Elmhurst College   An Introduction to Writing in the Electronic Portfolio Program It is important in writing material for use in your personal portfolio to make your writing convincing to employers and/or graduate or professional schools. It is best if you clearly separate the descriptions of important achievements, experiences and opportunities in your life from the reflections on the meanings of these experiences. Finally, the greatest good comes when you write about the impacts of these activities on your life and especially on your career. If you only describe what you've done, no matter how earthshaking it is, it leaves the reader to guess at its importance to you and your career. Your writing must be convincing, in that the reader has to see how your experiences directly relate to preparing you for the position or admission to graduate/professional school. To assist you in gaining the clarity described above, when writing your material for the Dimensions and Skills, you should follow the format below. Examples of good portfolio writing may be found on the Junior Portfolio Program course website: http://www.elmhurst.edu/~perport/docexamp.html Describe / Explore. First, write a brief description of the course, activity or event. Identify the purpose for selecting the learning experience, why you chose to participate and what your role was in the experience. Reflect. How has your learning been enhanced from the experience? Write a reflection on what you learned about yourself from the experience. Look at it in terms of enhancing your abilities and interests, obtaining new and diverse points of views, gaining leadership skills, becoming more involved in the wider community, substantiating or changing your values, and learning new skills such as communication or interpersonal skills, reasoning abilities or computer literacy skills. Impact. How has the experience changed you? How has it made you better prepared for your career? Write clear, cogent summary statements that you can later use in a resume or a personal statement, and that you can draw upon when you interview for a position or for graduate/professional school. Documentation of Dimensions and Skills When you have written good portfolio material, you will have a definite advantage as you pursue your career path. However, it is also important to provide examples of your best work to back up the statements you made in your writing. For example, if you state the you have become an excellent writer through certain courses and/or working on the college newspaper, you should also have examples of good writing that you have done. These can be simply stored as files on your Web Page or your working disc. You may also use other types of media, such as audio or video files and even such things as pieces of your art work. It is important to begin now to collect examples of your best work. These examples are the proof that you are, indeed, professionally prepared.