Project Management
Our group capstone project for Project Management was to pretend that we were a company preparing a bid to redesign the Blue Ridge web site. A very worthy project indeed. We then had to create a presentation of our resulting bid along with any supporting information we had. The requirements were to define our sponsors and stakeholders, have a written scope statement and statement of work, have a Microsoft Project plan, prepare a powerpoint presentation and then present our proposal. Our group went a little further than the requirements.
From the beginning of our project we assigned "jobs" to each of our group members, I was the "Creative Director" of our company. We researched who our stakeholders were and then actually interviewed some of them. We decided on a company name and fake background information. I designed a logo for our company and then, given some of the suggestions from various stakeholders, designed a home page that would be our basic template for our fictitious website. We also decided along the way that we would save some cost by using student supplied photos and animations in our website. To do this, we would hold a photo and flash animation contest whereby the winner would have their work published on the website with a byline. They would also receive a T-shirt which I designed that says, "I Got Flashed at Blue Ridge CTC."
This link will take you to the webpage I designed...Blue Ridge Home Page.
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Computer Ethics
This was a potentially boring class that was actually made fun by a teacher that was willing to step outside of the usual lecture methods of teaching. We had discussions, sometimes heated, and played rounds of "Jeopardy" centered on the chapter readings. It turned out to be a great way to learn the information.
I still am of the option, however, that if a person has ethical standards, they don't need the class. And if they don't,...well, that isn't going to change by taking a class.
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Information Literacy
The Information Literacy class was essentially a beginner class on using Microsoft programs. If I had known I could test out of it, I would have. However, the capstone project, or rather, projects were kind of interesting.
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Network +
Jeeeez! I never should have taken Network + as an online course!
Thanks to a great tutor who helped me through sub netting, I passed, but the biggest thing I learned from this class is that it is not what I want to do for a living. Every time I thought I was getting the hang of things, I'd go on to the next chapter and completely forget what I'd learned from the chapter before...it's just too much information.
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During this semester, I also was the first Blue Ridge CTC student to test out of the Career Transitions class. I guess they figured I'd been through enough career transitions already!