15 Jan Advice for preparing your dossier:

Personal Dossier – Your Employer Wants to Know You

Imagine that you are applying for a job, and your potential employer wants to learn about you and your personality. Because this job requires you to closely interact with people in difficult and vulnerable circumstances, your employer needs to know what kind of person you are, and whether or not you would be sensitive to the needs of the people that you are serving. Your employer is interested in how well you know yourself and can express yourself.

Your employer is impressed that you have taken a course in Personality. Thus, in addition to your ability to self-reflect, your employer is also interested in your knowledge of personality psychology, based on what, specifically, you have learned in that course. The student learning outcomes for this Personality course should provide the framework for demonstrating what you have learned. Here are the learning outcomes for this Personality course:

By the end of this course, students should be able to:

1. Compare and contrast the major personality theorists and their theories.

2. Demonstrate an understanding of methods for assessing personality.

3. Demonstrate an understanding of the biological and environmental basis for individual differences.

4. Apply personality theories and research to explain human behavior.

Your final product should be a professional-looking dossier about yourself that you would be proud to present to your potential employer. Your dossier should include:

· A brief (2-3 pages) autobiographical essay that introduces yourself to your employer and explains how your background – and your experience taking this course – prepares you for the position.

· A clear description (3-4 pages) of how the work you did in your Personality class has helped you achieve EACH of the learning outcomes listed above.

o For EACH learning outcome, describe to your employer how the knowledge and skills that you gained will help you in your career and/or your personal life.

· Sources that provide evidence of your learning. Your employer needs to know that you are not simply making stuff up. Therefore, you will need to CITE SOURCES, to show that you have read relevant materials, learned from them, and can now effectively use these sources to back up your claims. Your sources should include:

o Peer-reviewed journal articles (at least two, published within the last five years)

o Assignments you did in this course

o Links to informative web sites

o Notes you have taken from your textbook

o Descriptions of your personal observations of human behavior

· Proper grammar and spelling. Do a spelling and grammar check using your word processor and then proofread to further check for errors. Take care that your writing flows well from start to finish and has good paragraph construction.

· APA style guidelines for citing your sources. Go to the following web site for help: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/

Advice for preparing your dossier:

· Carefully reflect on your overall learning experience in this course.

· Evaluate the quality of the work that you did in this course. Select your best work to include in your portfolio

· Organize your dossier so that it has a clear beginning, middle, and end, and flows smoothly throughout.

· Prepare multiple drafts and carefully proofread your final draft before you submit it onto Moodle.

· If you need any assistance with this assignment, please contact the FranU Learning Resource Center (https://www.franu.edu/offices-services/learning-resource-center).