When last my group met, we discussed which project we were going to fulfill on and how we would do it. We haven’t decided on what to do, but we agreed that we would work together on making the team schedule. Many of us have different time frames to meet up with one another, which is why we decided to make sure that we knew when those who could meet could and how to work in unison for our project. We agreed that Kate Martin and the Occidental would be the perfect project since it evolved the creation and historical representation of what Kate did for Lincoln plus how much it ties into the building itself. The only challenge I foresee is if we may have encountered whether or not the owner is working to cooperate with us on filming and designing a website. I worked on making sure the Kate Martin and The Occidental bar would be set up for us to come and interview with them. I called the owner and got in touch with her to make sure it worked out. It took some time to get in full contact with her, but I hope that over time, it would be understood that this can be a bit of a process where we need permission on what we can and cannot film. This week went well, and I hope next week will be all the more influential.

Hello! Welcome to Week 4!
A schedule is extremely important when it comes to overall group and project success! Without a proper schedule, almost all groups can suffer from extreme procrastination and lack of organization.
After our project pitches last week, our group (Sad Journalism Kids) decided to switch up our original plan of the Big Top Aerobics place and instead go with Kate Martin and the Occidental, the Bar that is opening up downtown in the Haymarket. We decided to switch to this instead of the big top because the points brought up in pitches by the two instructors were excellent. Access to Kate’s is much better considering the personal connections we have there, and the rich history of the building makes this much easier to do an entire project on.
For the work done this week, I’ll be honest I didn’t help with much, but that is mostly because there was not much to help with. I helped present the pitches during class (somewhat) and fixed the issue with the Team Contract Submission. No real challenges, apart from the submission errors. Going forward, I need to communicate better with my team and see how I can help more when needed if needed.

I feel like having a set schedule for anything helps with proper distribution of expectation and work put out. For group work specifically, it acts not only as a way to avoid procrastination, but also as a sort of communicator, similar to a contract. 

Creating a specific timeline of what we need to do and when we need to do it is a way to properly communicate what is expected from everyone in the group as well as an opportunity for us to plan around our own schedule to ensure equal effort and organization. 

While our team has not explicitly decided between the Haymarket bar or the performing arts center, it is seeming more like we will settle with the bar idea. I think it gives way more history and interest as well as easier access due to the contact we have already initiated. 

All and all I am very excited for us to start working on the project. From what we have been told, it seems like an excellent place to get video and photos, as well as a hotbed for interesting Lincoln history and intriguing interviews. I think we are going to have a lot of fun with the project once we settle on a narrowed down course of action. Oce we know specifically what we are doing, I believe it will be a marginally painless process.

I think it is important to make a schedule within our team because it will help us coordinate the dates on which we can work together on our project. Setting up dates to go to the place to get content are very crucial for the ending success of what we create. I believe our team is leaning towards doing the project over the bar we discussed in our project pitch. Further discussion on what area we would like to focus on still needs to be done so that we are not tackling too broad of a topic. This will be between the bar and its owner who just opened it, the history behind it all and all the various things the bar offers. I think this might be one challenge that we might face. Setting up days and working with the bar owner might be another challenge that could arise. While I think it may be difficult at points, with communication between us and the owner I think it is still feasible. With the project pitch that was given this week, I helped with some of the research for a couple of the ideas. This was a little difficult since the individuals who came up with the ideas did most of the searching and sharing of what they found. I think next time this type of situation arises where there are fewer ideas needed than group members, we should each come up with and find our own and then share as a group. This allows everyone to have an idea or ideas in the hat and everyone can participate more. It will also allow for a broader range of choices to choose from, and possibly a greater diversity of good options.

Creating a schedule is important for the successful completion of a project because it keeps everyone focused, on task, and allows people to take note of what they need to complete for that day/week. Creating a schedule for our group for this class is especially important because we only meet once a week for 50 minutes at a time. With so little time face to face during the designated class period, it is important to create a schedule for group meetings for additional days of the week. Having a set schedule for people to look back on is important to staying organized. Additionally, it is important to have a schedule of when assignments are due and when we want to have completed certain tasks by to make sure we are progressing with our project and not leaving loads of work for us at the end of the semester. Our group decided that we will utilize the class period completely to work as a group, because we will already be together to work on our project during that time. We will also schedule other meetings for other days of the week as needed if we are behind schedule. I think it will be difficult to find times for our group to meet outside of class because we all have busy schedules and lives outside of class too. This week, we finished our group contract and presented our ideas for project pitches. We still need to discuss as a group what project we will pursue after the feedback we got from our peers and CoJMC professors. Challenges we encountered included getting negative feedback on ideas we were confident with, dealing with these comments, and learning and working towards improvement. In the future, we will consider take into consideration Katie’s critiques and be more specific with our examples.

