Wisniewski 1 Michael Wisniewski Professor Collins Writing 39C 12 February 2014 Artifacts 1.

Midnight Mission: I volunteered here for 3 Months in High School. Located on Skid Row, the Midnight Mission opened my eyes to the realities of my less fortunate neighbors in Los Angeles. . This site and the experience served as inspiration for my paper, and seemed perfect for a paper dedicated to social justice and advocacy.

2. The search began on google, like most others

However, as I soon became aware, 2 days into research, homelessness was too broad of search topic to return any meaningful results or to find a topic specific enough to decide to advocate on its behalf. 3. A research exercise in class opened my eyes to the need to think of specific key terms related to my topics. Searching for the drug war and Obama , using the search terms drug , war , and Obama made me realize if I did the same thing for homelessness maybe I could find similar interesting topics others had written about. With my

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current method, typing in homelessness didnt produce many meaningful results. Eventually, I came to realize that criminalization of the homelessness was actually a hot topic. 4. Subject Terms: This became my best friend in the class. I actually had a process to find material. Begin search. Type in criminalization + homeless. Then boom, a plethora of articles to read and browse. Finally, I began to get somewhere with my research. No wonder authors tag their research with key terms to make it easier to find. Well, easy to find if you know what youre looking for. Now, I did know and my paper began to take shape.

5. Phoenix Grill (UCI): how does an eatery at UCI relate to my paper? It doesnt. Does revision relate to my paper? It definitely does. My meeting at the Phoenix Grill made me realize the importance of focusing my paper into specific areas. Staring at paper by myself is an entirely different perspective than watching it being butchered (extreme term, yes) before my eyes at the Grill or dissected by my peers. But the experience was helpful made me again realize I needed to refocus and pick specifics.

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An example of the aftermath of my conversation. I realized I need to define terms to make my paper understandable and clearer to the reader. And even after narrowing my topic to criminalization of the homeless, my conversation made me acknowledge I needed a more pressing and urgent example to introduce my topic instead of basic background information. 6. Revision #1 : With a few more days of work, I changed my introduction to include anecdotal evidence of my experience at the Midnight Mission. The introduction was still a work in progress, but it seemed to be a much better way of introducing my topic

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7. Outline

The outline for my paper grew throughout the course with 3 major takeaways 1. Concise & clear language 2. Provide context for examples while evaluating the sources as well while building in complexity 3. Engage with opposing views, use the counterarguments to your advantage to strengthen my argument.

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8. Databases: This giant database is where I found the majority of my texts/ journals / research. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's (SAMHSA) hosts this site to give people more information about best practices to prevent and end homelessness.

9. National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty. A Huge help in my research with reports and studies about the effects on the criminalization of the homeless and an advocacy group for homeless Americans. The Center is referred to in many government publications while it still maintains a critical eye in its blog posts about government positions 10. Michelle Alexander and her thesis that Drug Wars are the New Jim Crow laws proved to have some similarities to my topic and helped inspire me to pursue mine with her passion for advocating for incarcerated African Americans via the Drug War.

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11. Helping Hearts for the Homeless Advocacy Week Feb 11-13 , 2014 dedicated to informing UCI Student about homelessness , a cause usually unfamiliar to most in the bubble of college. From my observations, it was primarily focused on presenting a startling facts about homelessness, and they did not pick a particular group of homeless people they wanted to advocate for like vets or college students. However, it did seem to be attracting a good amount of attention on campus, including my own.