Summative Review

Over the course of a year, I was not only able to explore my interests but also find a new facet in the community I was never introduced to before. There were new support systems of women that only pushed me to go further and brought me into their circle for a short while. Although there were some obstacles along the way, I was able to see myself grow as a student and person. I started the project as someone just somewhat interested in politics, not knowing where it would lead me. However, as I worked on the project and explored the world of politics, first in the media, and then dove deep into the community, I found it to be a passion. I had no idea if politics was an area I wanted to pursue, but after talking to all of the women through emails and interviews, I saw a spark in every one of them. They had a goal and path for their community, a desire to make a difference, which in turn put a spark in my project. With the many challenges that came with the project, I was only able to grow and find new skills or enhance the ones I had. When I struggled getting responses to emails or questions, I was only pushed to reach out to more women. I had to look into a new community, research, and go past any boundaries I had set previously. I learned new ways to contact and gained a new sense of confidence whenever a new situation arose. After finding many new obstacles with combining all of my information, especially after the interviews, it seemed easier to just give up. Instead, I found other ways to complete my goal, even if they seemed somewhat unconventional. After the whole project, I learned many new pieces of information, but the most important aspects were widening my own interests and finding a new determination as I faced difficulties. After looking back at the project as a whole, I wish I did more interviews and community work when the elections were still in progress. I didn’t have a set idea of what I wanted to do until after the voting happened, so there wasn’t much I could be involved with in the community. I could talk about what the candidates learned from their campaigns, but I couldn’t experience it first hand, which could have been extremely helpful. 

The whole new experience of taking a capstone course was a challenge in and of itself. I’ve never done a self-guided class, and had no idea how it would turn out in the end. I’m someone that thrives on structure and knowing exactly what is happening at each moment. By taking the course, I not only challenged myself academically, but also as a person and expanded my comfort zones. I went into that area of unknown and went with the information I had to take me to the final project. Also, I’ve only had a few experiences where I had to reach out to someone in the community, all of them with the support of a family member or friend. When I had to do the same thing for my project, but by myself, I was questioning my every move and tried to postpone any meetings for as long as possible. After the first few, I realized that these women really just wanted to help, and weren’t intimidating at all. As a result, I was again able to leave my comfort zone of staying in my own bubble and made great strides on my project. Afte I started creating the final project, I ran into many problems, especially related to time, that made me constantly doubt that the project would ever be finished. I had too much to do and correct in not enough time. In the end, it all came together, but there were times where I had no idea how I would present a final idea. After extra time was put into the project, I realized that everything just needs to be planned out before I started, so it wouldn’t seem so overwhelming. 

In the beginning of the year, I wanted to focus on how women politicians were represented in the media compared to men. After a long amount of research and a few interviews, I realized that a large problem in our community is that a lot of women didn’t know how to get started, even if they had a passion. It was only until later that they got involved and wanted to actively make a difference. Similarly to me, there are many young women who also want the same thing: to make a difference, but have to know where to look or don’t have access to many resources. With some help from women within the community, I was able to change my topic to focus on making a collective site with all the needed information available. I took what the women I interviewed said they wished they had when they started, what advice they would give currently, and any experiences they found valuable or challenging. From there, I sorted the information to fit with the research I did on the project and combined what I believe would be most helpful. When talking to Juanita Perez Williams, I found that she was also working on fixing the same last bit of information in a different county, with an educational program directed towards young girls in high school. I felt it was important to know that other actions like my project are happening in other areas as well.