6. Assignments

The whole course is based on 500 points.

All assignments are marked on a 4-point scale. If a particular exercise is worth 40 points, and you get 30 on it, you got 75%, or a B.

• Exercises (250 pts)
  
• Ex 1A: Personal Goals (250 words; informal personal essay, including a quote from Setonian editor-in-chief Stormy Knight) 25pts
  
• Ex 2: Field Trip Report (400 words; informal personal essay OR news feature) 50pts
  
• Ex 3: Spot News (600 words; news coverage of a local election-related event) 50pts
  
• Ex 4A: Evergreen Draft (800 words; profile or other feature suitable for January or Summer publication) 50pts
  
• Ex 4B: Evergreen Revision + Sidebar (200 more words) 50pts
  
• Ex 1B: Personal Assessment (250 words; reflect on your progress towards goals) 25pts
  
• Portfolios (150 pts) -- Four collections of reflective writing, including
• A lab report (a 400-word news article, written in the third person, following all the principles of good journalism)
• A richly-linked blog entry (collecting your thoughts on the readings and other class activities)
  
• Other brief items as specified (I may ask you to respond to a discussion question, or react to a breaking news event, or provide an update on an ongoing project.)
• Due on the Monday after issues 2 through 5 are printed. Accordingly, the four portfolio due dates are scheduled for
  • Sep 29
    
  • Oct 20
    
  • Nov 10
    
  • Dec 02
    
• News Project Portfolio (100 pts) -- a portfolio that documents your planning for, contributions during, and reactions to the election-related class project. Exactly what this portfolio entails will depend on what the class project turns out to be. (My suggestion is that we organize a public event, such as a presentation on the First Amendment, or a debete between the College Republicans and the College Democrats.)
• No Final Exam. In the past, EL200 students have presented their final project reports during the slot reserved for the final exam. This term, since I'm hoping we can do an election-themed project, and the election is Nov 4, I'm hoping we can wrap up all the presentations in early November, so that we won't have to meet during the final exam slot.