Gateway to University Honors | honors-portfolio

Honors Experiential Learning Project Proposal Form

Complete this proposal prior to your project’s start date and upload it in the UHP Database (https://webapps.uc.edu/uchonorsstudent). Create a project (“Add a new record”) in the “Tracking Project” tab and then upload your proposal document as an attachment. Your submission will be reviewed during the next review cycle.

While the quality of the proposal is most important, strong proposals are typically 3-4 pages in length (single-spaced). Please maintain the proposal format.

Basic Information
Full Name: Elysse Winget

UC Email: wingetem@mail.uc.edu

College: McMicken College of Arts and Sciences

Major: Communications (changing to Creative Writing spring semester)

Title of Project: Elysse in England

Thematic Area (choose only one): Community Engagement, Creative Arts, Global Studies, Leadership, OR Research

Expected Project Start Date: January 2015

Expected Project End Date: June 2015

Project Information

Provide a detailed abstract of your proposed honors experiential learning project.

I will be traveling abroad to London for the spring semester in 2015 through Arcadia University. I will be studying and living at a traditional English university, most likely Royal Holloway University outside of London for their astounding creative writing program. As a creative writing major, I find travel essential. I’ve never really traveled and I’ve lived my whole life in Cincinnati; I feel like I can’t be an adequate writer until I step outside of my “bell jar” so to speak. Spring semester is from mid-January to mid-June, with a month long break in which I plan to travel around Western Europe independently. I will keep a blog during the trip as well to document my experiences! I am excited to travel weekends around the city of London, make new friends, appreciate and embrace the British lifestyle, and study writing adamantly.

Clearly and thoroughly address how each of the following elements will be exhibited in your work:

Connection to Learning Outcomes within the Honors Thematic Area (identified above)

I’ll experience the British culture and interact with individuals from a different culture; I will be the one with the funny accent for once! I want to research London and read British literature before departing to be knowledgeable rather than ignorant. I plan to keep a blog and talk about the things I learn about the foreign environment and adapt to a new culture.

Interdependence of world economics, political systems, and environments; for this I plan to study the history of the monarchy before traveling abroad and seeing how the monarchy works once I filter in with the British culture. I want to know more about the logistics rather than the entertainment aspect that we see through the lens of the media! I want to truly understand how it works.

Participate in a global society and understand the role of a global system rather than just an American system. I plan to interact with other students and ask them about British lifestyle; I realize that the language is the same, but the culture is not! I want to know what a day in their lives looks like. I want to experience it from that perspective as well, considering myself a citizen of the environment. I also want to volunteer and give back to the community I will be living in, as to acknowledge that I owe their country as well, not just my own.

Connection to Goals and Academic Theories (include reference list, as appropriate)

I think it will give me experiences to write about and expand my world; people with anxiety disorders keep their worlds very small, and I refuse to let my world be small just because I lack serotonin. I can’t write without knowledge and experience either. I also think that experience and good writing go hand in hand; I’m hoping to be able to write a novel after the trip about the experience, fictional or nonfictional, that will be a test for my future. My goal as a writer is to travel, working hopefully for non-profit organizations that promote education and literacy. I hope to travel to third world countries, engage with individuals from different backgrounds, and portray the experiences I have through writing. I would like others to get to read my works and experience the world through my lens, as someone who has experienced and seen the multiple cultures and realities of the world. I can’t effectively do that at this point in my life, but my trip to London is hopefully my start. It also doesn’t hurt that Royal Holloway University (the university I hope to study at) has a very good English program and a well-known creative writing department! J

Ted Talk about creative writing; watching some of these could prepare me academically for the courses I will be taking abroad as I dive further and further into my major.

Reading Sylvia Plath’s journals from when she studied in London; I’ve read some letters to her mother from her trip, and I am currently reading her unabridged journals; I hope to dive into the sections from when she studied at the University of Cambridge and notice how her writing techniques changed and how her perspectives altered when she was away from home.

Take a British Literature class fall semester at UC before going abroad. I know there is currently a seminar offered about British Literature for English students. I would love to have this class under my belt before going abroad!

