Due dates

A clear thesis statement is due Friday, March 13. This should consist of one to four sentences and present a clear thesis statement or research question around which the paper will be organized. An ungraded rough draft will be due in early April. Late papers will be accepted with 2% deducted per day up until a final deadline.

Thesis statement/research question

One way to frame a thesis statement, which can sometimes also be used as the first one or two paragraphs of a paper, is to present the broad area of research and the purpose of the paper (for instance, the politics of social security reform in 1991/1992). Then tell the reader the purpose of the research (for instance, this paper examines the how and why of proposals for reform in 1991/1992). Then present the research question (for instance, how did the Ross Perot presidential campaign change the debate about social security and what permanent policy and political effects did that have?) This format may not always work, but it is useful for you to think about whether or not your research topic is interesting (what is the broad area of research) and is specific (does it asks a question that can be answered).

I expect the papers to be 8 to 18 pages in length.

Sources

I expect to see at least 6 sources. Sources should be published by reputable academic publishers (university publishers for books or academic journal articles). I recommend using google scholar to facilitate your search for sources. When you have found an article, you might consider looking at articles it cites or articles which cite it for more sources. Google scholar has a feature which allows you to see other articles which cite an article, which I recommend.

Rough draft

In order to assess your progress, I am asking that you turn in a rough draft of your work about 3 weeks before the final paper is due, ie April 11. I assume you will already have some work done, and you should feel free to send me whatever you have, so long as it meets the minimum criteria of being two pages long and being sufficiently well-formed to express the structure of the paper or how you are going to answer the questions.

Final draft

Format

A good paper should be as long as it needs to be. It should include the number of charts and tables that it needs. It should include the number of references that it needs. If your paper is very different from these guidelines, that may be because writing a good paper about your topic requires some adjustment, but it may be a sign that there is a problem. That said, I expect the paper to be between 10 and 20 pages 2x or 1.5x spaced. If you go long, that is fine, but if you go over 25 pages, let me know in advance and tell me why. It may be the case that you should focus more and we might discuss that.

I expect you to use at least 3 academic sources or primary data sources in your main argument. The data of your paper is likely to be the existing research, and the data should consist at least in a substantial part in works outside of the popular press. That doesn’t mean you can’t use popular press, but official or academic publications should be used to ensure some degree of rigor and impartiality. By main argument, I mean that these sources should be used to support your argument, not merely as a part of a review of existing literature.

Some information is best presented as a chart or table and I encourage the use of charts and tables.

Structure

Make things easy on the reader. Use section headers. Don’t write run-on sentences or over-long paragraphs. Your paper should follow the principle of, “In the first part I tell ’em what I am going to tell ’em; in the second part—well, I tell ’em; in the third part I tell ’em what I’ve told ’em.” That is, an introduction and conclusion section should be included.

On top of that, there should be a literature review section near the beginning of the paper and a discussion section near the end. The literature review should discuss recent, similar papers or articles in the academic and possibly popular press. The discussion may include your opinions on the meaning of what your found, policy implications, and/or new questions your research uncovered.

In most cases, material should be your own analysis of existing research. The main body of your paper will likely include the facts of the issue and how those facts inform your research question. It may include a discussion of the model used to address the question (for instance, you may discuss a social science approach or a way of organizing data). It may also include a discussion of how you chose and found your data (for instance, if you are comparing and contrasting a set of policies, how did you chose those policies and how did you come up with principles used to compare them).

Rubric

Following is a draft of the rubric to help you understand how the paper will be graded.

Introduction and conclusion	Introduction explains importance of topic. Includes a clearly identifiable statement of the research question. Conclusion reiterates the research question and explains how the paper answered the question and the papers main points. (20)					Introduction and/or conclusion are insufficient to give a high-level understanding of the point of the paper. (0)
Structure of paper	Paper structure is clear, so the reader understands how the content of each paragraph fits into the paper in general. Usually this is achieved through clear headings and subheadings for sections. Paragraphs generally fit under the appropriate subheading. (10)					Paper flow is broken or contains significant sections which break the flow of the paper.  (0)
Understanding of literature or data	Review of existing literature clearly identifies the research question and conclusion of cited sources. Differences between sources are delineated and implications of sources for this paper are clear. Literature or Data is summarized with a table or diagram. (20)	Review of existing literature clearly identifies the research question and conclusion of cited sources. Differences between sources are delineated and implications of sources for this paper are clear. No data or literature review visualizations are included(15)	Literature review is over-basic, nuances in the sources are ignored. Literature reviewed has obvious holes where more research should have been included. (10)			Paper shows clear misunderstanding of more than one of the sources discussed and literature review contains significant gaps (0)
Use of evidence to support research question	Argument in the paper is clear flows in the writing. Supporting evidence for argument is accurately identified from literature or data. Evidence which does not support argument is clearly understood and discussed and limitations of paper are identified. (20)		Argument in the paper flows in the writing. Supporting evidence for argument is accurately identified from literature or data. Evidence which does not support argument and/or limitations of the paper are ignored. (10)			Paper draws conclusions which are not clearly supported by the evidence identified. (0)
Spelling and grammar	Perfect grammar and spelling is ideal but errors are understandable. Introduction and conclusion should be error free or nearly so. Errors in the content should be minimized so that the reader is not distracted (10)		Spelling and/or grammar errors distract the reader but rarely if ever effects reader understanding. (5)			Spelling and/or grammar is a consistent problem which affects readability and reader understanding.
Sources and Citations	6 or more academic sources, all cited correctly using same style (Chicago or APA preferred) (10)	6 or more academic sources, noticeable errors in citation style (8)	3 – 5 academic sources, all cited using same style (Chicago or APA preferred) (6)	3-5 academic sources, noticeable errors in citation style (4)		2 or fewer sources (0)
Turned in on time:	Turned in May 2 (10)	May 3 (8)	May 4 (6)	May 5 (4)	May 6(2)	May 7 (0)