Intellectual Perseverance

To define a person’s character, critical-thinkers must have and build upon nine different character traits (confidence in reason, intellectual humility, intellectual courageous, intellectual empathy, intellectual integrity, fair-minded, intellectually engaged, intellectual perseverance, and intellectual autonomous).

 Among the nine traits listed above is intellectual perseverance; intellectual perseverance can be defined as: ones willingness and consciousness to obtain and practice his or her intellectual insights and accuracy despite difficulties, obstacles, and frustrations. In addition to have a firm understanding of his or her rational principles despite oppositions from others, one must overcome resisting confusion and breach unsettling questions in order to achieve a deeper understanding or insight and arrive at a desired conclusion.

Intellectual perseverance is the beginning stage of thinking, in this stage one starts to notice associated problems in his or her thinking, but is deficient in the information needed to reveal solutions. Most problems are not easily solvable and can sometimes be complex in nature. Intellectual perseverance presents a person the ability to work though such complexities despite related complication and/or frustrations he or she may encounter. For example: In my UCF Cornerstone class, intellectual perseverance was essential to understanding how to effectively manage multiple related activities without affecting the quality of the experience each of my team member received.

Partnering with Marine Recourse Counsel, a non-profit organization in Brevard County, our team chose to participate in the activities highlighted below:

1.      Mangrove beach cleanup: to collect mangrove propagules off the shore of a local beach and to provide a safe housing.

2.      Removal of invasive species from Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge.

3.      Planting of native species at The Museum of History and Natural Science, Cocoa FL.

You can view the results of our efforts by visiting: http://titusvilleshorelinerestoration.weebly.com

As team leader, intellectual perseverance gave me the ability to:

·         Manage each of the above listed activities

·         Correspond with Marine Recourse Counsel

·         Assigning and delegate associated tasks for each project

·         Solve all unresolved problems

Summarized below is the lessons learned from my UCF Capstone project; highlighting the team’s intellectual perseverance.

For each major phase of the project, identified below is what worked, what didn’t work, and ways our team could have improve.
Project Phase/Task	What Worked	What Didn’t Work	Ways to Improve
Propagule Pick-Up	Meeting everyone at a central location and carpooling. Cut down on cost into the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge	Walking from two ends of the beach and meeting in the middle. The walk was too much for some volunteers	Have checkpoints on the beach were volunteers can drop off findings; not have to carry such heavy loads.
Invasive Species Removal	Removal of the invasive species was successful with the help of Marine Resource Council volunteer	The first site was already cleared from invasive species. Our contact with MRC had to relocate the entire team and our volunteers.	Have a team member volunteer to scout out the area prior to arrival to allow for any last minute changes.
Propagule Planting	We planted 6 new native plants for the Museum of Natural Science	We had planned to plant mangroves out at the Wildlife Refuge, however that was not possible.	Due to last minute changes in planting location, out team was not familiar with the types of plants we would be working with. We did not have any control over this.
Recruiting Volunteers	Reaching out to the local cub scouts and boy scouts	Posting flyers around BCC and UCF at both Titusville and Cocoa locations.	Recruit volunteers from all generations; to educate both children and adults.
String Activity	Having Marine Resource Council there to assist with recognizing the invasive species	We were successful with this activity	Allow volunteers to become familiar with the invasive species prior to arriving for the activity so they can actively point out the invasive species.
Targets analysis: How effective was the project/team?
Achieve goals and meet project objectives? We were able to effectively meet all of our goals and objectives.
Meet deadlines? We met all of our target deadlines by staying true to our timeline. Most activities were done on the original date assigned; however, we had to push back our planting date due to the shuttle launch.
Monitor and stay within budget? We were able to stay under budget for most activities were based not based on money.
Communicate about the project? We were very effective in communicating. We met after class and on weekends. We also used Grouptable and emails as effective ways of keeping in touch.
Resources assessment: Were the resources allocated to the project (time, money, personnel) appropriate, sufficient, and efficiently used?
Yes, each of our activities had an allotted amount of time. During this time, with the help of 10-15 volunteers, we were able to effectively meet each of our objectives. We collected over 800 mangrove seeds with a goal of 500 and successfully removed 12 Brazilian Pepper trees.
Lessons learned: What are the key lessons learned that can be applied to future projects?
We feel that education was one of the most vital parts of our project. We believe that having the resources to educate people on why these projects are so important is essential to our success.