History Essay
Instructions: When writing your paper, make sure to identify your thesis or the overall argument of your essay. That is, what is the historical significance of your topic? The essay should be an exercise in critical thinking. Analyze the topic based on the historical evidence provided. You can only use the attached files for reference and cite them.
- Immigration: What issues did the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 Immigration Act addressed at the time? How did the 1986 Immigration Act change immigration policy? What is the significance of the 1986 Immigration Act? Identify and explain how the political policies of the Immigration Act of 1986 changed the immigrant experience.
Sources: In Canvas there are a number of articles on each topic. Use these articles as the basis for your essay. You are encouraged to research from the Cerritos College Library and from the library’s online database for additional sources. Sources can include a primary source, or secondary sources such as newspaper articles, journal articles, documentaries, and books. Please make sure to include copies of your sources with your paper and highlight or underline exactly where you found your source material. Failure to do so will result in a failed grade. Please consult with the librarian or with your dear professor on what additional sources you can use for your paper.
Paper: Papers should be approximately 5 pages, double space, 12 pt. Font. You are to use footnotes in Chicago/Turabian style when citing your sources. I strongly encourage that at least one rough draft be reviewed by your professor or the Writing Center for content, structure and grammatical errors.
Paper MUST be submitted to the turitin.com website.
Late Papers: Late papers will be docked ten points for each day they are late. For example, if I receive a paper is submitted the following day it will be penalized 10 points from the final grade. If it is two days late, it will be penalized 20 points and so on.
Factors That Will Impact Your Score:
- Plagiarism—Plagiarism is defined as the act of using or fabricating the ideas of another person as if they were one’s own, without giving credit to the source. If you fail to properly cite your sources or invent your sources this is a form of plagiarism. Students who purposely engage in copying large sections of material from books, the internet, other student papers, or in anyway representing another’s work as their own will result in a failed grade for the course and be referred to the Dean for appropriate action.
- Unclear Thesis—Thesis does not logically provide any solution or answer to the issue(s) relating to the topic of your paper.
- Lack of Evidence—You do not critically analyze any of the sources nor do you reference them in your paper.
- Lack of Citations—All quotes MUST be cited at the end of the quote or in the paragraph you have summarized.
- Footnotes—All your sources should be referenced in the footnotes and cited in the Chicago/Turbain style. Please see the Rampolla book or the Purdue University’s “OWL” (Online Writing Lab) for footnote/citation examples.
- Passive Statements—Sentences should state the actor before the action: “Obama won the election,” “The bird ate the worm.” Passive statements are weakened by making the actor seem to not be in control of the action: “The election was won by Obama,” “The worm was eaten by the bird.”
- Too many quotes—Your paper contains numerous quotes in the paragraph and little to no analysis.
- Paragraph Form—Paragraph structure is not clear and sentences are not typically related within the paragraphs.
