Course Syllabus
English
235 – Technical Writing |
Email:
pat.mesch@bellevuecollege.edu |
Fall Quarter 2013 |
Office:
R230 |
Instructor:
Patricia Mesch |
Voice
Mail: 425/564-2099
|
Office:
425/564-2341 |
Textbook: practical STRATEGIES for technical communication,
by Mike Markel
Course Requirements:
1. Assigned textbook reading (often 2 or more chapters a week)
2. Weekly Discussion Board
3. A Comparative Feasibility
Research Study [requiring technical data
collection,
analysis, and presentation. A
Recommendation Report will be the final project.
4. Three Short Written Assignments
· Memo Evaluation
Topic Choice Form
· Instructions Revision
5. Four (4) written technical
reports:
· Project Proposal
· Project Progress Report
· Project Data Report
· Project Final Report
Weekly Discussions ask
you to apply the technical communication (TC) principles you are
learning; be prepared to participate by understanding the information covered
in the assigned reading. Through discussion, we will discover the reasons for
various technical writing strategies and their practical applications.
Research Projects:
Your four reports
are generated from a feasibility study that each of you will design,
research, develop, and report on during the course. You will be given complete
instructions and topic choices for your project in the second week of the
quarter. You will be asked to define a specific topic, purpose, and reader
for your project by the fourth week of class.
Grading:
All reports must be completed in order to pass the course. Your course grade
will be calculated in the following way:
Short Written Assignments (3) 10%
Report 1:
Project Proposal 15%
Report 2:
Progress Report 10%
Report 3:
Project Data Report 15%
Report 4:
Final Project Report 30%
Discussion
Board (10) 20%
Grades on assignments are calculated
using a 100-point scale:
A+ |
A |
A- |
B+ |
B |
B- |
C+ |
C |
C- |
D+ |
D |
D- |
F |
100- 99 |
98- 93 |
92- 90 |
89- 87 |
86- 83 |
82- 80 |
79- 77 |
76- 73 |
72- 70 |
69- 67 |
66- 63 |
62- 60 |
0- 59 |
Due Dates:
All reports are due on the dates
listed on the final research assignment :
** All assignments should reach me by midnight on the due date.
(Please attach
them as Word documents)
Exceptions: You may turn in one of your first three reports one
day late by arranging it with me on or before the due dates.
Late reports should be turned in no more than one day after the
original due date, and must arrive in electronic form by midnight.
Any report turned in more than one day late will be dropped one grade
level each additional day it is late.
Assignments turned in late because
of illness must be cleared with me before submission.
Revisions:
You may revise Report 1, the Project
Proposal, for a better grade. The revised grade will be the original
grade averaged with the revision grade. Revisions must show
substantial work and improvement to earn a higher grade.
Saving Your Work
Be sure to duplicate your 235 work from your hard
drive to some other medium (USB Drive, CD, etc)
as backup. Keep your rough drafts until your report is returned to you after
grading. All graded reports should be saved until the end of the quarter as
proof of work completed. This will save you from having to rewrite a report
that is destroyed or lost.
As verification of your work,
research notes and sources for your Final Project Report should also be saved
in duplicate as your work progresses. In other words, there is no bona fide
excuse for not having proof of the work you have completed for class,
especially at the end of the quarter.
Plagiarism
The ethical considerations of
cheating in technical writing are much greater than in other kinds of writing.
Since you will use technical writing in the workplace, it is mandatory that you
communicate all technical information accurately, completely, and honestly.
Most professional organizations, including the Society for Technical
Communication, have clearly defined codes of ethical behavior (see the Code of
Ethics on p. 28-30,in text ).
The BC Student Code is also very
clear about the seriousness of cheating and the actions that faculty members
are required to take in cases of plagiarizing:
The BC Student Code prohibits
cheating, stealing, plagiarizing, knowingly furnishing false information to the
college, or submitting to a faculty member any work product that the student
fraudulently represents as his or her own work for the purpose of fulfilling or
partially fulfilling any assignment or task required as part of a program of
instruction. All forms of cheating, stealing, and plagiarizing will be reported
to the Dean of Instruction. Please
read the entire section on “Academic Honesty” in Student Procedures and Expectations
on the Arts & Humanities Division website
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member of the campus community feels welcome to participate in the life of the
college, free from harassment and discrimination. We value our different backgrounds at
Bellevue College, and students, faculty, staff members, and administrators are
to treat one another with dignity and respect.
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