For your second project, you’ll be focusing on a common genre in academic writing: the persuasive essay (sometimes also referred to as an argumentative essay). Essays that are assigned in college courses are often expected to be persuasive in nature. That is to say, it’s expected that your essay will have a stance or a point that it’s trying to make and that you will use evidence of some sort to support that point.
Additionally, persuasive writing can be found in many genres. A cover letter is attempting to persuade a company to hire you; a business report may be attempting to suggest a change to upper management; a professional email might attempt to convince your team to use a different process at your workplace when the current one isn’t working.
Topics: Choose ONE of the following:
Argue for a policy or process change in your current or former high school or in the school your children go to.
Argue for a policy or process change in a procedure in your workplace.
Argue for a policy or process change in your local neighborhood. (This needs to be very local, as in the neighborhood you live in or work in. Do not try to tackle large systemic issues here).
Argue for a policy or process change in a volunteer or religious organization that you belong to. The change should be focused on a local issue, such as the way that volunteers are selected for leadership positions, rather than large-scale issues such as a change in the mission statement or beliefs of the organization.
This needs to stay LOCAL. In other words, do not choose a topic that would need to be handled at the state level or at the uppermost management of an international corporation. Make an argument for a policy change in your school, your office/workplace, your organization, or your (very local) community.
To get started, I recommend that you first brainstorm potential issues and then pick one or two issues and brainstorm potential solutions. The paper will establish the problem/issue but primarily focus on presenting and arguing for a solution to the problem.
The change you argue for must be directed toward a logical audience, which means addressing someone with the ability to make the change. Arguing that your high school should add a swimming pool won’t logically work if you address students, who cannot make this change happen.
Length: 700-900 words
Note: The minimum word count must be reached; upper limit is a suggestion, but you will not be penalized for going over.
Genre: Choice of email, formal letter, or essay
For this assignment, you’ll be allowed to choose from the following three genres: academic essay, professional email, and professional letter. The email and letter will have some small differences in formatting and possibly their introduction and conclusion paragraphs from the essay, but in general, all three of these genres will follow the same overall organization and content as an academic essay for the purposes of this assignment.
Familiarize yourself with the genre that you have chosen before starting your draft. You may look up genre samples (letters, emails, or essays to better see the structure and conventions of the genre you choose, but do not include any outside secondary sources within your paper)
You will not be allowed to use secondary research for this assignment.
You can use primary research only, such as personal experience, observations, and interviews.
There should be no books, articles, or other research used in the writing of this paper though. (Research writing is covered in ENGL 1190).
I strongly recommend creating an outline before writing this paper as persuasive writing needs to be organized in a specific way based on the conventions of this type of writing. (We will cover this throughout this unit).
To prepare for writing this essay, you will:
Choose a topic from the list below to write about.
Choose one of the following genres to write in: academic essay, professional letter, or professional email.
Choose a specific change to argue for based on the optional topics.
Come up with a plan for how the change could be implemented.
Determine what evidence you need to support your argument and collect your evidence.
For any of these topics, please note the following:
Your essay, letter, or email should...
establish the problem or issue using evidence (this can be things you observed, an interview, your personal experience, etc).
suggest a solution to the problem (this is the policy or procedure change)
include steps needed to implement the solution
include a refutation (counterargument) section
If you are writing about your workplace or a small community/organization, I recommend that you do not identify anyone by their actual name for this class assignment. Make up the name of your company or audience, for instance, to preserve confidentiality. (Basically, if you’d be concerned about someone at your workplace reading this, use pseudonyms/fake names).
Your paper should be formatted as is typical for your chosen genre. If you chose to write an essay, please use MLA formatting. If you choose a letter or email, use the expected conventions including font, spacing, margins, etc. that would be expected for that genre (you do not need to put a typical header on your paper for these genres with your name, class, etc—just format them like the genre would be formatted).
You will be working in your teams to review each others’ papers and give one another feedback. If your team has two or fewer members present today, please let me know and I’ll combine you with another team.
To start, bring up your paper on the computer in Google Drive. Share your draft with the person who will be your peer reviewer in Google Drive using the share button on the document.Once you are done with Round One, you can switch again for round two. You only need to review two papers today (so, in a team of four, everyone won’t read everyone’s papers).
Read the entire draft.
Keep your tone positive and make suggestions for the other student (see "In-Class Peer Review" reading for more on this).
Use complete sentences and specific examples from the rough draft to clarify what you are referring to. Do not address the spelling, punctuation, grammar, or mechanics.
At the end of the paper, answer the following questions. (You can use the numbers to organize your points).
Is the paper logically organized? Does it include evidence to support its claims?
Does the author use specific examples and evidence to support claims?
How persuasive is the evidence/argument? If you were the target audience, would you be persuaded by the evidence/argument? Why or why not?
