Second Essay Assignment

ENGLISH 101-21 Second Essay Assignment

Issue: As background to our major writing project of the semester, we have discussed the important controversies surrounding universities today as posed by Zachary Karabell. We have also read two essays that address specific issues in modern education - the use of technology in the classroom and student cheating. As authorities on education, both as participants and as researchers, we now want to fully explore one contentious aspect of university life at UK.

Assignment: Write a 4-5 page essay in which you argue something relevant about a contentious aspect of academic life at University of Kentucky. Because you want to situate your discussion of UK in a larger argument, you will need to refer to at least two academic library sources (secondary sources). These sources can function as background information, as a way to establish a problem or question, as an illustration to support your argument, as evidence, and/or as a point of view to argue against. Because you want to use UK as a “case study,” you will want to include field research (primary sources). Primary sources can include interviews, surveys, pamphlets, your own observations, etc. The audience for this essay is readers who are inclined NOT to agree with your position, which means you will have to spend time addressing opposing arguments (refuting them or qualifying your own argument in light of them).

Purpose: . You will continue to practice the process of writing, from brainstorming, to freewriting, to discovering a thesis, to drafting, to revising, to editing. . You will continue to work with the basics of augmentative writing – presenting a clear strong thesis and supporting a thesis with appropriate and convincing evidence. . You will learn to research effectively and to incorporate both primary and secondary sources into an argument. . You will work with the basics of academic writing – organization, audience, paragraphing, introductions, conclusions, addressing opposing arguments. . As a means of gaining more control over your own college career, you will explore the historical debates surrounding academia and to focus on one debate in particular.

Required Readings: Zachary Karabell “The Students” 1-23 Zachary Karabell “Society and Higher Education” 213-231 David Gelernter “Unplugged: The Myth of Computers in the Classroom” (handout) Mark Clayton “A Whole Lot of Cheatin’ Going On” (handout)

Key Due Dates for Essay: 10/20 short writing due 10/25 first draft due 11/13 final essay due CONTENT  Do you have a thesis that argues something relevant about a .60 contentious academic issue at UK?  Are the reasons and evidence in support of this thesis credible, relevant, and fully developed?  Have you included field research?  Have you included at least two secondary sources, not counting internet sources or encyclopedias or popular magazines? In citing these sources, have you represented the author’s point of view without distorting it?  Have you inserted correct parenthetical citations for your sources? Failure to do so may result in a zero content grade.  Do your paraphrases put the ideas of the text into your own words? Are your quotes accurate – do they quote the text word for word?  Does your paper adequately address opposing viewpoints?  Does your paper conclude somewhere in the beginning of page 4 (or on a subsequent page)?  Are there substantial differences between the first and second draft? ORGANIZATION  Does your intro adequately introduce your essay?  Does your conclusion adequately conclude your essay? .20  Is your essay as a whole logically organized?  Is the structure made clear to your reader through transitions?  Are your paragraphs logically organized internally?  Is this organization made clear to your reader through transitions?  Have you eliminated repetition in your paper? STYLE  Is your writing clean stylistically? Do you use strong verbs and active voice? Are sentences concise and clear? Have you .20 combined sentences as needed to create sentence variety? Have you eliminated unnecessary tag phrases?  Are your sentences grammatically correct? Remember not to use “this” or “that” as a pronoun and to use a comma with an introductory phrase. Also remember to use a comma and a conjunction to connect two independent phrases (phrases that can stand alone as sentences).  Is the voice and tone appropriate for the audience?  Is your paper formatted correctly? Is it typed with 1inch margins and Times Roman 12inch font?  Does the heading adhere to the heading modeled in class?  Have you included a works cited page, in correct MLA format, that lists the texts to which your paper refers? Total In-class homework 09/29 *process writing *read and annotate Karabell’s “The *style/sentence combining Students” 1-23 *out of class writing on Karabell Wk 7 10/02 *out of class writing due *read and annotate Karabell’s “Society and *discuss “The Students” Higher Education” 213-231 *discuss second essay *Out-of-class writing on Karabell 10/04 *out of class writing due *discuss *read and annotate David Gelernter “Society and Higher Education” “Unplugged: The Myth of Computers in the *the rhetorical triangle and Classroom” and Mark Clayton “A Whole Lot argumentation, including evidence of Cheatin’ Going On” (handouts) *out-of-class writing 10/06 Fall Break Wk 8 10/09 *out-of-class writing due *decide on a topic *discuss Gelernter and Clayton *freewrite *group work: brainstorm and narrowing ideas 10/11 *freewrite due *generating research questions research questions *discuss second short writing 10/13 Library Seminar *gather, read/annotate, summarize and evaluate sources Wk 9 10/16 *using sources ethically and smoothly *short writing *discuss field research *group work on field research ideas 10/18 *Field Research Day – no class *field research 10/20 Second Short Writing due *draft essay *discovering a thesis Wk 10 10/23 *read and discuss Shelby Steele in- *complete an early version of second essay class *opposing arguments 10/25 Draft of Second Essay due *whole-class workshop 10/27 *whole-class workshop Wk 11 10/30 Draft of Second essay Returned *prepare for conference *whole-class workshop 11/01 *conference-no class *revise – if your essay will be workshopped, be sure to have a revised draft 11/03 *whole-class workshop *revise Wk 12 11/06 *whole-class workshop *revise 11/08 *whole-class workshop *revise 11/10 *style/self-edit – bring a revised draft *revise a final version of second essay to class Wk 13 11/13 Second Essay due *discuss third essay *audience/voice Teaching Philosophy My teaching is guided by the conviction that reading, research, and writing should be collaborative and transformative endeavors. As a teacher, I believe I am most effective when modeling. I ask questions that model critical reading and thinking skills (towards the end of the semester, students will be responsible for generating these questions). My comments on student drafts model the kind of revision suggestions and strategies that students, later in the semester, will apply to both their peers’ writing and their own writing.

