Thursday, April 24, 2008

Cooperation is key

Hi, this is Sandy - for the CAC students, I'm Jerry's counterpart, I teach ENG 303 - and I want to step in and underline the importance of making this a cooperative project. It sounds like everyone is busy, and that's understandable, but my primary concern is to make sure that everyone - ENG and CAC students - are working in the same direction.

I think it's fine if the groups (ENG and CAC) want to work at different paces and fine if you can't work out times to meet together in person. Indeed, it sounds like the CAC students want to move more quickly; this is fine, but it is very important that you coordinate to make sure that what you work on serves both groups. Please clarify with each other that the CAC multimedia work is in line with what the ENG students are working on. I think what you've achieved so far is impressive and the project will be very successful. It sounds like the CAC students will provide video and images, so the primary task is coordinating and making sure that the particular video/images are what is needed for the project. Hope this makes sense and please email/contact me if you need clarification.

Sandy

To clarify

First off, I want to apologize if my last post seemed hostile or disrespectful, for I was not intending to sound like that at all. (But after a later read I realized it may have come off that way.) Also, to clear up, when I said "we" in my previous post, I was referring to Liz, our professor, and myself. And, to be honest, I was rather bothered by the fact that in Rachel's comment back, she said that your whole group doesn't think we contribute ideas, when we have posted our ideas on this blog (like we were supposed to) when barely anyone else did. It's obviously just a distance and time conflict, so I don't see why we should be getting hostile towards each other. Things just aren't working out, but its none of our faults.

Anyways, I feel it best to just work on our own (like it seems we are doing now, anyways) and spend our time working, instead of trying to keep up with each other and figuring out when to meet, who does what, etc. There's just too much going against us and we need to just focus on our work.

I would like to thank your group for the help and work we had done thus far, and wish you luck on the rest of your project.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Ok, so here's what's going on.

Liz and I have decided to work at our own pace, on what we originally discussed (doing photos and videos of events such as an execution). Our teacher told us to just work on it because he likes our ideas and thinks we can produce something interesting. We'd appreciate you guys helping, but to be honest, our group has been moving at such a slow pace that we're worried that we won't finish on time. We're currently working on a map of Iraq/Morgantown, and from there we are using iconic buildings in Morgantown (such as the CAC, Mountain Lair, etc.) and writing events that occur in those locales. We are then taking video and photographs of said events to post on the final website (using our original map as the navigational tool).

Like said, any help would be greatly appreciated. Feel free to post ideas on here. And we plan on working on this some this weekend, so don't hesitate to call us and come help out.

My number is (304)216-0499.
Liz's number is (928)221-7045.

:D

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Link

Here is the link to the Realtime Amsterdam website that Amy was talking about at the meeting yesterday:

http://realtime.waag.org/

Monday, April 14, 2008

Second meeting and other ideas

Can everyone meet like we did last week? Library at 1 p.m.

I had a couple of ideas for the map and also for the documentation portion of the final project.

The five of us in the 303 class can each pick one of the events from the map like Baldwin suggested in class on Tuesday. For each event, the person will write personal accounts, etc. like he said. I was interested in picking the library looting event. I think Kristen expressed interest in the truck bombing event on 705. I was also thinking that along with the map that we work on, we could use various photos we have and photoshop them to complement the personal accounts and reports.

The other idea I had for the documentation was pretending that the Wise library had been looted of valuable Appalachian resources, and we could either hold a sign protesting the authorities' lack of action or ask students to sign a petition as they go in the library. (This is meant to parallel the looting of valuable ancient manuscripts that took place at the International library in Baghdad.) Someone could videotape and take pictures while we do this. I figure this would be easy enough and would only take as long as we need on video.

What do you guys think? Do you have other documentation ideas?

Friday, April 4, 2008

First Meeting

Can everyone meet on Tuesday at 1 p.m. I think the CAC students only have about 30 minutes at this time, but that should be enough time to start planning and to get everyone on the same page. Maybe we can meet on Evansdale to give John and Liz more time?