Initiative, Independence, and/or Creativity

Because I have already traveled abroad and because I will be going abroad for a study tour in April of 2014, I will not be a stranger to travel or to Europe, which provides a bit of background and less fear of flying and the distance I’ll be away from home. I think that each time I go abroad, it makes the next time feel safer and more comfortable, so by the time I make it to my long-term journey, I should be fully prepared. I also am open minded, which will help me when I enter a new university in a different country with no one I know to guide me. I think I will be able to have conversations with those unlike myself, and hopefully make long lasting connections. I also hope that, with practice, I’ll bring a strong writing background and knowledge of creative writing as well as British literature, to the point where I can adapt and acclimate easily to the course load at Royal Holloway University.

Reflection

Because I plan on keeping a blog online while I’m abroad, I hope to be able to use the blog as my reflection. I also hope to write a novel or novella about the trip when I return as a personal form of reflection, of which I could also submit.

Dissemination

For dissemination, I plan on writing an article for the News Record about my travels. I’ve written for the News Record before and been published, so hopefully I can meet with one of the staff and write something about traveling abroad that could also be published. This will make it probable that others will read about my travel and hopefully aspire to do so as well!

Project Advisor (list the person’s name, title, and contact information)

Jill Reister at UC will be helping me with my application, as well as Liv Rothfuss from Arcadia University, who’s university will be the one I am going abroad through. I have already had in depth conversations with both, who are encouraging and supportive throughout the process.

Jill Reister, University of Cincinnati International Programs, jill.reister@uc.edu

Liv Rothfuss, Enrollment Counselor for Greater London, University of Oxford, and University of Cambridge, rothfusse@arcadia.edu

Budget (if applicable

Spring semester at Royal Holloway University (which is most likely the school I will be attending) is $19,990. I talked to my parents and they are willing to pay for the semester, assuming my scholarships from the University of Cincinnati transfer over as well. I will personally pay for the deposit to the University of Cincinnati to keep my enrollment as a student while I’m absent for the semester. I will be working all summer and creating a savings account for when I go abroad for miscellaneous travels!

Final Project

The significant event that shaped my first semester of college was most definitely taking my intro to creative writing class. I had never taken a writing class prior to college; I always did well in English, scored perfectly on the writing portion of standardized tests, scored perfectly on the writing portion of the ACT, but yet, I didn’t think much about it. I didn’t think I was very good, I thought it was just good luck. I decided to try writing a novel this summer as well, just to test myself as a writer and see if I could write something that lengthy. I still never thought it would blossom into anything. However, when I came to college, I tested out of my generic English classes so I decided to take something on my own for fun; that class happened to be the one that helped me find my passion. I truly believe we are all destined for greatness and that we all have a specialty; I just never really knew I had one.

After a couple weeks of the class, I realized how much I finally enjoyed going to class and learning. I had insightful conversations, made friends, had nerdy conversations about our favorites books and works of writing, and slowly realized that perhaps my passion was writing. I decided to go have coffee with my professor to talk about the prospects of being a creative writing major. Our conversation was rich and made me so excited for the prospects of one day working for a publishing company, or working for a non-profit called Room to Read that builds libraries in third world countries. It made me excited to travel and write, to see the world and to document what I saw, and write about it in beautiful language. I started reading more and more, until it got to the point where I’d be reading at football games because I could not stop thirsting for written word. After giving it a lot of thought, I changed my major officially to creative writing. I’m unbelievably excited to see where I go with the degree, and I know it will be somewhere happy, regardless of the profit.

I decided that the best way to show my love for writing was to let the class read it; I don’t like to let people read my writing because I’m new and naïve. In a word, I’d like to think I’m good, but if people read it, I may be disproved, and that’s a scary thought to think that the thing I’ve found such a passion for is actually useless. Nevertheless, I’m submitting a piece of my personal journal as a sample to one of the many things I’ve written this semester. I started keeping a personal journal, in hopes of one day incorporating it into a novel or short story. I figure it’s better to document everything as it is in the moment in anticipation for the day it becomes useful. I hope that my journals one day go public, but until that day comes, they’ve only been shared to the class!

