Welcome to the class blog for Fall 2017’s ENG 101-8 First Year Writing Course at Emory University!
In My White Tee: The Freshman Review enabled the freshmen of this particular course and section to publicly provide an outsider-becomes-insider account of Emory and greater Atlanta area cultures. This course helped the first-year students become actively engaged in campus life and explore Atlanta in order to become the go-to news source for their freshman class while also practicing writing and thinking skills that will be useful to them in other classes and throughout life. First-year students, from any field, interested in having regular social media activity as a key component in class activities, attending extra-curricular events, and improving rhetorical and composition skills were invited to join in the efforts of a freshman class news blog. While administrators and upperclassmen run the Dooley Report and The Emory Wheel, the students in this class created their own bridges to understanding Emory by attending events and writing reviews from their fresh perspectives. The students worked alone or in groups to create posts for the class blog (in which students summarized, critically analyzed, and reflected upon their adventures). The students learned more about their writing processes as well as how other students write and think through journaling, peer editing, and revisions. The students also had the opportunity to practice dynamic multimodal expression via blog posts beyond the essay (it’s 2017 – videos, podcasts, and social media are our friends).