Tag: music

Projects: Goals for 2013

After a moderate amount of thought about the word resolution, I’ve decided that I prefer the term goal to talk about what I want to accomplish here. I think that’s more appropriate for me because it’s action oriented and not necessarily dependent on a new year beginning. I’ll be posting a short series on what my new goals are and how I’m going to implement them. This post is about some projects that I’ve been thinking of and what I want to finish.

Work related:

I’ve had some ideas kicking around about some potential research and assessment projects. I want to do some research around patriarchal masculinity and helping people make meaning of how to change their view on masculinity to be less violent, aggressive, and controlling and how to challenge that in their everyday lives. It’s really about redefining feminism for a lot of people because the definition has been hijacked by conservative media that talk about how radical the movement is. (It has also hijacked radical to be a bad thing when in actually it means to get to the root of something or a departure from tradition; progressive).

I also want to do some work around what meaning students take away from going to a cultural competence or social justice workshop. How much does a student learn and what do participants take away from their experience? I want to explore what makes the session more effective for students. Can the students identify the issues in their real life after the program? How does the information stick and what have they retained after about a month?

As a part of my resident director position, I create a community development plan that I’d like to development an assessment method to go along with it so I can measure how effectively my plan is being implemented. The focal points for my plan should be measurable so I’m going to incorporate an assessment tool in my RAs programming so that it’s easy for them to collect assessment data from their programming. Part of that will be creating new posters based on my community development plan so that the residents are aware of what we’re working toward.

Co-Curricular:

I’ve continued to be interested in web design and projects since my bachelors degree in Information Technology and part of that has been just reading some articles on the web about design. But I want to do more. I recently talked to a friend about creating a portfolio site for him which I’m way behind on. So I’ll be getting more going on that project soon. Another piece of that I’d like to do is work to brand that design as a freelance company type of thing that I could do other projects with. Which would mean creating a design for that page too!

I’ve always been enthusiastic about music and I’d like to get back to being more active with that. I’ve got some old songs that I’ve written that I’d like to re-record and refresh. I also have been playing with new apps on my iPad (mostly from Korg – the new iPolysix app is great! I know I need to explore audiobus too which lets you link up different apps.) so I want to explore more electronic music textures and ideas too.

One of the perks of my job is getting tuition remission and I’d like to use that to explore either design or music technology/production to learn more about some of these interests. Eventually I want to explore doctorate programs that I’ll start in the next couple of years. The problem is in what? Higher ed? Social Justice Education?

That’s what I’ve got on the to-do list for 2013. What do you have left undone from last year that you’re finally going to work on?

The Resolution Game

It’s 2011. This is going to be an very interesting year for me as I will graduate with my M.Ed. in Higher Education Administration and find a full time job. Given the circumstances, I think my resolutions could simply include making sure I graduate and find a job. But I like to challenge myself a little bit. 🙂

  1. Read more – Over break I finished up a book I’d been reading for a couple of months, breezed through another in a day, and then read two of the books that I got for Christmas. There was something about it that was refreshing. I really enjoyed curling up on a couch with the book and losing myself in another world while surrounded by silence. That relaxation is something I want to continue through the year. (you can see all of these in the GoodReads widget on the right of the blog)
  2. Yoga and more water – These are my obligatory health related resolutions. I’d like to do yoga because it keeps you limber but also strengthens. There is also an amount of calm and concentration associated with it that I’d like to keep going. As for the more water, it’s really about replacing the soda that I drink with water and trying to cut soda out as much as possible.
  3. Find time to be inspired by new people and things – Over the break I discovered some new people that I’m inspired by. Jean Michel Basquiat is one of them. I want to make sure that I’m allowing myself to draw inspiration from a wide variety of people. Whether it be my supervisor, my peers, my students, or scholars and artists, I want to diversify my inspiration to incorporate music, literature, art, as well as scholarship in my work.
  4. Take more photographs, write more music, write a story – This is where the diversity of my inspiration will really come into play. I love taking photographs and I want to create the time and the frame of mind to do it more. I’ve written a few songs and many more fragments. I’d like to continue to use music as a medium for self expression. As I was reading some of the books during winter break, I was inspired by what I was reading as well as the Hudson river (I was on a train right next to the river). These inspiration led me to write a few fragments of stories. They are really just character sketches, but I want to do more with it and create something complete.
  5. Professional Identity – In addition to all of the goals above, I’d like to continue to define my own professional identity. My areas of passion drive my work and I want to define what it is about those passions that drives me to be the professional that I am.
  6. Expand my work as an advocate. A professor that I had last semester truly inspired me to become an advocate and activist for the things that I believe in. I want to make sure that I focus on these beliefs and incorporate them into my work.

I have a varied list of goals/resolutions that I want to keep this year. Not all of them apply directly to my professional development, but they are part of my identity which defines me as a professional. So reading a novel or writing a song may not directly apply to my work as a Residence Director, but they all influence who I am as a person which influences my work as an RD. It’s all connected.

Now that I’ve written them, I just have to follow through with them all!