Extra credit Blog Post

    For  my proposal I decided to write about prevention and penalties for sexual assault on campus. My intended audience was the administrators of Indiana University, because most my evidence revolved around an article in Ethics in Higher Education , that focused on a sexual assault case from Indiana University. This way the problem was exigent for the administrators as they have a history of struggling to deal with these types of cases. It was only Logical that I chose the Administrators as the target audience, as they are the only ones who have the power to put my proposal into action. It was easy to find email addresses for the administrators so then I had to narrow my option down to either the President (Michael A. Robbie) or the Chief of staff (Karen Adams). I ended up emailing Karen Adams because emailing one of the higher in command (not necessarily at the top though) would allow the individual to develop their own persuasive techniques to sway the president and other authorities one direction, had I convinced her of my solution. Also, The fact that the Chief of staff is a woman helps my proposal. Since the majority of the victims in this case are women, Ms. Adams would better sympathsize with my issue.

    Knowing that someone was going to read my proposal inspired me a little bit to revise it. I already wrote it with the audience of Indiana University administrators in mind, but  having a specific administrator helped me in my use of audience appeals. By Writing to someone closely involved with academia, using logos helped me to solidify my points and simplify my paper so that my audience would understand and find my proposal quite agreeable. My credibility was established through the mention of my experience with one of the prevention techniques, and through my use of quoting other credible sources. I was able to heavily incorporate pathos into my proposal as my audience is female, and could relate to the fears, concerns, and general temperament around issues of sexual assault. This made my audience more specific, as sending it to a member of the opposite gender may not have the same emotional impact as sending it to a woman.

I receive many benefits from writing this proposal. As a student, I benefit in knowing that there are precautions to my safety on campus and that education is highly valued. By having other safe schools, I have another option if I had to transfer and a general feeling of peace of mind. As a person interested in maintaining harmony through the law and justice system, I believe my proposal would restore balance to a place where it was lost. Also, I mentioned in my proposal how laws are violated when college justice systems punish the students the way they currently do. Students, myself included, would benefit from having a safe campus that doesn’t break laws and support criminal activity. Finally as a woman, and someone who believes in equality and safety for all,  it would be a step in the right direction in eliminating systematic sexism and crimes against women. I feel like everyone (all genders) could benefit from that. Along with defeating patriarchy, it also gives me a sense of ease, knowing that colleges are taking care of their students.