Office Hours: MW 11:00-1:00 & by appointment
Email: bickfordl@winthrop.edu Web:http://faculty.winthrop.edu/bickfordl
COURSE OBJECTIVES:
1. To gain experience writing for different audiences, such as those encountered in business and government
2. To gain mastery of basic stylistic techniques in both written and oral presentation
3. To gain experience developing a major written report from initial proposal through final draft
4. To learn editing and revising skills
5. To gain familiarity with the basic formats for reports
6. To gain experience with the use of figures and illustrations for reports
7. To gain experience gathering information without relying on library sources
8. To gain experience using current technology in the most rhetorically effective manner
TEXT: Pfeiffer, William S. Pocket Guide to Technical Writing
In addition, each of you should find, borrow, or purchase a user’s guide to grammar, punctuation, and documentation. The Bookworm stocks the Prentice Hall Reference Guide to Grammar and Usage.
ATTENDANCE:
Students are expected to attend class. An absence for any reason is counted as a class missed.
Four absences will reduce the final grade by five percent. Five absences will reduce the final grade by ten percent. Any student who misses more than five classes will receive an F for this course. Should you be physically present but mentally absent (i.e., texting, surfing the web, sleeping), you will be counted absent. Students who are tardy to class must see me after class or the tardy will count as an absence. Two tardies count as one absence. STUDENTS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING THAT TOOK PLACE IN CLASS DURING THEIR ABSENCE.
WORK STANDARDS:
1. All assignments must be done on a computer, saved to a flash drive and backed up on a hard drive or on your z drive in the Winthrop system. All work should be available to be reproduced at any time throughout the semester. Should you fail to back up your work or be unable to reproduce it, your grade will be lowered by 20% for that assignment. In addition, all written assignments must be turned in through turnitin.com by 5 PM on the due date. I WILL NOT GRADE A DOCUMENT UNTIL IT IS TURNED IN ELECTRONICALLY AND IN HARDCOPY.
2. All work should be submitted on time. Any work not turned in on time will count as a zero. IF SOME EMERGENCY KEEPS YOU FROM TURNING A DOCUMENT IN ON TIME IN CLASS, IT WILL NOT COUNT AS LATE IF YOU HAVE SUBMITTED IT ELECTRONICALLY BY THE TIME CLASS BEGINS, BUT NO CHANGES MAY THEN BE MADE TO THE DOCUMENT BEFORE YOU TURN IN THE HARDCOPY.
3. Work with an error of any kind (typo, punctuation, spelling, format) will not receive higher than a "C." Our goal is work that would be acceptable in business, industry and/or government.
4. Plagiarism of any kind will NOT be tolerated and may result in a grade of zero for the course, depending on the offence. Students are required to review the University’s plagiarism policy in the Student Handbook.
5. All assignments must be completed to earn credit for this course.
ROUGH DRAFT CONFERENCES:
Towards the end of the semester, each of you will be required to meet with me in my office for a conference on the rough draft of your final project. You will be responsible for signing up for a conference time, coming on time to your appointment, and bringing a full rough draft of Part Two of your project. Anyone who misses his or her appointed time or does not bring a full rough draft of Part Two will automatically earn three absences.
ASSIGNED ACTIVITIES:
1. Major project (20%)
2. Oral presentation of major project (10%)
3. Instruction project (10%)
4. Proposal (10%)
5. Audience Analysis (10%)
6. Progress Report (10%)
7. Letter of Application and Resume (10% total)
8. The following shorter assignments will be worth 20 %:
Inquiry Letter
Oral How To
Oral Progress Report
Graphics
Oral Presentation of Instruction Project
BEFORE ANY WORK IS MAILED OR DISTRIBUTED IN CONNECTION WITH ANY ASSIGNMENT, I MUST CHECK AND APPROVE IT.
REVISION POLICY:
You may choose to revise any graded document in this class other than the Major Project. Both the revised copy and the original copy of the document must be turned in, and the grades of each will be averaged together. You may choose to revise a piece of work up to two times, and all revisions are in to me before Rough Draft Conferences begin.
EMAIL POLICY
IT has set up a listserv for this class and automatically enrolled you, using your Winthrop POBox email address. I will be emailing you during the semester through the listserv. If you do not regularly check your POBox email account, please either forward your campus mail to the account you do check or manually subscribe to the class listserv from your preferred mailing address at http://www.winthrop.edu/acc/imailsrv.asp.
I will allow you to email me the draft of a paper, but I will not correct or comment on your paper and email it back to you. If you wish to confer with me about a draft, we will have that conference in person.
STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES:
Winthrop University is dedicated to providing access to education. If you have a disability and need classroom accommodations, please contact Gena Smith, Coordinator, Services for Students with Disabilities, at 323-3290, as soon as possible. Once you have your Professor Notification Form, please tell me so that I am aware of your accommodations well before the first assignment.