Editor's Note
We chose the ever growing need for a renewable and sustainable energy source that will be infinitely used with little to no side effects such as pollution and destruction of the Earth. Through the on-line magazine we would like for our readers to contemplate the future of alternative resources mainly solar power/energy. We provide everything our reader will ever want to know about solar power and the rapid advancement of the technology. We think that all the topics we covered are equally important. We would like our reader to contemplate the thought of preserving our planet and the human race by using environmentally friendly resources that don’t pollute and are renewable. Our report in the online magazine has provided information for people to explore the possible advantages as well as the challenges of solar energy. We hope people will make informed decisions about available energy resources and how they impact the health of ourselves and our planet. Solar power is just one of many solutions to help us wean are dependency on fossil fuels.
In Qiwen’s commentary, she discussed that solar energy is a dangerous technology because of the manufacturing of solar panels creates many toxic chemicals and pollutants but also helps ease the use of traditional energy sources. Qiwen chose the commentary as one of her genre papers because she wants people to understand all aspects of solar energy and its uses. Hulya’s commentary was about the group research paper on solar power. She wanted to strengthen the report in a logical way. Her commentary is helpful for the reader to note some facts about using solar power. She has logical explanations about solar power's position in the future. Max’s commentary he wrote about how solar power is the best alternative energy resource we have available right now. He chose this position because he realized after all the research on group report that solar power is a great sustainable source for energy. Qiwen chose the review as her second genre paper because of a video she watched that provided great information about air pollution and the need for clean energy sources. She focused on the issue of air pollution because it is one of many serious problems that affect everyone daily. In her review, she discusses the issues of air pollution, especially in China because she lived there and experienced its detrimental effects first hand. Hulya reviewed a short sci-fi story called Pail of Air as her genre assignment. She likes writing reviews and found the story interesting and thought it would be a good idea to write a review that is relevant to the magazine's theme. The story Pail of Air is about an only family that survived after a big massive star hits the world and pushes it out of the Sun's orbit. Max’s chosen to review the Tesla Motors P85D a sports sedan that solely runs on electricity. This vehicle could use solar power energy from your solar panels at home and you would never have to pay for fuel costs again. Qiwen utilized the home memoir as her translation because it made a connection between our chosen issue and her life growing up in China next to a cement factory that polluted the air resulting in a layer of dust in her home, school and covering the local plant life. On a recent trip home the factory was shut down and she witnessed a dramatic improvement in air quality. Hulya chose the title Sunny Days for her visual translation. She pondered about what the Sun means to her. She thinks that the Sun is a symbol for safety and guidance and love. She finds all these things in her family. She says “The people I love are my light that keeps me going to the right direction. The happy times we have, are the times like sunny warm days.” Max used PowerPoint for his visual translation on the Tesla Motors P85D. By Creating a power point he was able to highlight the benefits and advantages of this vehicle using pictures and easy to read texts. Using a power point is very efficient and quick to get the point across. We discovered that in making revisions that we had different ideas and thoughts about the direction and stance we were forming on the topic. The genre and translation papers showed us that there are different ways to communicate our thoughts and ideas through multiple modes of media. We learned the difference between each genre paper and how to use images to support the writing to be more persuasive and understandable. Communication, collaboration and compromise are essential to the success of your group in completing this project. Our research report and genre papers have very clear and important information for readers to understand the many aspects surrounding the use of solar energy. We researched many websites and articles for credible sources of information comparing multiple different points of view. We designed the website to be easy to use without compromising the integrity of our information and research. We wish we could have better represented our own perspectives and opinions on this topic without sacrificing the overall thesis of our online magazine. We would have liked to spend more time deciding the topic and direction of our research paper. We all had different perspectives and ideas on what should have been included in our magazine and why. By Hulya Aktas, Max Hagan, and Qiwen Huang |