Another Week Down

Another week has passed and brought us even closer to the start of our final projects. I’ve been doing some research on different possibilities for the digital story, but I’m just not sure if it’s exactly what I’m supposed to be doing. I’ve looked into volunteering at the Boys and Girls Club, The Youth Center, the local Humane Society, and Habitat for Humanity, just to name a few. There are plenty of charitable organizations in my area, but many of them are only looking for monetary donations. As for the others, many of them are looking for a longer term commitment and I’m unsure of how long we’re supposed to do this for. I also didn’t realize how strenuous it had become to volunteer your time at some of these places. I figured I could just walk in off the street and say that I wanted to help out and they would take me right in, but that’s not the case. There’s actually an application and interview process at many of these places and they don’t have to take you. This is where the problem with time may come in. If they can get a commitment from someone for six weeks and I can only give them three, then they will most likely choose the other person. I don’t know, maybe I’m looking at the wrong things here.

As for the readings and assignments for the week, well, they didn’t get any easier that’s for sure. There were some interesting stories. I especially enjoyed the “The Prince” by Niccolo Machiavelli. His take on leadership was a little different than the norm I think, but he does bring up some valid points in his writing. This story brought up some good discussions in the forum and I enjoyed reading the other students’ thoughts on the matter. Aside from all of the things I learned this week, there was one in particular that really caught my attention. It was pointed out by a classmate and I just thought it was very interesting. John Wilkes Booth was present at Lincoln’s second inaugural address. I had absolutely no idea about that. I wonder if he was planning to do what he later did, but backed out. I guess we may never know the answer to that.

Josh