Writing Exercise: Interview Summary/Synthesis

This  assignment is designed to help inform a topic that interests you, and  the information you gather here will be used in your Proposal Letter  assignment.

For this  assignment, you should be interviewing a person who has expertise about a  topic you are interested in. Please note that you should be conducting  an actual interview; you should not be summarizing an interview  conducted by someone else.

Part #1: Choose a Research Topic and an Interviewee

You  do not need to submit this portion in writing, but you do need to  accomplish this in preparation for your research assignment. 

In  preparation for your research proposal letter in the next topic, you  will need to choose a topic for your proposal. This research proposal  letter will be directed to an audience who can create change  (Congressperson, business administrator, or other similar audience). In  the proposal, you need to suggest a change or a solution to a current  problem. Examples of strong proposal topics would be things like funding  ideas for an animal shelter, starting a recycling program in a  community, suggesting a better plan for public transport, or another  idea that interests you. You will be proposing solutions for these  issues. Choose a topic that you are passionate about and for which you  will be able to develop at least one solution. While this information  should be enough for you to choose a topic, please consult the  assignment sheet within Topic 7 if you have more questions about this  assignment. 

Once you choose a topic, it’s time to choose a credible expert to  interview on that subject. In other words, you should avoid choosing an  interviewee who is a close friend or family member unless that person  truly is an expert in the field. This credible expert should have 10+ years of experience in his or her discipline. Choose  an interviewee who not only could offer some specific details about the  problem but one who may also be able to offer suggestions of a  plausible solution. Use the information contained in the lesson  presentation to secure and conduct a successful interview.

Part #2: Summarize and Synthesize Your Interview

When  you summarize and synthesize, you take the smaller pieces (the sections  of the interview) and develop them into one cohesive piece. Doing this  exercise will help you prepare for the research proposal letter, where  you will need to incorporate at least a few ideas from the interview.

To successfully summarize and synthesize, you might find it helpful to follow this sequence for your essay:

1) Provide Background Information:
In  your introductory paragraph, introduce your audience to your  interviewee. What is his/her name? What is his/her experience? if  relevant, where is the interviewee employed?

2) Summarize the Interview:
While  you want to avoid the all-too-predictable question and answer format,  you should provide information about what you learned from the  interview. Take a look at your original questions, group them into  categories, and use those categories to build your body paragraph(s).  Also, you may note the interviewee’s reactions in your summary as well.  Was the interviewee nervous about answering a question? Did he/she seem  knowledgeable in the subject matter? Make this summary work for you by  including whatever details and responses you feel are important and will  help you when you write the research proposal.

3) Synthesize the Interview:
In the conclusion, synthesize the interview. To synthesize just  means that you should consider all of the information you gathered from  this interview and draw conclusions. What did you learn from the  interview? How did the interviewee and/or the interview help you gain a  deeper understanding of your topic? Other findings?

No  source citations are required for this assignment, but please review  the rubric to get a better idea of how you will be assessed.