To ensure our team is successful, our group will need to make sure that we communicate well. We will have to communicate about times and days we are available to meet, what we want to get out of the project and what we are all best at to succeed in creating a good final project. I think being able to work together and communicate are two qualities that good groups that succeed have. A few things that can cause a group to not be successful are not communicating, having a difference in opinion on the type of project or project details or varying ideas of what the final product should be. For this week I helped out a little bit with the presentation slides, as well as the group contract. I also continued to look up interactive sites for our next presentation and found some ones that I thought were pretty interesting. Some of the challenges I encountered were being able to contribute when some of the ideas were not my own, and the individuals who did come up with the idea already most of the information ready. In the future, I will have ideas prepared and have information ready on subjects that have been discussed.

For me, I think the best thing I can do for my group this semester is to be present and give it everything I’ve got. I know I bring a unique set of skills to the group that I know can be utilized to be something great. I think I bring a unique perspective when it comes to video capture and editing, as well as web design stemming from my software development minor. Characteristics all good teams share are straight and straightforward, communications, dedication, and motivation. As long as we do everything we can to make sure we are communicating nothing, but success lies ahead for us. On the flip side, the same things can be said when it comes to poor group synergy. If the group shows up unmotivated, with no idea what is going on for the day, we would be bound to fail. We have to make sure we are all giving our full attention whenever we make arrangements to meet and knock some of the work out.

This week I handed in the group contract and helped research a few of the potential project subjects. No challenged quite yet. That being said, going forward, I know I should talk a bit more when we are meeting. I just sat and worked during class this week and didn’t say much.

This week we discussed further on what topic we should do. We finalized that we should start with presenting our original idea of the Big Circus performance center but then also agreed about a local bar in town that we may use. Overall, It was a very productive session this week. As a team, the biggest contribution to the team this week was the dynamic that we all have with one another. It was more a team bonding session than anything else. WE talked about what roles we all would take in further detail from last week and knew our own strengths and weaknesses. If our minds wander and we can’t focus on what to do and our responsibility then we are in for a long run. in the future, we will communicate better on how to communicate with one another and learn what project we have and how we can contribute to the overall class with said project. till new week

I think at the end of the day, successful teams are comprised of individuals who are willing to not only put forth effort, but who are also willing to form a relationship with their group. I’m not saying everyone should be besties, but an air of tentative acquaintance can help make the work more cohesive. 

Other important qualities are organization, the desire to put forth effort, humility and above all communication. I have always been taught that to be successful, one must communicate to the point where it is impossible to misunderstand. Communication makes the world go round and if a group is unwilling or unable to effectively communicate then they will never be able to create anything of note. 

After talking more and working with our group, I have high hopes. I think we are all still a tad shy, perhaps already stressed with the demands of the semester, but overall I think we are going to be able to really make something of this class. 

We’ve moved away from the performing arts center and more towards an interesting new bar downtown. Frankly, I think it gives us an opportunity to explore some local history while simultaneously creating a really cool and intriguing project. I have very high hopes and I am excited to see what the semester has in store.

This semester, communication will be the key in order to ensure success with this group project. The idea of a semester-long group project scares me a little, but I have confidence that my group and I will continue to communicate effectively so we get everything done on time with exceptional quality. I have been a member of group projects in the past where I have been tackling the work for the rest of my group members because they did not commit to their tasks; this is something I will not tolerate any longer. We also need to hold each other accountable, as we will all need to be on the same page throughout this semester’s entirety. Good teams exhibit good communication like I stated previously, but just as important as communication is effort. All group members need to contribute equally so we can end this semester on a high note. If our team does not work together successfully, we will designate a weekly schedule for times we will meet together as a group, as well as creating a document where all group members can see what their part in the project is. This week, our group was productive, and created our powerpoint presentation to be showed during next week’s class about potential project topics. We conducted research on many different options and narrowed it down to the final 3. Additionally, we created our group contract for guidelines for the rest of the semester and explored ideas for the interactive website presentation. A challenge for this week included narrowing down our ideas. We can overcome this in the future by being more prepared for class discussions.