Overall Reflection

This past month, I was assigned a project for advanced reporting class. The project was to conduct research and interviews on International organizations or people from other countries within the Kansas City metro area. Originally, I was going to try and do it on the Buddhist Rime Center because I always wanted to learn more about this religion and culture. However, after talking to previous Park students who have used this topic they recommended I try something else.

            My other options were to do it on some of the organizations like People to People, the International Trade Council and the International Visitors Council or try to find some people from other countries in Kansas City or do something Park related. What did I end up doing? Well, I ended up taking a slightly different approach and choosing a different topic for each format. The different formats were a slideshow, a podcast, written feature and a video feature.

            The first format was the slideshow. For the slideshow I did it on an Italian family, the Marker family, which a friend of mine knew. I interviewed them and learned about the differences between the culture of Italy (Northern Italy in particular) and America. I learned interesting things about Italian culture such as their strong commitment to family and of course, their passion for food.

            The second format was the podcast. For the podcast, I wasn’t sure whether to feature an individual or a group. However, I saw a flyer for a cultural event at Park University on Saudi Arabia. So I decided to take advantage of that for both my project and to learn about the culture.  I learned about how the Saudi Arabian culture believes a lot in religion and pilgrimage. I also got to see how they conduct ceremonies, weddings and other rituals.

            The third format was the written feature. The written feature I did it on the International Visitors Council of Kansas City. I wrote about what the organization does and it serves the community for international visitors.

            The fourth format was the video feature. Originally, I was going to do it on the International Trade Council but I wasn’t able to do it because the executive was on maternity leave. So instead I decided to stick with the International Visitors Council and attended one of organization’s events at Californo’s in Westport. The event was focused on some of the International visitors sharing their experiences in America and Kansas City.  I thought the most interesting thing was hearing about each of the international visitors’ experiences and how it has changed their outlooks.

            Finally, the last part of the project was to promote my blog on social media sites. I promoted my blog on Facebook and Twitter by posting the links to my projects.

            Overall, I thought this project was pretty difficult at first because I had a hard time figuring out what to do. But once I figured out decided to do something different for each project it didn’t turn out to be too difficult. Also, by focusing on different topics for each, I learned more than had I stuck with just one topic.