Does the paper give a fair showing of the arguments on both sides of the issue? Why or why not? (e.g. counterargument)
What are one or two things the author is doing well as far as the writing goes? (Think high/middle order concerns like organization, flow, logic, paragraphing, etc.)
What are one or two areas that can be improved? (Focus on high/middle order concerns)
Remember, BE SPECIFIC. Point to specific parts of the paper to explain your points/suggestions. The point of peer review is to help your partner become a better writer. Please write/sign your name before or after your peer review.
If you are absent on the day of peer review, you must work with a Reading and Writing Studios tutor to get feedback on your draft. Please let them know that you would like them to focus on high and middle order concerns for your feedback and show them the above questions. To receive credit for peer review if you work with a tutor, you must create a PDF of the session summary email you receive from your tutor after the session is complete.
NOTE: before revising your paper from your draft, make a copy of the file, so that you don't overwrite the draft.
All revisions must be done in Google Drive so that I can view a history of your revisions.
After peer review, you will revise your rough draft. Focus on high and middle-order concerns during this revision. While editing and proofreading are appreciated, you will be graded on having completed high/middle order concern revision.
I recommend the following steps for revision:
Make a copy of your rough draft in Google Docs and rename the file to Revised Persuasive Paper.
Read through your peer review feedback.
If you went to the Reading and Writing Studios, also look through that feedback.
Make a list of major revisions that you plan on doing, starting with the highest-order concerns.
Double-check that you are working in the "Revised" draft file (and not your rough draft). All revisions will need to be made in this document in Google Docs.
Work your way down from the big picture (high order concern) revisions, such as rearranging information, adding or deleting sentences, etc., to the smaller issues.
To make a copy of a document in Google Docs:
Go into the document.
Click on File > Make a Copy
Rename the file: Revised Genre Analysis
Check that the folder shows "Project 2" (if it does not, click on the folder and use the arrows to navigate to the correct folder).
Check the button for "Copy comments and suggestions" (this will allow you to easily see any peer review comments while you revise your paper).
Then click "Make a copy"
Note: Before you turn in your project, delete or clean up all peer review comments from your REVISED draft (leave these in your rough draft). You may want to leave them up there while you work on the revisions, but the final copy should be a clean copy.
Double-check that you are working on the correct file when you work on your revisions. You may want to close out the rough draft tab in your browser to make sure you aren't accidentally flipping to the wrong one.
For each paper, you will fill out a reflection and self-evaluation form to reflect on your writing process and evaluate your work. The form will need to be copied to your Project 2 folder in Google Drive and the completed form will be due with your Project 2 submission packet.
How to Make a Copy of the Form
Go to the Reflection and Self-Assessment Forms folder in our class public Google Drive folder.
Locate the form for Project 2 and double-click on the form to open it.
Once the form is open, click on File and then Make a Copy.
If Make a Copy is greyed out, check that you are logged into Google on your computer/browser.
Change the folder to your Project 2 folder in your ENGL 1180 folder.
To change the folder location, click on the folder name in the pop-up window.
Then click on All Locations at the top of the pop-up window.
Navigate to your Project 2 folder by double-clicking on: My Drive > your ENGL 1180 folder > Project 2
Once you have navigated to your Project 2 folder, click Select.
A copy of the form should now be in your Project 2.
Filling Out the Form
Carefully read the different areas of the form and fill out the form thoughtfully and thoroughly. Further instructions are located on the form.
Your Project 2 Submission Packet is a sort of ongoing portfolio, which will need to include the following:
☐ Persuasive Paper rough draft
☐ Peer review(s) from classmates
The peer review will be on your rough draft (no need for a separate document).
If you are using your late freebie on this assignment or are absent on peer review day, you have two options for peer review:
Find someone else in class (or several people) who is also taking a late freebie and exchange papers and peer review each other’s papers outside of class. Make sure you read “In-Class Peer Review” beforehand and use the Peer Review questions above.
Go to the Reading and Writing Studios to look over high- and middle-order concerns. You can show them this handout as a general guideline for the type of feedback you are looking for. They will have a form that you can show me as proof of attendance.
Note: you cannot use this visit to count as your required Reading and Writing Studios visit for this project.
☐ Revised Persuasive Paper
The revised essay must be 3-4 pages (700-900 words), be in the genre of an email, formal letter, or essay, and use support from primary sources (such as observations, gathered statistics, an interview (formal or informal), etc.). See the Persuasive Paper section above for a full list of the requirements and the prompt.
All revisions must be done in Google Docs so that I can view a history of your revisions. See the "Revised Persuasive Paper" section above for further instructions.
☐ Reflection and Self-Evaluation Form
Remember: All of the requirements for the individual items need to be met and all of the items in the submission packet need to be included in your Project 2 folder to get full credit (check plus).