The Research Paper is Creating Horrible Writers

I’m a third-year student at Ohio State. If you read any of the humanities papers I’ve written this year, I guarantee that you’d fall asleep before you reached the end. And yet, I’ve managed A’s on all of them.

I’ve learned how to write what professors want to read.

Professors expect specific content, formatting, and style from the essays we submit. It makes it easier for them to grade and limits the number of “surprise” submissions they receive.

But it also limits a writer’s creativity.

Pros and Cons of Writing Requirements

Here are the four main limitations that instructors impose on students:

1. Word Count Requirements

Giving a minimum word count is the easiest way to prevent insufficient arguments. Without it, students may not dive deep enough into the topic and miss expectations.

However, these requirements can also lead to papers that are verbose and stretch arguments too far. If you can convey your idea in 1000 words, why struggle to stretch it to 2000?

2. Citation Requirements

“ Your analysis must include an interpretation of 3–5 works of literature, and should draw from a minimum of 5 critical/scholarly sources. You must use proper MLA in-text citations.”

It’s an important skill to be able to read academic papers and repurpose their arguments. Professors often regulate the type and number of sources that students can use with the hope of hitting this learning objective.

This often leads to an over-reliance on outside sources and a lack of critical thinking about their own argument. If a student finds a solid source, they’ll often just pick out a few quotes and change their argument to easily incorporate them.

When “all arguments must contain supporting evidence”, a student’s prior knowledge or experience suddenly doesn’t matter. This also limits the argument to things that have already been written about. Good luck being original!

3. Content Requirements

Broad themes help to steer students in the direction of the class’ learning objectives. Sometimes, though, instructors will take it a step further and offer thesis statements to choose from.

This takes away much of the research process that helps students develop their ideas and leaves them no incentive to find a creative topic that they actually want to write about.

4. Structure Requirements

More often than not, professors give suggestions for the layouts for papers. This could be a target number of paragraphs, how many pages to give an argument, how many sentences an introduction should be, etc.

The five-paragraph essay structure should have been abandoned in middle school. Yet, some professors continue to hold their student’s hands by giving them essay templates.

Often, the hardest part about writing is organizing the content in a logical way. Depriving students of this struggle leads to cookie-cutter papers that nobody actually wants to read.

What Do Students do under these Constraints?

• Use big words to sound smart: My old roommate used to compete with himself to try to get the highestFlesch-Kincaid Grade Level he could on essays. His reasoning: “If it sounds smart, I must be onto something”. With his 14.5 grade level art history paper (unreadable to 95% of America), he got a higher score than me on the essay.
• Pick boring topics that are the easiest to write about: Writing about how thieves are unethical is much easier than writing about how they are. I’d be much more interested in reading the latter, but most students wouldn’t for fear of a bad grade.
• Say what (they think) the instructor wants to hear: Some instructors are more open-minded than others, so it’s risky to guess how your idea will be perceived. Students often avoid controversial arguments or align them with the professor’s views.
• Avoid using what they already know: When instructors note that all arguments must have supporting evidence, students have to avoid referencing any personal experiences or knowledge because it would be considered “unsupported”.

Why is This Such a Bad Thing?

We’ve all gotten an email from a coworker that is way too long or way too boring. Outside of academia, brevity is key.

Find any successful person and I guarantee you they are able to deliver a concise piece of writing. They know that it’s the best way to get more people to listen to what they have to say.

Successful people are the ones who are the best at communicating ideas.

When students aren’t encouraged to convey their ideas in a concise and interesting way, they form extremely bad writing habits that will limit their success.

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To be clear, I’m not preaching that we should get rid of the research paper.

They’re great at teaching how to construct logical arguments and defend them from every angle. That’s an extremely important skill to have in a world where even the news lacks credibility.

But, I do wish we lived in a world where professors would give fewer requirements and incentivize students to try new things.

I think this would lead to more creative arguments, deeper understanding of topics, and writing that wouldn’t put me to sleep.

What can students do?

If an instructor gives you an assignment with vague or minimal requirements — EMBRACE IT. Don’t ask for clarification. Be bold and surprise them with an interpretation of the topic they haven’t heard before.

If there are heavy requirements on the content, try to push the boundary of the topic. Check in with the instructor to approve your outline beforehand if you’re worried about your grade.

When a professor gives word counts and layout requirements, don’t consider them much until the end. After writing, if you think you’re way off target from their expectations but proud of your writing, explain your choices and see if they’ll give you some leeway. Restructure if they don’t.

What can instructors do?

Consider assigning a piece of writing that isn’t a research paper. See if students can convince you that they understand a topic by writing a blog post about it.

This would more closely model the writing they’d do for a company, so I think it has an equally important place in academia.

If you must assign a research paper, write your requirements in a way that rewards unique arguments and doesn’t allow students to use sources as a way to avoid critical thinking.

Be clear with students that you are grading them on the quality of their arguments, not how many words they write, how many sources they use, or if you agree with them.

If a student can convince you that thieves are more ethical than the rest of us — no matter the format, wouldn’t you say that deserves an A?

Courtesy:https://writingcooperative.com/the-research-paper-is-creating-horrible-writers-heres-how-we-can-help-258ff71b9a83