Class Power and Inequality; Final paper Option (200 points)

Report due 12/7 via Canvas by 11AM (5-6 pages; 200 points)

This assignment is to write critical overview of a topic related inequality (race, class, gender, sexuality, etc.). The goal of the assignment is to summarize a social problem or issue related inequality, power, or class in US society or abroad. You should find several sources to summarize the key features of the selected urban problem or issue.

In this paper, choosing a topic that is interesting and researchable is vital. This topic should be specific enough that it is focused and coherent yet broad enough to be able to find others who have been interested in the same topic. A good way to determine if your paper topic will work is to formulate your topic as a research question. Examples of excellent topics/questions might be “How does racial segregation in urban/suburban schools affect student outcomes?”; “How has the growth of finance affected income inequality in affluent countries?”; “How has the War on Drugs created racial and class inequalities in American society?” or “How do social programs provided by the government and social organizations help and/or hurt the poor?” If you are unsure about the quality of your topic, please email me.

The paper should be divided into five sections marked off by headings (Ex: Introduction). In the first section, the Introduction, you should briefly describe your research topic/question, why you decided to research the topic, and why this topic is relevant to society. You should also give a very brief overview of the literature you will examine in the body of the paper. In the Key Issues section, you should go into more detail on the topic that you chose and make connections between the different readings and research found on your topic. A good way to approach this section is to identify the main causes, consequences, and potential solutions to the problem that you are examining. A major challenge to this assignment is to remain concise in order to not go too far over the page limit. You should have identified at least 5 sources for the report. All sources should be properly cited in the paper using ASA (or a similar format) and included in the references section. In the Evaluation section, you should briefly evaluate the literature you have examined. Questions to answer include: What evidence do you find convincing? What evidence is not as convincing and why? What new questions do you have? In the Conclusion section, you should briefly restate your research topic/question, briefly summarize the literature and how you evaluated, and then state what you feel you have learned from writing this paper. The final section is the References section.

This 5-6 page paper should be written in Times New Roman 12-point font, double or 2-point line spacing, and standard margins (1 inch).

PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS ASSIGNMENT IS DUE AT 11AM and not 11pm as usual.

Topical Research Paper rubric

Report, 200 points (Due 12/7 by 11am)

30pts: Introduction- Do you properly introduce your topic? You should give a basic description of what you will be discussing in this paper. Also explain why you chose to write what you did and why it is relevant to society.

40pts: Key Issues- What does the literature you have found say about your topic? Do you make connections between the different readings? To achieve the maximum possible grade, you should interweave the discussion of your different sources instead of having separate paragraphs for each one.

40pts: Evaluation- You should address the following topics: What do you make of the evidence in the sources? Are their arguments sound or do they have logical errors?What new questions do you have?

30pts: Conclusion- Do you summarize and conclude the paper appropriately? Do you restate your research question or thesis? What have you learned from writing the paper?

20pts: Overall organization- Does your paper have a logical flow? Do you jump around all over the place or speak about one issue (or at least interwoven issues) at a time?

20pts: Grammar- Do you write with proper sentence structure, spelling, and word agreement?

20pts: Citations and References-Do you have at least 5 sources? Do you properly acknowledge them?