Evaluating Learning
Classroom Participation and Attendance | Research and Writing Projects Memo |
Book Review | Website Review | Project | Evaluation of Team Members
Grading
Classroom Participation and
Attendance
Your individual contributions to the class-making and responding to oral presentations and participating in class discussions-will be an important part of this course. Thus, your participation in class will be the basis for 20% of your course grade. Moreover, you will fail the course if you have more than two unexcused absences from class.
You will write 6 papers (described below), beginning with a short one (a memorandum) and ending with a project report. Mr. Fragale and I will describe each assignment in class, and for most assignments, there will be assigned reading in Pechenik. I will also give you an evaluation form for each assignment.
These forms will function as a check list (Did you format the document properly, submit the appropriate documents, etc.?) and will also describe the criteria by which Mr. Fragale and I will grade your papers.
Except for the pre-proposal and final project report, you will submit each paper twice, first to Mr. Fragale and then to me. Mr. Fragale, using the evaluation form as a guide,will read and mark your paper and return it to you with suggestions for revision. You will then revise the paper along the lines suggested and submit the paper to me, along with the version you submitted to Mr. Fragale and his comments. I will then read and grade your revised paper. Neither Mr. Fragale nor I will mark every mistake, every infelicity, every poorly cast sentence in your papers. Rather we will try to identify, on the basis of the paper you have given us, your strengths as a writer; and we will give you a few pointers on how you can become a better writer. If we believe it appropriate, we will refer you to the Writing Center (KEI-316; ext. 3866) to work on specific aspects of your writing. At the Writing Center you will also find a number of books and useful (and free) handouts on punctuation (e.g., the semicolon, the colon), grammar (e.g., idioms, passive voice, parallelism), and writing papers (e.g., writing introductions). The Center also publishes a book, Model Student Essays, that you may find useful for this and other courses. The Writing Center tutors are very busy, so you should make an appointment if you wish to work with one.
Papers are due at the beginning of class on the dates listed in the Schedule of Classes (see below). For some assignments, I will also ask you to submit a digital version of your paper. You can do this by dropping a copy of it in the Submissions folder for this course on the Curriculum Server. Having access to these digital files will make it easier for me to combine the reviews into a single document for you. For example, I will use such electronic documents to combine all of your book reviews into a single document, which I will then make available to you via the Distribution folder for this course on the Curriculum Server.
On the dates on which most papers are due to me, you will also make an oral presentation to the class in which you summarize-not read-your paper. These presentations will serve at least two functions. First, they will give you opportunities to develop and practice an important skill. Second, they will enable you to tell the rest of us about your project, which will be of general interest to all of us as we work to understand tuberculosis and which may be of specific interest to students working on other projects.
Every paper must have an Acknowledgments section in which you identify the individuals who helped you prepare the paper and the specific ways in which they helped you, for example, discussing ideas, proofreading, editing, helping in the library, etc. The College holds its students to the highest standards of intellectual honesty and prescribes harsh penalties for academic dishonesty, including plagiarism. It is your responsibility to be sure that work you submit conforms to the College's guidelines, as described in The Catalog.
In your memo, you will list the five available projects in your
order of preference, with #1 being your first choice; describe the
reasons for your choices; and tell me what strengths (language
skills, database knowledge, organizational skills, related prior
experience, etc.) and interests (interest in the topic, career
goal, etc.), that you will bring to the project. The choices for
projects are:
- TB in children
- DOTS Plus in the treatment of MDR-TB
- TB in migrant workers (This project will include a modest field component in Lancaster County).
- TB education needs among community health organizations in Lancaster (This project will be primarily, though not exclusively, a field project in Lancaster City).
- Anti-TB vaccines
On Sept. 14, you will choose a book related to this course in the F&M Library. On that date, you will also learn about writing book reviews. You will then write a review of the book you have chosen. In addition to submitting the usual paper copies of your review on Oct. 5, you should also place a copy in the Submissions folder for this course on the Curriculum Server. I will combine the reviews and distribute them to the entire class. One of your goals in writing this review is to tell the rest of us about the potential value of the book for the class projects, in particular which project(s) it might be most useful for.
On Oct. 5, you will choose a web site related to this course and then become familiar with the site. On Oct. 17, each of you will describe your site in a brief presentation (less than 5 minutes) to the class. One of your goals in giving this review is to tell the rest of us about the potential value of this web site for the class projects, in particular which project(s) it might be most useful for.
Working in teams of three (or four), you will prepare four documents on the topic to which you have been assigned.
The first will be a pre-proposal. This document, which is
due to both Mr. Fragale and me on Sept. 28, should have a title
page, about 2 pages of text (this and all other documents should be
double-spaced), and a Literature Cited section. The text should
include an introduction, a thesis statement or a statement of your
objectives, and your plans for developing the thesis statement or
meeting your objectives.
The second document will be a proposal for your project. The
proposal will include an Introduction and background, in which you
will describe the general topic that your team is addressing; the
specific topics that you will address; the resources (books, papers
in the literature, web sites) that you have identified; a
Literature Cited section; a timetable for your work; and a plan for
how you will meet your objectives. The last item should include a
description of how you will divide responsibilities among the
members of your team, how often and when you will meet to work on
your project, and how the actual document will be written. The text
of this paper (excluding Literature Cited) should be 6-8 pages. On
the due date, your team will make a 15 minute oral presentation. An
additional 10 minutes will be allotted for questions and
discussion. Among other things, the oral presentations should
inform the rest of us about your progress and help the other four
teams better understand the place of your and their projects in the
overall scheme of the course.
The third document will be a progress report for your
project. The progress report, which you should consider as
representing 50-75% of your final paper, will include an
Introduction and background; supporting text; a description of what
remains to be done (read, summarized, written); your plan for how
you will finish the project; and a Literature Cited section. The
text of this paper (excluding Literature Cited) should be 10-14
pages. On the due date, your team will make a 15 minute oral
presentation. An additional 10 minutes will be allotted for
questions and discussion. Among other things, the Q&A following
your presentation should help you clarify what remains to be done
on your project.
The fourth document, your project report, will include and
Introduction and background; supporting text; a conclusion; and a
Literature Cited section. The text of this paper (excluding
Literature Cited) should be 14-18 pages. On the due date, your team
will make a 25 minute oral presentation. An additional 15 minutes
will be allotted for questions and discussion. For the oral
presentations, I will invite a discussant to participate in the
response to your paper. The discussants will be F&M faculty,
physicians, or public health officers.
By Sunday, December 3, you should send me an email in which you succinctly evaluate the contributions of your collaborators to the project.
Memo - 25 Points
Book Review - 50 Points
URL Review - 20 Points
Project -
Pre-Proposal - 40 Points
Proposal - 50 Points
Progress Report - 90 Points
Project Report - 125 Points
Class Participation - 100 Points
Total - 500 Points
