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TERM PROJECT
THE GLOBAL CHANGE SAVVY CONSUMER
| OBJECTIVE: To construct an
informative report and illustrative slide that recommends a consumer choice or product
based on criteria that you devise and which links or connects to some aspect of
Global Change as addressed in NATS 101-GC. |
Deliverable #1
is to select the type of product you will
investigate & explain: (1) WHY you selected this
product type and (2) DESCRIBE your initial "plan of action" for your in-
depth study of this type of product
(past due) (worth
3 pts)
Deliverable #2
is to write a PARAGRAPH that explains the
specific link in your GC Savvy Project to
GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE and/or one or more of the NATS 101-GC course topics. Submit your paragraph (in
Word .doc or docx, or PDF) in your D2L DROPBOX (past due)
(worth
5 pts)
DIRECTIONS:
NOTE: As you begin this
assignment, it is recommended that you watch the
"Kilowatt Ours" film. We will begin
watching it in class soon and it is posted in D2L.
STEP 1 - Decide on the type of
PRODUCT you are going to evaluate.
(See category choices below or devise your own.)
Some good starting places to begin
thinking about products you might want to evaluate for this
assignment are:
STEP 2 - Develop a set of
CRITERIA (i.e., 3-4 evaluation factors) for how
you are going to evaluate the product.
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At least one
of your evaluation factors must
connect to Global Change
via some topic we've discussed in class this semester.
Some examples: differences in the amount of
CO2
emitted by a vehicle based on fuel economy, the
crashworthiness of a vehicle (remember Laws of Motion?),
where the product came from and the amount of CO2
emitted to get it to you, differences in the degree of full
spectrum UV protection, whether the product is produced in a way
that exacerbates deforestation, whether the product is
recyclable or made of recycled "post-consumer" material., etc.)
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For appliances and some other types of products, the
government's
ENERGY STAR
RATING is a good way to compare energy usage (and
sometimes water usage) within product lines.
What is Energy Star
How to interpret the Energy Star Label
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Here are two good consumer websites for environmentally responsible
shoppers:
Co-op America (Green America)
www.coopamerica.org
& Co-Op's
Responsible Shopper website
The Better World Shopper
www.betterworldshopper.org
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The other criteria you use
can be anything you decide is important to you: cost,
reliability (frequency of repairs on that model), longevity,
specific functions you want in the product, quality, style,
taste, availability, "coolness factor" etc. -- as long as you
define specifically what you are looking for in the product.
STEP 3 - Do RESEARCH
(and/or "Field Work") on the choices available within your
product line via the web or by "window" shopping in actual stores.
Select 5 different items or
examples from that product line that you are going to compare
and evaluate.
(click here for an optional worksheet for recording your
data during your "field work")
If needed, make calculations
to compare one product with another in comparable units.
NOTE: you do not need
to purchase anything for this assignment, what you are doing is
research in order to make wise purchases in the future.)
In general you should select items of the same type
of product for a fair comparison, but this may depend on the
category of product you are evaluating -- see the
guidelines for each category).
STEP 4 - Summarize your research in an organized way with
COMPARISON
TABLES that display the data you collected and rate your
product models according to your different criteria . [see
Example ]
-
Your
DATA TABLE should illustrate the
differences between your products by displaying the data
you gathered for each one. It should also include some annotation
explaining what information you collected and why. (Either
here or in your write-up you must explain -- in a paragraph -- the connection to
global change for one of your factors.)
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YOUR
RATING TABLE
should display your products rated and/or ranked according to
your rating system. (A separate caption -- in text or table
format-- should be included to explain your rating system.)
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You can use whatever type of
table design you wish, as long as you construct the table
yourself and don't just copy an existing table from, say,
Consumer Reports
or
www.fueleconomy.gov
. The table can be constructed
in a word processing program and doesn't have to be fancy.
You can use symbols to communicate information (see
use of symbols in this example of a Consumer Reports
type table), or simply enter numbers, words or phrases in each
cell of your table to communicate how you evaluated that product
(see following examples).
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For a "model" of how to
construct your DATA &
RATINGS COMPARISON TABLES, see this
EXAMPLE OF COMPARISON TABLES which is based on a
fictitious product and hypothetical data.
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Optional: In addition to presenting your
collected data in a table and organizing it in ranked form in another table, you
may also wish to illustrate it with an optional graph or
chart to make your presentation more effective. Here are some
EXAMPLES OF CHARTS (xls format) using the same
example as above. For illustrating your rating results on
your PowerPoint slide (Step 6), a graph might be more effective
than a table -- but you are not required to include a chart or
graph.
Learn
how to create a TABLE in MS Word and/or construct a CHART (graph) in MS
Excel HERE.
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It is important that you
fully explain the information in your tables and state how you
obtained your data and derived your rating system either in the body of your WRITE-UP
(Step 5) or in detailed table captions accompanying your
tables.
STEP 5 - Compose an
EXPLANATORY WRITE-UP
of 2 (or more) pages1 containing:
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an
introduction
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a paragraph describing
what you did to investigate and evaluate a
product
-
a
paragraph
explaining your selection or ranking criteria (i.e.,
your evaluation factors)
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a
paragraph on how at least one of your evaluation
factors links to GLOBAL CHANGE and/or our
class .
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your
final "The Bottom Line" recommendation with a
reasoned explanation of the basis for your
conclusions
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a
reference list showing sources for your information
(e.g., webpage URL's, etc.)
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At the very end, add your TABLES (Step 4).
If you created any (optional) CHARTS or GRAPHS, add
them at the end also. The Tables and optional
Charts are in addition to the 2+ pages noted above.
1
The total length of
the write-up is flexible.
You don't need to email Dr H to ask if you can go over 2 pages
or if it should be double or single spaced. Use the length
and spacing you need to get your information across. Just don't go to either
extreme: i.e., a "bare bones" report with minimal
content or an over-the-top report with too much info or lots of
verbage without saying much!.
STEP 6 -
Create a single
POWERPOINT SLIDE
-- one (1) slide ONLY, not a presentation! -- that will attractively present your "GC Savvy
recommendation" to the class during our class
slideshow and which illustrates its
connection to global change and/or NATS 101-GC.
The slide must contain the following items:
(click here to see a SAMPLE SLIDE
based on the fictitious product used to illustrate the table
and chart in Step 4).
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your
NAME
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a product you are recommending
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a
clear connection to GLOBAL CHANGE
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some specifics explaining the
connection to Global
Change (in a phrase or sentence).
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information about your rating of the product
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your "BOTTOM LINE" statement about the
product (from your WRITE-UP (Step 5).
CAUTION FOR MAC USERS:
be sure your ppt file will view properly on a PC
before you submit it to the D2L Dropbox. PC's will not display
TIFF *(.tif) files in PowerPoint (ppt or pptx). If you
want to insert an image, save it as a JPEG (.jpg) file BEFORE
you put it into the ppt slide. When you copy and paste an image
with a Mac, the default is a TIFF file so you must save the
image as a ,jpg file whenever you copy and paste it into your
PowerPoint. It will look fine when you view it on your
Mac, but will come up blank when the same file is displayed on a
PC. See this
LINK for details about problems
that sometimes arise.
STEP 7 - Deposit both your WRITE-UP file (doc or
PDF)
and your SLIDE file (ppt) in the
D2L DROPBOX
by the DUE DATE & TIME
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