Monday, September 3, 2012

My name is Shelby Johnson, I was born and grew up in Colorado Springs, Colorado. I'm rather tall and  I love to play sports. I'm normally game for most things; rock climbing, snowboarding, karate, play time down at a gymnastics gym, basically anything fun. Let's see. I am the youngest of 4, 2 older sisters and 1 brother who was lucky to have so many wonderful girls in his life. Sadly, no pets but that's okay. I was a gymnast for 10 years then switched to diving and now dive for BYU. My birthday is Valentine's day, and I think snow is one of the most wonderful things in the world. An interesting thing about me is that I have seriously considered joining the circus. I would mostly do aerial work on those ribbons and trapeze and hoop. I also happen to love it. So there's a short introduction to me.
Op Ed proposal
Shelby Johnson
Topic: Persuading BYU students to jog/exercise more to stay or become healthy.
Relevance: The beginning of the year is so busy and full of activities it's hard to make time to exercise and by the time schedules allow it, most students aren't in the habit of doing so, or weather makes it difficult.
Rhetorical situation: Addressing a young audience, from multiple back grounds including; political, socioeconomical status, and familial connections. My topic applies to all parties and I'm trying to convince them to start a running regimen of just 30 minutes a day.
Claims: By running or jogging or walking for a consistent half hour every day several benefits have been discovered that greatly improve daily life.

  • Endorphins are produced which contain anti-depressant and anti-anxiety properties and increases the pain threshold. "Men are that they might have joy," (2 Nephi 2:25) 
  • Endurance increases, decreasing fatigue and mid-day drooping.
  • Mental efficiency increases, increasing capacity to memorize facts.
  • Stress tolerance increases.
  • Heart health improves
  • Metabolism speeds up.
  • Bones become denser.
  • Body configuration improves, overall shape and posture.
Assumptions: Intelligent audience that will see how this can only help them. Slightly motivated as well, so they'll actually run.

2 comments:

  1. This is a good start. You should probably specify how many days a week you should run. You say every day, so are you convincing your BYU audience to run on Sundays? Doesn't the body need a rest?

    Make sure to remember counterarguments as well. How could someone argue against this?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I would remember that there are people who absolutely hate running. And there are some other people who would like to start, but don't know how to start or where to go to find out. May mention something about where you can go to get started?

    ReplyDelete