AllSmilez4U

Personal life

Alyssa Leilani Quichocho Gorrell (1990-Present) better known by Lyss, is a full-time student at Everett Community College in Everett, WA. Though her major is undetermined, Lyss hopes to receive education that will equip her to do long term mission work in developing countries. In addition to being a college student she is currently employed at Veterinary Specialty Center of Seattle in Lynnwood, WA. She has been employed as a Certified Veterinary Assistant with experience in Dermatology and Cardiology (2013-2017) and is now the Referral Coordinator for Neurology (August 2017 - Present).

Lyss is known for being an active volunteer. One of her biggest passions is being involved with Among The Reeds. As the current Secretary of the non-profit organization she preforms administrative roles along with participates in mission trips to Haiti. In addition to individual development through sponsorship of education, she also assists in the medical clinic, dental clinic, vision clinic, providing medical supplies, food and prayer. Lyss continues to support her local community by also dedicating time to SnoCoRo (Snohomish County Rotaract Club). Once again she holds the current title of Secretary and is known to not only participate in SnoCoRo events but also with a few local Rotary Club’s charity events. When she is not active with school, work or volunteering she enjoys learning kreyòl, dancing hula and spending time with her family.

Wikipedia interest

Parts of Wikipedia that would interest Lyss would be topics that contribute to her life goals. Researching areas of Sociology or Anthropology can be beneficial. In this process she can discover links to more information or get ideas for a career path. If Lyss becomes involved with Wikipedia long term, she could connect to pages on Haiti. She believes understanding Haiti’s history and culture as a whole will help with building relationships and developing individuals. For sentimental reasons Lyss could even investigate pages related to Guam or the Chamorro people to better understand her own ancestry.

Article assessment

My mission trips to Haiti have created a deep passion for the culture and the country. While integrating with the locals and growing relationships I found it necessary to participate in traditional ways. Public transportation is a great way to become submerged with the people in their everyday lives. I’ve experienced that the common options were paying for a motorcycle driver or ride in a tap tap. I visited the Tap tap page on Wikipedia and found three aspects of it worth commenting on: my discovery of inactive links, the “Travel warnings” section seems limited and there is no information on the average tap tap fare.

Inactive links

Overviewing the page, it seems that the amount of citations are proportionate to the information provided. With further investigation I found that two of the five links are currently inactive. I tried to go to the first reference link provided and then deleted part of the URL which led me to the original article about Haiti, but I was unsuccessful to find any mention of tap taps.

Travel warning

I feel the sentence in the section titled "Travel warnings" is bias and without enough citation. “Many developed countries” to me feels that the statement should be supported by three or more 'developed countries'. Yet I find it was then followed by one sentence to represent Canada’s view then another sentence for the United States’ view. The sentence about Canada is cited, the link is active, and the page is current; this can not be said about the statement for the United states’ view. Although the statement for the United States was also cited, the link is inactive.

Fare

With the understanding that the cost of public transportation can fluctuate I think some information would give the reader a peak into Haiti’s current economics. There was an anonymous statement at 9:48pm, 11-01-08 on the Talk: Tap tap page to add information about how 'blans' (non-Haitians) are generally over charged than Haitians. This subtopic could include that detail while leading to further Wikipedia pages such as the Haitian gourde. If it was to give costs per town and city it could include links to the corresponding locations.

End of Mission

To conclude I am very pleased to find a Wikipedia page about tap taps. I appreciate the few photos that were included and will say from personal experience they are accurate in appearance. I feel readers can get a basic concept of a tap tap from the information provided. With some constructive criticism, this page can be improved. Correcting the links or finding new sources would give the Tap tap page more reliability. Reviewing the "Travel warnings" section would encourage a more neutral and accurate representation. Like any Wikipedia page, adding a key subtopic such as the average tap tap fare would grow the article in a well-balanced way.  

(Sidenote: As part of this assignment, I also posted a question on the talk page of the Tap tap page here)