English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

This week I helped make some final decisions regarding the audience. Last week we all came up with the best possible sources for our audience between general lawmakers to the general population. I suggested we use the American Federal Lawmakers as our audience, specifically the Secretary of Energy. The rest of the group agreed that this would be our primary audience.

On Monday of this week, I again initiated an AIM chat so we can all get together and all be on the same page in terms of what is due and when. Two of the group members weren’t able to attend but me and Adam are both in the same classes as one other group member so I suggested that we each talk to that person in our classes about what was discussed.

My week was spent researching credible internet sources as these are often the most current and able to be easily updated as things change in the energy industry. I found two websites that I decided were the best sources for what I wanted to include in the white paper. The U.S. Department of Energy website contains very credible and up to date statistics on the energy usage in the United States from year to year. It also has statistics and information regarding all nuclear power plants in the country. Another website that I chose was the website for the Energy Information Administration. In addition to credible and valuable statistics on energy usage reported by the U.S. Government the site contains easy to understand information about nuclear industries in all states, a summary of all U.S. nuclear reactors, and a list of the status of those reactors. I will use this site to introduce and explain the concept behind nuclear energy in the white paper.

This next week I will be gathering ideas for formatting the white paper and getting together with my group to decide on how we want to format it.