To foster collaborative learning, my classes are designed so that course readings, discussions, and writing assignments engage students in a semester-long, shared inquiry. Class discussions focus not only on the theme of the course (such as diversity, higher education, or language & culture) but also on students’ research and writing. Students share versions of their essays in whole-class revision workshops that help to create a classroom community of writers. They also work with me in small writing-group conferences.

In my writing and literature courses, discussions and assignments allow students to discover topics to which they can connect both academically and personally. In fact, students often write essays that combine reflective and academic prose, and their essays are sometimes as much about the discovery process as about the topic itself. Such an investment in the process of inquiry will ideally lead students to see that their academic work can change the way they understand their lives, their world, and their roles in their world. While my literature classes focus, necessarily, on literary history, as well as the historical and social contexts that produced this history, they are also concerned with how students’ read the texts in relation to their own lives. I hope that literature, like academic inquiry, will engage students intellectually and emotionally and morally etc.

I invite the authors we read into the classroom as a way to make writing “real.” Last spring, Bobbie Ann Mason visited my U.S. memoir class to discuss the writing of her 2000 memoir, Clear Springs. So that students begin to imagine their own writing as “real,” they write for audiences beyond their classroom community; students “publish” their work at the end of the semester, typically on a public website or at a public conference/exhibition at the student center. This semester, with the aid of a $450 grant from the UK Stuckert Center, students in an elective sophomore-level writing class that I designed as a service- learning course will publish excerpts of their essays in a chapbook to be used for publicity by the Lexington Volunteer Center. In consultation with a representative from the Lexington Volunteer Center, which serves as a liaison between potential volunteers and local organizations, students will design and edit a collection of profiles, site descriptions, and reflection pieces.

In the spring, I will teach a first-year writing course that takes “diversity” as its theme. We will read memoirs that deal intricately with issues of class, nationality, and/or race, memoirs such as Min-Zang Lu’s Shanghai Quartet and Zohreh Sullivan’s Exiled Memoirs. Through the readings, students will discover points of inquiry to explore in essays that draw upon self-reflection, library research, ethnographic evidence, and in-class readings. Their last paper will explore diversity locally – in their home communities, in Lexington, or on the University of Kentucky’s campus. The capstone of the semester will be a production of a “talk show,” taped in the student center, exploring issues of diversity at UK. Guests could include the director of the Martin Luther King Cultural Center, students involved in International Conversation Hour, etc.

It is important to me to keep up with our profession’s ever-evolving conversations about teaching. I hope to continue to draw classroom practices from these discussions of pedagogical practice and theory.