Skills Acquired at Ashford

Enrolling at Ashford University has been one of the best decisions I have ever made for myself. I have developed many new skills and also feel as though I have embarked on a new journey of self-discovery and personal growth. I have found being able to engage in conversation with people from all over the United States and other parts of the world to be both interesting and insightful. I have learned that I have things in common with others from across the globe despite us having different cultural backgrounds and being from different generations.

Here at Ashford, I have learned how to conduct thorough research and navigate through an online library with different databases. I have also learned how to differentiate between scholarly, primary and secondary sources. Before my enrollment at Ashford, I understood what plagiarism was but I was not aware how important it was to cite references on a reference page and to use in-text citations for quotations and paraphrased opinions taken from others. In addition to properly citing information taken from other sources, I also learned that when we support our arguments with scholarly sources we strengthen our arguments. Scholarly sources analyze information based on studies and are not biased. They also include citations for all information stated in the source that further substantiates the validity of the information.


In GEN499 I learned the difference between primary and secondary sources and why it is important to use both types of sources in our research papers. Primary sources can provide us with factual support to our arguments while secondary sources can assist in summarizing and analyzing our primary sources. For example, quotations from one of President Obama’s speeches (a primary source) will show the audience what he directly said, and a scholarly article (a secondary source) analyzing his speech can help a reader understand the President’s position and why it is important to both the nation and world.

I learned that it was very important to write objectively. ENG325, an Intermediate Composition course I took early this year, taught me that even when we take a stance on an argument we are still obligated to consider and discuss the opposing viewpoint. By stating and discussing the opposing side of our argument we show our readers that we have done our due diligence and research and that our argument is not merely based on opinion, but can be substantiated by facts.

In COM345, Media Writing for Communications, I learned that when beginning research it is extremely important to identify your target audience and the medium you will be using to convey your message. When we identify our audience in advance, we can write in a manner that will reach our audience and cater to their needs. If we are targeting teenagers and write an article or advertisement using vocabulary that they do not understand, they may immediately lose interest. When targeting our audience, we must try to find a way to draw them in and cause them to want to know more.

As a communication studies major I am hoping to find a job that will involve writing and communicating messages to reach a target audience. The research and writing skills that I have gained here at Ashford will be very helpful to me in my future career endeavors in the communications field. If I should land a job as a communications specialist, knowing how to find research that will strengthen the messages I will be conveying and knowing how to identify my target audience will ensure that I am successful in communicating my messages directly and appropriately.