Week 6 Update

July 14, 2023

Three accomplishments:

1. I finished my first QGIS map to use for my final paper. It maps the locations of all the letters from CWRGM that I use, and I geocoded them myself. 

2. I finalized the secondary sources I'll be using in my paper's literature review/historiography section. Thankfully, I only have to work with five books.

3. I got to meet Cash Money Honey, the campus therapy dog, and eat a homecooked brunch and bagels courtesy of Maeve. 

Three obstacles to completion of my best work:

1. I spent most of the week dehydrated because the taste of the water here prevents me from happily drinking the suggested 64 ounces of water a day. 

2. I'm learning that multi-tasking isn't a skill I am good at, and that that might be okay. I tend to work better when I focus on one task at a time. I also tend to work better when I am not surrounded by cool people I want to talk to all the time. This week I did a lot of task switching and chatting. Next week I plan on working in my carrel more to prevent myself from getting too distracted or sidetracked. 

3. A work-life balance is hard to maintain when you hold yourself to tight standards. I need to remind myself to ride the wave.

Three things I've learned:

1. I learned how to refine a research poster's format and content. 

2. Scholars like Dr. Johnson, who spoke to us on Monday, are looking further into 19th-century Black female writers! And, the person she is focusing on, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, has a Pennsylvania connection and a connection to my tentative senior thesis! 

3. Literature can be used in history theses if the works and their writers are studied with historical lenses rather than as creators and their creations. 

Bonus: ArcGIS StoryMaps take a long time to make well!