Cover Letter

Formatted letter: Cover Letter

To whom it may concern,

When I first embarked on this research writing process I wish that I could say that I was going into it with my head held high, no worries, and a conquer all attitude. This, however, was most certainly not the case. I was terrified at the thought of long hours spent at my keyboard sifting through mounds of internet resources and countless citations. Needless to say I had my doubts on me ever becoming a “research writer”. I found myself sitting in class in the first week picking topic that I was going to end up pouring more effort into then any other project I have ever sank my teeth into before, of course I didn’t know that I was going to care about it that much. I chose to research the effects of the internet on the music industry while focusing on how the internet is helping independent musicians. My topic didn’t start out like that, of course, it instead went through many changed before I even wrote my first draft.

Finding sources is what really helped morph my topic into what it is now. I found articles that related to my topic and reshaped the topic to fit them better. There we very few sources that I could find so I had to make do with what I could find. I remember writing my annotated bibliography and completely hitting a brick wall and just trying to make do with what I had which is why if you look through pages one through eight in this portfolio you will see very few sources that I didn’t even create a works cited page for. That was just the secondary research and by the time I came out with my final product I still only have eight sources as you can see on pages 23 and 24.

Later on I found that my secondary research was much easier then my primary research because then I didn’t have to rely on other people to get things done. For my primary research I sent out surveys, which can be found on page 17, to two bands and one artist and analyzed their results. Not all of the bands liked to get things back to me in time which ended up being a rather large hassle. After they all got back to me though everything went rather smoothly.

Actually sitting down to write my final draft was the most daunting task that I have attempted in a very long time and the first draft of my final paper was terrible and was rewritten three times and was taken to the writing center for critic. I can honestly say though that writing all my thoughts in order made me excited about my topic all over again. I found a new life coming to it now that I could see the final fruits of an entire semesters worth of labor.

Taking this course has probably been one of the best decisions of my college career hands down and bar none. This class has not only taught me how to write a research paper but how to become a better writer in general and how to personally invest myself in my writing and research. This course has also given me a chance to explore my capabilities as a writer when I think that I have come to a point where I think that I can’t possibly write anymore and how I can fix that feeling to produce a meaningful and good paper.

Sincerely,

@02218635