Excerpt from my personal journals:

November 23rd, 2013

I always think I should go out; have a beer, or two, or three, or more with a few friends or with an entire group of strangers at a fraternity house I've never been to with music I don't listen to playing in the background, making it impossible to communicate with anyone in the room but yet, because of the liquid courage, giving you the perfect silence needed to engage in some sort of sexual misconduct with the opposite sex (or the same sex, whatever you prefer, I'm a liberal) on the "dance floor" which just so happens to be made of rotting wood or concrete that is wet with alcohol. Writing it does makes it seem even less appealing than it does when I just casually think about it. I wonder at what people find fun in that.

I want to be content by myself, without a drop of anything (disregard my anxiety medication; I consider that a "supplement" rather than an "enhancement". Plus, it really does society a favor, I'm less irritable). People judge me so much for preferring my tiny, box of a dorm room on a Friday or Saturday night listening to culturally popular but collegiately unacceptable boy bands and reading a, in my opinion, "good" book, usually involving one Sylvia Plath, who people refer to politely as the "girl who stuck her head in the oven" and then immediately judge yours truly for my passion for the dead girl's writing, assuming it's as dark and tragic as her passing. What they fail to realize is how she is the only person I can truly relate to in this beautiful world, and how she is the thing that keeps me holding on, because she didn't, and I wish she had.

You see, I don't like parties because, well, I live in this world in my head, and it's a lot better. It looks the same as this one, but happier. I'm still a student on this brilliant campus, and I'm still a Chi Omega, and I'm still the same basic 5 foot 3 inched red haired hot mess. The thing that's most different about this world is that no one can find me, because it's mine. I love this hole of a dorm room, because I love to be alone, stuck in thought. My thoughts are what keep me alive, what keep me company, and what I like the most in this world. I have this infinite capacity to learn any and all of the things I've ever wanted, and I'm on a campus that allows me just those opportunities.

In my world, I'm going abroad to London to follow in Plath's footsteps. She once said that being completely removed from a society that you are familiar with is the scariest thing for a person, but also the best, because you grow and you learn. If I want to be a writer, I feel like I need to experience more than this city I've lived in my entire life, despite the fact that it's brilliant and I would not change anything about my location up until this point in my life.

Traveling abroad, to be honest, scares me. My biggest fear in life (besides, dare I write the word, blood) is being on airplanes. For some reason, the sheer thought of being 30,000 odd feet in the air with little to no control over what happens or where we will land freaks me out to no end. The first time I went abroad, I definitely sobbed regrettably for the entire eight hour duration of the flight, and I cried even harder once I arrived in the Netherlands and realized how far from home I was, and I continued having panic attacks all week (clearly this was before my diagnoses so at this point I just thought I was crazy rather than a victim of generalized anxiety disorder). So for me to want to spend a semester abroad, I must seriously be insane, right?

Well here's my thing… I don't like being scared of things. Having an anxiety has made me fear the unknown, as well as the world at large, but it doesn't mean I want to be that way. I want to experience all of the things I've always wanted to experience. I want to see all the places I've never been given the privilege to see. I want to be unafraid. I figure that pushing myself and taking advice from Ralph Waldo Emerson who once said "always do what you're afraid to do", I might find myself making my world a little bit bigger and brighter. That's my main problem with my disorder; anxiety makes your world small. Right now, my world consists of Cincinnati; that's tiny. I want it to consist of all things possible. I want it to be limitless. So I will put forth the effort, I will do what I'm afraid to do, and I will leave behind my tiny world here and expand it across the Atlantic.

