Continuing Education Sans the Institution

I must agree with Mark Twain: "Don't let schooling interfere with your education." In my case, it's not so much my current school so much as my lack of schooling. I'm not entirely sure what I plan to do about graduate school at this stage of my life, but I do know I want to learn all I can about electracy. With the consent of Dr. Ulmer, I've chosen to "take" his courses on my own free time without concern for the technicalities of acceptance and admission into a graduate school.


For my first order of business, I intend to read and review Dr. Ulmer's sites and blog. Reading what he has done will prove to be enriching, educating, inspiring, and above all telling of the projects I'll be updated and/ or undertaking. Secondly, I need to locate the books -- a few are actually in the on campus libraries. Luckily, I enjoy the benefit of the UF libraries as a UF employee, so it would appear that I have the luxury of reading these books for free. As I have a... "discrepancy" with the county library, I'll have to wait to clear that up before utilizing it for the remaining books I can't find on campus. Suffice it to say I need to stop forgetting to drop off that book to the book mobile. Next, I'll take notes from the books much like I did in Ulmer's classes. Finally, I'll revisit my projects from Internet Literature and Hypermedia to either update what I currently have or build from scratch.


As it stands, I have much to read and so much more to learn. And with that, I realize my auto-time has already been set back an hour. Didn't WP get the memo that we won't get our hour back until November 9th?

Blog Neglect

Regrettably, I am 100% guilty of blog neglect. It would seem I work in phases of writing activity. Perhaps I could blame an increase in my work load between mid-August and late-September, but I'm merely grasping for a scapegoat when I should only blame myself.

While directing a professor to the chair of the English department to find technical writing students to edit papers, I decided to check in on Dr. Ulmer, my favorite English professor. Okay, let's be honest -- my all-around favorite professor. I discovered that he's created a blog, of course in typical fashion as well. I've been inspired to sit down, review his course syllabi, start revamping my MyStory, and taking on new projects. I certainly could use the direction, and Dr. Ulmer is a pioneer on the subject matter. After all, he did coin the term "electracy." I consider myself extremely lucky to have had the opportunity to take his classes.

I've been inspired to sit and write a bit more after reviewing a couple pages of his blog, so hopefully I will manage to be more productive with my writing in the coming days and weeks.