Reflection

What did you enjoy about this project?

Completing this project was extremely enlightening for me. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about Trinity history in a way that I could feel connected to it. It was extremely excited to learn about two influential and successful athletes that paved the way for me and my fellow athletes today.  

What surprised you about this project?

I was genuinely surprised by how hard it was to find information. I had to sift through articles and articles to find information that was not only relevant to my project, but also interesting to include in my paper. I definitely underestimated how difficult it would be to search for hours at a time with nothing to show for it at the end. Thankfully, my meetings with Professor Graf and the librarians in the Archives section helped me to overcome this challenge and find the information that I needed. 

What was the most challenging aspect of the project, and how did you manage it?

The most challenging aspect of the project was figuring out which information to include and which to exclude. While I struggled to find information in the beginning, when I sat down at the end of the project to synthesize everything, I realized that I had much more than I expected. It was important to me that I did not just compile all of my information into a single document, but that I created a coherent and informative research piece. To do this, I had to be picky and specific about what I chose to discuss in my final project. This was definitely hard as I felt connected to all of the information I had learned over the past few months. 

If you could start over, what would you do differently?

If I could start over, I would spend more time interviewing. My interviews are where I got my most helpful and interesting information. In fact, most of what I learned about my athletes came from talking to people that either knew them personally, or learned about them through the years. The interviews provided me with great first-hand knowledge of my topic. I definitely would conduct more interviews as well as talk with my interviewees for longer if I could start over. 

What did you learn about history and/or the historical process through this project?

Something about history that I didn't learn until the end of this project was the difference between the way that we handle and address sensitive topics today and how they did so in the past. It was extremely difficult to find sources regarding Trinity’s racism in the athletic department during the 1970’s. It seems like a lot of the Trinitonian articles back then were not eager to discuss such important topics, but this has not been my personal experience at Trinity. I find our current community to be extremely open to such discussions as I think that we have learned the importance of communication and understanding of different perspectives. 

What did you learn through this project that can be applied to life outside the classroom?

I learned that history repeats itself. From the start of this project to the very end, this was a reoccuring theme. Seeing the struggles as well as the successes of previous Trinity athletes opened my eyes to just how connected we are to history, even if we aren't always aware of it. I will definitely keep this with me and apply it to my life by continuining to remind myself to use the past as a learning experience. While we cannot necessarily change the past, we can use it to learn and improve our future.