In the world I live in in my mind, I don't need the love and affection I seek from a male counterpart. I may have one in my mind… and he may be perfect… and he may or may not be based on a real person, but I assure you this man is not real… however, I will not settle for less than this man, because I deserve this much. I'm not saying I'm superior or better than every guy at this university or anything, I'm just saying, I have kept myself pure and I have waited contently for the person to give me this feeling of irrevocable, unconditional love that I've lacked my entire life, a feeling I've never felt, but am confident I would know I'd found it immediately once I feel it, and it just so happens, I've never had that feeling. I've had strong feelings before, which is how I know they exist, and how I know they can be bigger. I guess it's a bit presumptuous, but I trust my gut on this one. I'll be content to be alone in this world until the man from the one of my head decides to invade the real one, the physical one, the one in which we can finally be together. But like I said, he doesn't exist, not that I know of at least, but that's how it should be… for now…

In the world I live in in my mind, I'm not patronized for reading; in fact, my world is filled with books and literally geniuses, whether they be characters like Holden Caufield or Sydney Cartone, or authors like William Faulkner or Oscar Wilde. My world is filled with appreciation, which is the warmest regards of gratification. My world is filled with intelligence and elegance, with champagne at dinner and wine at dessert, but that's the only kind of drinking there is because it's drinking to be classy and not to be drunk.

In the world I live in in my mind, no one can find me. It's not that I'm antisocial, or that I don't like people, but I thrive on independence and solitary moments like the one I'm experiencing tonight. God keeps me company, and that's the best company there is, and honestly I don't have time to waste my words through speech; I need to waste them through writing.

The world in my mind is beautiful, but it's not real. But it's where I live, and it's where I love, and it's where I get experience. And it's all I’ll have until I finally get real world experiences. I can’t wait until I do; then I won’t be writing fantasies, I’ll be writing an incredible reality.

This I Believe Statement

We were asked to come up with a statement that spoke to us and summarized a core belief that effects us each day, so I picked working for God rather than money. I heard someone speaking about that and it just made so much sense to me personally because the work I want to benefits others, but it won’t make me much money. Considering I grew up where working a job that doesn’t pay well is frowned upon, it’s very important to me to explain why I’m okay making less when I could be making more. I would rather be happy and help more people than make money, and its an important value I hold myself to. I never want to be encouraged by materialistic want.

So without further adeu:

I believe in working for God and not for money. I grew up in an environment where everyone worked for wealth. No one enjoyed their jobs; they just enjoyed their paychecks that paid for their luxurious homes, their children’s educations, their fancy cars, and their reputation. I grew up believing I too needed a job like this because the monetary things I would earn would give me more happiness than a job could.
         However, I went on a mission trip my sophomore year of high school and realized what I wanted to do with my life; it was not business related or anything in the medical field. It was working with individuals with disabilities. I came home from the trip and told my family that I wanted to work within the realms of an organization that helped people with developmental disabilities.
         My sister laughed in my face. She told me a job like that would not be possible if I wanted to maintain the lifestyle I lived. I would not be wearing the clothes I was in today; everything I owned would be cheap. I would not live in a lavish house in the type of affluent neighborhood I lived in now. I would not be able to afford going out to eat every weekend, nor would I be able to afford going out at all.
         My sister worked for a good business, and she did make a decent salary, and she did buy a home and she did wear only designer clothes, and she did look happy, but only on the surface. She frequently cried to my mother all the time about wanting to quit her job and how much she hated it and how miserable she was every day, but how she couldn’t because she “needed” the money. She only looked happy based on her material worth and her monetary possessions. I wanted more than that.
         I knew working with people with disabilities wouldn’t pay for the house my sister had just bought. It wouldn’t pay for any house in that neighborhood for that matter. I wouldn’t be able to shop with her at Lilly Pulitzer or Anthropologie; it’d be Forever 21 for me. I knew I would be frowned upon in the community I grew up in for my lack of wealth, because in our town wealth equaled success, and they would assume that I was unsuccessful.
         The reality is, I would be the most successful of them all. Regardless of my clothes or my possessions, I would have a smile on my face every day. I would be happy and enjoying myself at work. I would be benefiting more people, and helping more than just myself. I wanted to work for God and serve His people rather than myself, even if that meant a “lesser” lifestyle. Now, I live every day working towards the goal of helping others in my community in preparation for the future when I make a career of it. This I believe.