4th Year CMNS Student’s Tips on Writing a Paper

Tip 1: Start early, start small

When I say ‘start small’, I literally mean it. For me, the first day I start working on a paper is used only to write a plan and look at some sources. 30 minutes, that’s it. However, I start at least 10-12 days in advance.

Starting a paper is quite daunting, so the phenomena here is that by at least starting somewhere with your paper and early, you’ll feel more comfortable going back and adding to it.

It sure beats pulling all-nighters and/or being super stressed for a couple days, that’s for sure.

Tip 2: Use your TAs and Professors

I can’t really say anything more about this. They have emails. They have office hours. They can literally go over your entire paper (sometimes) and point out your strengths and areas for improvement. Send them as many emails as you need because they’re the ones marking your paper.

However, don’t be me and send 7 emails in one night to your TA asking small individual questions each time. It probably has to get annoying at some point.

Tip 3: Put the weaker parts in the middle

Recommended by Dr. Jody Baker himself, the thinking is that markers will mostly remember the beginning and ending sections of the paper, while the middle section will lose some focus from the marker. So, if you have a section you’re stressing about because it might not be as good as your other ones, just make it fit into the middle of your paper.

Tip 4: Don’t lose marks on citations

Man, losing marks on citations really grinds my gears. I’m a 4th year student, and I’ve almost exclusively used Citation Machine. Sure, sometimes I’ve had to make some edits because the site isn’t perfect, but it has worked probably about 90-95% of the time.

Just make sure you check your citations, and cite as you go! Every time you reference something, just throw it in the back. Saves a lot of stress, believe me.

Tip 5: Use many different sources

You guys know the list of sources that your professor will include in your paper guidelines and it almost always includes the minimum amount? Yeah, go above that.

In my personal experience, TAs and professors love to see even the smallest of claims backed by multiple academic sources. It looks weird and questionable if for most of a subject, you reference mainly one or two sources and then throw in a source here and there to make the minimum requirement.

Spice it up! Make it look like you did some research (totally not just spam-search related articles, only read the abstract, and pick out random bits of information along the way).

Tip 6: Proofread. Seriously.

I can’t stress this enough. Even just one read-through to check for simple grammatical mistakes could make the difference between an A paper and a B paper. Too many times have I heard professors say that there’ll be at least 10-15% of the class that doesn’t check their work at all and that it’s quite evident when grading. You’d be amazed at how much your papers can improve if you simply check over them.

My personal advice? Give it to a trusted friend or family member too! Outside feedback is always great, and if you finish early, why not check it with your TA? They’ll help pave the way for an easy A!