that I like to meet where I write personally, but I also remain articulate and particular about my choice of words. Another challenge I had to overcome in my writing was to be comfortable picking topics that I am interested in that are considered controversial, like my research proposal. Apart from that, the only other thing that challenges me while writing is having to finish a paper for school on a topic I might not necessarily like. To wrap things up, this was definitely one of the assignments I’ve enjoyed the most for class this semester.

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