76-101 Contribution Assignment (Paper 3: 30/100 points) Due dates: Proposal (2 copies): M 3/29 Rough draft (2 copies): W 4/14 In-class peer review: W 4/14 Oral presentations: W 4/21, F 4/23, M 4/26, W 4/28 Final draft (w/ rough draft attached): F 4/30 (the last day of class) Task In a nutshell, for your final paper you are to make an argument that says something new in the debate over multiculturalism as an educational reform. This means, for one, you will need to choose an issue and a paradigm case (a problem case or set of problem cases that illustrate the tension in the issue you have chosen) and use the paradigm case as the basis for making an argument on the issue. Beyond identifying an issue and describing a paradigm case, you will need to synthesize and analyze the positions that some of the authors we have read have taken on the issue and use this synthesis to convince your readers of your main point. It might help to think of the contribution paper as a synthesis-analysis paper you have elaborated into a fully-developed argument. Your “tour” of the authors’ positions and points should offer you opportunities to make points of your own—as you seek to take your audience from point “A” to your point “B.” Purpose and audience Try to anticipate how your readers might respond to the claims you plan to make. Some readers may not understand your claims; others may disagree with them. Try to address the needs of these two types of readers. The “Readings” For this paper, you are required to draw on at least 4 of the relevant texts we have read or will read for class this semester (including any from the first half of the semester that seem relevant—such as Gilmour [the Birkbeck schools] and Hard Times [Dickens’ depiction of the Gradgrind school]—as well as the video “A Different Place” [which we will be seeing and which counts as a “text” with respect to this requirement]). Alternatively, in the place of one of the texts we read and discuss in class, you may choose to work with a text we will not read for class—so long as it is relevant and you get my permission to do so. That said, there are a number of acceptable alternative texts on reserve at the library; I hope to make a few others available; and should you come across a reading you think might work, ask me about it. It is up to you which texts you choose to work with. However, choose them carefully since you want to select those positions that will appear—not only to you but also to your readers—to be the most relevant to your issue. For example, if you focus on an aspect of the politics of multiculturalism, you will want to work with positions for which politics is a central concern; or, if your issue involves some aspect of teaching or learning, you may want to choose positions that address issues of pedagogy. Requirements The paper: Length. It will probably take approximately 6 to 7 pages to adequately argue your position, but be concerned less with the length of your argument than with its quality. The oral presentation: Your oral presentation should be a 5-minute talk in which you first give a “nutshell” of your argument and then talk about some interesting aspect of your project. Bear in mind that oral presentations are meant to be interesting, not definitive. Therefore, tell us one interesting thing about what you are doing, not everything you possibly could say on the subject. Think of your presentation as a sort of “campfire story,” not a full-blown oral argument. Contribution Assignment 76-101 Contribution Assignment 1