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Your grade is determined by the following 4 primary criteria:

THESIS ARGUMENT - roughly %50
A paper that doesn’t have a thesis argument will not receive a passing grade. You must do more than compare and contrast. You MUST take a position and back it up with textual evidence from a variety of research sources.

USE OF TEXT - roughly %25
To back up your argument you will need to use quotes. You will need to pick quotes that actually back up the points you are trying to make. You need to use proper MLA citations (which we will go over many times in class), introducing authors and title names in the paper as you go, and also providing a properly formatted Works Cited page at the end.

ORGANIZATION - roughly %12.5
A good paper follows proper critical essay structure, uses a scholarly tone, has all the basic information in the right places, has transition sentences that make points flow smoothly from one to the next, and presents a complete argument by having points build on one another in a reasonable order.

PRESENTATION - roughly %12.5
Papers should be typed, printed neatly, and be free of spelling and grammar errors. Papers should not be crumpled up, unedited, or sloppy. Pages should be numbered. The title of the paper should be centered and have proper caps. It shouldn’t be three inches high. If you frequently make the same spelling errors --like using the wrong version of there, their, or they’re, for example-- then you need to be on the look out for this problem and do extra read-throughs before you submit your paper to correct the issue.

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• Don’t use clichés, worn out phrases, or the kind of conversational tone that you might use in a diary entry or a letter to a friend.

• Don’t begin your paper with “Since the dawn of time….” or “Did you ever wonder…”

• A college essay should not read like an article in a magazine. The college essay format is NOTHING like the kind of writing you read in Ladies Home Journal, Sports Illustrated, or Entertainment Weekly. Emulating those styles will cause your grade to suffer.
  

• There’s a difference between a SCHOLARLY opinion and a PERSONAL opinion. A scholarly opinion is one that is based on systematic evaluation of texts and materials. A personal opinion (such as “The piece we had to read was really hard…” or “This writer sucks”) is based on intangible personal preferences. Do NOT put personal opinions in your essays.

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•  It amounts to a report. (It summarizes sources and/or the
topic without analyzing them/it.)

•  It fails to engage with sources or contains serious misreadings of them.

•  It reflects an inability to select and use relevant quotations from the sources.

•  It is very disorganized and/or very unfocused.

•  It contains serious citation problems (plagiarism or bordering on plagiarism), or fails to use an appropriate style throughout (MLA or APA preferred).

•  It contains frequent sentence-level errors that impede meaning.

•  It does not meet the page requirement.

•  It does not meet the source requirement.

•  It reflects very little research.

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∗    C essays go beyond report writing to a fairly sustained analysis of a research
interest.
∗    In the C essay the writer uses a theoretical framework, but it may not be entirely
suitable.
∗    The writer does not sustain the framework but does return to it as the essay
unfolds.
∗    The C essay engages with sources, though it may rely heavily on a couple of
them.
∗    Most of the sources and quotations selected are suitable to the paper, but not all of
them.
∗    The C essay begins to use quotations to develop and extend ideas, not only
support them.
∗    The C essay is organized, but there may be sections that lack organization or
focus.
∗    The C essay may have some sentence-level error, but it rarely impedes meaning.
∗    It meets page and source requirements.

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∗    C+ essays are more complex than C essays in one or more significant ways; for
example, they may engage with the sources in more intricate ways.
∗    An essay that looks like a C but reflects more comprehensive research may merit
a C+.
∗    A student might earn a C+ because the essay attempts to work on a difficult
question or issue, or takes risks in challenging dominant interpretations of the
topic.

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∗    The conceptual framework used to analyze the topic or case is appropriate for the
topic, and are in view throughout the whole of the paper.
∗    The author complicates the framework in some way that surpasses a basic
application. This effort may involve using the case material to test (or even to
challenge) the validity of framing concepts, or working with more than one
framing text.
∗    The B essay demonstrates appropriate use of sources. The writer's use of both
conceptual and case material reveals that she or he has clearly entered into a
scholarly conversation.
∗    The B essay uses quotations to develop and extend ideas, in addition to using
quotes to support ideas. The author locates points of disagreement as well as
agreement among the sources, and uses those points to take a position on the issue.
∗    The B essay is generally well organized, though there may be paragraphs or
sections where the essay does not cohere because connections have not been
completely worked out.
∗    The essay contains few sentence-level errors and very few citation errors.

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∗    Is more complex and/or has more depth than the "B" paper in one or two
substantial ways.
∗    The B+ essay reveals a moment when the student's own interpretive approach or
position is well developed.
∗    The B+ essay's use of theoretical framework might be particularly sophisticated.

∗    The B+ essay may lack the ambition and scope of the “A” paper but is highly
proficient.
∗    The B+ essay often has the ambition and scope of the “A” research project but is
one draft away in terms of coherence, control, and/or error.

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∗    The A essay project is ambitious in its projects, the questions it asks, and the texts
it uses.
∗    The A essay uses the case to test the limits of the frame, and may propose an
alternative frame or make appropriate changes to the frame.
∗    A essays reflect complex understanding of the issues raised.
∗    The A essay relies on carefully chosen sources and quotations that demonstrate
that the student has read around in the research area.
∗    The A paper is well-organized and controlled, with few citation and sentence
level errors.