English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

In the reading “Kairos and the Cover Letter” I learned how important it is to craft a cover letter that is very specific toward the employer and the specific job position. I also leaned from this reading the different styles in which a cover letter can be written. I personally feel that I would be most comfortable using the “Me Approach” in my cover letter. I will describe my skills and my eagerness for the job all using the “Me Approach”.

From the article “Resume and Cover Letter Guide: Drafting Descriptions”, I learned a number of very important things about creating a resume. Creating a resume is extremely important for college students because the ultimate goal for the majority of college students is to graduate college and get a desired job, and a well drafted resume is key in landing the perfect job.

The job I have chosen to apply for is an airline pilot job with Compass Airlines. I chose this particular job because I am majoring in professional flight and because flying is something that I love to do. There are many different types of flying jobs that professional pilots can do, but I am most interested in commercial flight. I chose this particular job with Compass Airlines because it is a wholly owned subsidiary of Northwest Airlines. Ideally it would be great to work for Compass Airlines in order to eventually move up to flying for Northwest Airlines. I also chose this particular job because with the economy currently falling on hard times airline pilot jobs are very scarce so pilots have to apply for any type of available pilot job. This particular job with Compass Airlines would teach me so much about the commercial airline industry and allow me to build additional flight hours in order to progress to larger airline companies, as well as progress from a co-pilot to a captain.

In the chapter 8 reading the structure of a document and techniques for good organization were visited. The author began by expressing the importance of determining a genre. The first step listed was to determine what you are writing; this can be accomplished by asking questions to yourself to pinpoint what you are trying to say. These questions will also help identify the audience and lead to the general order that the document should follow. An outline is a good way to begin to organize. State the main topics to be discussed.

This week's reading, Chapter 15- Starting Your Career, is a practical reading for college students. I like how the author emphasizes goal setting. I feel that a person that sets high but reasonably attainable goals is most likely to achieve them. One point that I feel like the author did not emphasize was that goals should also be measurable. By being measurable a goal can be more clearly reviewed to see if it has been obtained. The author discussed job searching and how the internet opens up a lot of opportunities, but did not leave out the importance of personal networking.

The topic discussed in Chapter 3, Readers and Contexts of Use, was the need to know your readers. The author began the section by explaining a way of profiling your readers. He suggests using the Five W and How Questions to define the readers along with using a series of guidelines that suggest what to include when writing to them. The author also incorporates some useful information on using search engines showing that with the addition of a few symbols a search can greatly be defined.