How Community has changed for College Students

Assignment 3:

Essay & Multimodal Component              Topic #1: C/C I&B for Students

Essay: A 6-7 page compare & contrast essay that is research based, & that offers both a critically objective analysis of the topic, & logically drawn conclusions fitting of the topic in focus.

Compare & contrast the importance & benefits of community to/for college students in a typical academic year to college students living through times of great change & uncertainty, such as during a global pandemic (so prior to now, & now…); explore & focus on explaining any similarities &/or differences in the ways that community was/is important & beneficial to college students in each situation, in order to draw some conclusions about the (potential) overall impacts having community has/had/can have for college students & the consequences of such impacts (be careful about how you draw & construct your conclusions-use logical inferences & avoid conjecture or unfounded what-if like scenarios).

It Must Be Research Based : You need to conduct effective college-level research (fitting of an end of semester assignment in a writing intensive course offered through the English department…) to better understand that which you have selected to compare & contrast. Some initial researchable ideas/search phrases are offered below, yet this list is far from exhaustive. Once you start thinking about & generate ideas on the topic, use any new ideas or trains-of-thought as research paths to take (or, less figuratively, as actual search phrases that you use when researching).

•How/why/in what ways community is both important & beneficial, in general & specifically to/for college students

•Why/in what ways/how community may impact college students

•What are the ‘impacts & consequences of impacts’ in times/places of great change & uncertainty

Understanding the Genre Components/A Form of Expository Essay: This general category, or genre, of essay (expository) requires students to investigate a topic, conduct research, evaluate evidence, increase knowledge & understanding of the topic (& all the interconnected elements necessary), in order to develop some logical claims about the topic in a clear & concise manner. This can be accomplished through comparison & contrast, definition, example, the analysis of cause & effect, etc.

Understanding the Genre Components/Compare & Contrast: Comparison in writing discusses elements that are similar, while contrast in writing discusses elements that are different. Crafting a compare & contrast essay, then, requires you to analyzes two subjects by comparing them, contrasting them, or both. The key to creating an effective compare & contrast essay is to choose (or to engage topics selected out of the options given) two or more subjects that connect in a meaningful way. The purpose of conducting the comparison or contrast is not to state the obvious but rather to illuminate subtle differences or unexpected similarities. Drawing distinctions between elements in a similar category can increase the audience’s understanding of that category, which is sort of a big part of why you write it.

To write a compare/contrast essay, you’ll need to make new connections &/or express new differences between two things. The key word here…is new! But no one expects you to reinvent the wheel or discover a new theory of everything; instead, through researching the topics, you’ll discover new to you ideas/facts/considerations. As you compile your research, continue to develop your thoughts, & then set to critically analyze that which you are comparing & contrasting, you’ll be in a good place to show that you’ve made new to you critical connections.

By assigning such essays, your instructors are encouraging you to make connections between texts or ideas, engage in critical thinking, & go beyond mere description or summary to generate interesting objective analysis: when you reflect on similarities & differences, you gain a deeper understanding of the items you are comparing, their relationship to each other, what is most important, & ultimately significant, about them.

Initiating Your Analysis/Investigation: Understanding the Assignment: Some assignments use words-like compare, contrast, similarities, & differences-that make it easy for you to see that they are asking you to compare &/or contrast. Here are a few hypothetical examples: compare & contrast Frye’s & Bartky’s accounts of oppression…Or, compare WWI to WWII, identifying similarities in the causes, development, & outcomes of the wars. Notice that some topics ask only for comparison, others only for contrast, & others for both. But it’s not always so easy to tell whether an assignment is asking you to include comparison/contrast. Note that you’re not just being asked to compare & contrast, there is another vital component to include: in order to draw some conclusions about (see prompt).

In some cases, comparison/contrast is only part of the essay-you begin by comparing &/or contrasting two or more things & then use what you’ve learned to construct an argument or evaluation. Consider these examples, noticing the language that is used to ask for the comparison/contrast & whether the comparison/contrast is only one part of a larger assignment:

•How do the different authors we have studied so far define & describe oppression.

•Compare Frye’s & Bartky’s accounts of oppression. What does each imply about women’s collusion in their own oppression? Which is more accurate.

Initiating Your Analysis/Investigation: Discovering Similarities & DifferencesMaking a Venn Diagram can help you quickly & efficiently compare & contrast two or more things or ideas. To make a Venn diagram, simply draw some overlapping circles, one circle for each item you’re considering. In the central area where they overlap, list the traits the two items have in common. Assign each one of the areas that doesn’t overlap; in those areas, you can list the traits that make the things different.

Making a Chart or charts may help you figure out what criteria you want to focus on in comparing the items. Along the left side of the page, list each of the criteria. Across the top, list the names of the items. You should then have a box per item for each criterion; you can fill the boxes in & then survey what you’ve discovered.

Asking Questions can help you think about the topics in a wholistic way. It’s always a good idea to start by using the questions reporters traditionally ask: Who? What? Where? When? Why? How? And remember, any good reporter, or investigator, knows that there are always dimensions or layers to any line of questioning (Who did it/who did they do it to/who else was there or involved/who witnessed it/who benefits from it…see, many dimensions to any one line of questioning…). You can organize your questions in any number of prewriting forms, such as outlining, free-writing, cubing, listing, etc. Oh, & don’t neglect sensory considerations-if you’re talking about objects or distinct eras, you might also consider general properties like size, shape, color, sound, weight, taste, texture, smell, number, duration, location, demographic, region, time, place, space, etc.

Anticipate Finding the Significance:It will likely benefit you to spend some time early on engaging some prewriting activity allowing you to thoroughly consider the purpose & content of the assignment & the focus of the class. What do you think the professor wants you to learn by doing this comparison/contrast? How does it fit with what you have been studying so far & with the other assignments in the course? Are there any clues about what to focus on in the assignment itself? Ask yourself these questions:What’s relevant to the assignment?What’s relevant to the course?What’s interesting & informative?What matters to the argument (i.e. claims) you are going to make?What’s basic or central, & not just obvious?What’s more important-the similarities or the differences?Why are either of these ‘things’ important?What’s is a likely significance I may find?How will my research on community help me?What larger points might the assignment be asking me to see?And so on….And on…until you’re sure you’ve anticipated the significance!

Submission Guidelines:

-Essay & multimodal component (initial considerations/information on a separate handout!) to be submitted on Blackboard by/no later than the listed due date.

-Your essay must to be 6-7 Full pages (works cited does not count towards total pages of development-this section is placed after your text, on the page after your last page, because, while it’s sort of part of it, it’s also it’s own thing…)

-Files submitted must be accessible (namely, by me, in some regards, a basic person); if you use a niché software/app to make either part of your submission, save it as a more common file type basic people like me will be able to open.