First Path Down

One of the things that I’ve realized about Pathways is that there’s a lot more places for reflection and it’s highly encouraged.  Not only do you have an assessment before and after each project, you have a reflection about your path before you can complete it.

The first thing that I noticed was my likelihood to go to the projects that I’m comfortable with (I.e. storytelling, visual aids, etc.) and stay away from what I wasn’t (I.e. blogging, podcasts, etc.).  While I don’t have to start enjoying those projects or do all of them, Pathways is designed to give you options that stretch you and I need to be taking advantage of them to really allow myself to grow.

While most of my assessment scores improved or stayed the same after I did the project, a few decreased.  This isn’t a bad thing, it’s more of a realization that I thought my skill was here, but after I did the project, I realized that I was really here.  There’s nothing wrong with that.

I found that skipping ahead on projects because I needed to give a speech that fit somewhere else, meant that some of the advantages of Pathways were gone, I didn’t have access to the materials for those projects (aside from evaluation forms) and what could have been very beneficial resources along the way.  Now that I’ve completed a path, I’ll have access to most of those projects for the future, should I need them.

Overall, Pathways is great, I miss some of the features of the Traditional Program, but that’s not stopping me from embracing Pathways.  Besides as I join in Pathways related discussions, I’m learning that a lot of what I’m missing exist somewhere within Pathways.

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