Research Paper Assignment

Danny Mayer
Fall 2009
Research Paper Assignment

This fourth (and final) writing assignment returns you to your blog work. Specifically, you will write a research paper that develops one aspect of your blog. You may choose to expand upon a theme or topic already addressed in one of your blog postings. Conversely, you may choose to develop an aspect of your topic that appears in many of your blog postings. With either choice, I am interested in seeing you transform the informal writings into a more developed, more formal, better researched writing.

If blogs are for short bits of information that don’t have to directly connect with each other, your task in writing the research paper is to sustain your focus on a single, dominant idea.

The article should further develop the analysis skills you began to use while writing your previous short summary/analysis essay, and your research skills you began to use while writing your long newspaper article. This assignment requires you to research and incorporate at least 5 outside (non-class) texts into your article; two of the sources should come from a library (ie, a site that is not Google, Yahoo, etc.).


Basic Guidelines: Essays should be between 1600 and 2000 words in length and have a title. They should also be typed in 12 font (Times New Roman font), double spaced, and have 1 inch margins all around. Papers should be in MLA format and include a works cited page. At least 5 outside sources; 2 of the sources must come from a library source.

In addition to these guidelines, we will work through several rough drafts of your work. Subsequently, you are required to prepare 3 separate drafts throughout the assignment. The first 2 drafts will be subject to peer reviews in class. Make sure to bring in drafts on due dates noted on the Week 11-16 Semester Outline (handed out and posted online).

Essays are due the second class period of Week 14 (November 18 or 19).

In addition to following the basic guidelines, I will grade you on your ability to engage with the following new and old principals. NOTE: We will not use MLA citations for this paper. All citations will be informal—that is, they will appear in the text itself. (ie, “According to a recent study in the NY Times,….” Or “Connors-Manke arguest that…”


New Principals: Ability to place research in MLA format; ability to locate and use academic (library) sources.

Old Principals: Ability to locate and incorporate outside research in a manner that does not plagiarize material; acceptable revision drafts that lead to an improved final paper.

Older Principals: Where necessary, creation of an effective summary that leads to detailed analysis; a placement of your ideas into a specific context that the reader can follow; an adequate introduction; a title that introduces the topic and grabs the reader’s attention; an effective integration of paraphrases and quotations into your paragraphs; ability to follow basic guidelines above.

Oldest Principals: awareness of audience (in choosing your topic), writing in complete sentences, using active sentences, defining any key terms, developing coherent and full paragraphs, utilizing elements of narration, description, definition, and/or comparison in your essays.