Experiencing CompoCon for the First Time
Compocon is a composition conference for English 1302 students to have an opportunity to have an informal conversation with professionals and experts from the university.This year, Compocon-The SPARK took place at the University of Texas-Pan American Ballroom on February 18th and 19th.The purpose of Compocon was to help students Develop the Big Question.The Big question is basically just what their question will be like for their research. In order to get help from a professional, the least they had to know was just an idea of what they wanted to do research on.
We interviewed students and professionals and got their opinions, point of views, experiences, and advice. From professionals we were given advice, such as what a student needed to get help developing their research question, and basically a student just needs to know what they want to research on or have their research question. From students, we were told what their experience was at compocon and if was helpful at all; we were told by two students that it was very helpful because professionals helped them get their research question clear and well written. Students had the chance to explore the ballroom and choose whatever professional they wanted to talk to. If students went without a research question, you would basically just tell the professional what you wanted to do research on, who your audience would be, and from where did you want your audience to be. With those things, the professional would start assisting you with the process of developing your question.
Professionals and experts had different signs up on their tables and had their information according to what they were specialized in, available. Some of the professionals were specialized in research, service learning, writing, writing studies, creative writing, interdisciplinary studies, design and many more. Some students were required by their professors to go and get help with their research questions, since in their class they’ll be working on a research project, so it came really helpful for those students like us (Sarai and Karla). What we concluded was that Compocon was a very neat experience, we went to compocon really confused because we did know what we wanted to research on, but we didn't know how to put it into a question. We were helped by two professionals from the hauser lab, another one we don't remember his name, and Bonnie.
Going to and engaging at compocon was very efficient. We highly recommend it if you need help with your research question, because they will help you until you finally have your question done and you understand what you need to know about your question. Compocon can truly help FYC students, because it is obvious that we arent fully experienced with research papers, so having compocon as our tool is grea!
