Making Good Grades

It is essential that you go through the common processes of writing well: 

• Reading (your textbook, notes, secondary and primary sources—all depends on the assignment).
  
  
• Thinking (yes, you need to think—let your reading stir in your mind for a while, come to conclusions about what you think about what you read).
  
  
• Writing (just get ideas down on paper in any way you can; your thinking often springs from such a process).
  
  
• Rewriting (the continual process of cultivating your ideas through revision).
  
  
• Editing for the final draft (find a friend—or better yet an enemy—to read your draft).  

The process of writing is always rewriting (and that doesn’t mean just a first or second draft, but several).  

Apart from that process (and it is almost never so linear), here are some basic hints.

Know Your Assignment and Professor Well
A lot of students who do poorly on papers do so because they did not fully understand the assignment.  Some of your writing assignments will be complex.  Make sure to read through the assignment several times.  If something is unclear, talk with your professor well in advance of the paper’s due date.  Ask what your professor is looking for if it is not already explained in the assignment.  Perhaps your professor is looking for you to imply rhetorical ways of knowing though the course seems to you a social scientific class.  Again, though your professor is not your only audience member, your professor will approach the grading process with certain assumptions about writing.

Pick a Topic You Like or Care About
Many of your writing assignments will be somewhat open.  You can pick your speech topic, or a theory to apply, a film to analyze, a problem to solve, a rhetorical artifact to critique.  Student who pick topics just to have a topic usually do not find the resolve to spend the needed time on the assignment. 

You are You, but Not Really
Some students mistake an embrace of subjectivity as a call for personal opinion.  That is not necessarily the case.  Your professors will undoubtedly care about what you think and the conclusions you draw, but you must always be theoretically sensitive.  In any assignment, you are often taking an approach or providing a certain voice.  Always write as an educated, competent communicator.  Anyone can supply his or her opinion; educated people back up their opinions with theory, research, and evidence.

Read and Re-read
Many students believe that reading through something only once is good enough.  You will always need to indicate that you have read well and thought heavily.  No matter the assignment, read and re-read the primary and secondary sources you are using as evidence.

Write and Re-Write
Students who write the night before a paper is due undoubtedly write to fail.  Any paper, even to be only decent, must go through several drafts.  Writing is an adventurous process in which ideas, arguments, and conclusions grow out of the creative process of revision.

R-O-C-K MLA and APA in the USA
While most of your papers will call for MLA, some might call for APA.  It is not uncommon (in fact it is all too common) for students to do poorly on a paper assignment simply because they incorrectly used a style manual.  Click here to view easily accessible MLA and APA guidelines.  Master these early in your college career so you do not have to spend the final days before a paper is due figuring out how to cite your sources and write a bibliography.

More Writing Tips
Very obviously, your professors will have more specifics about how they will grade papers.  However, good writing is remarkably similar regardless of the discipline:  

• Clarity is a goddess.  Be specific.  Be explicit.  Be concrete.  Professors do not want to have to guess what you mean.
  
  
• Sophistication and nuance are keys to success.  Your professors are seeking complexity in your writing, hints that you have really thought about the material; perhaps you even make a claim that is counter intuitive.  No-duh papers are always boring to read.
  
  
• In argumentative papers (and most will be), you should consider infusing the spirit of refutation in your prose.  Some might simply call this judiciousness.  Your professor will be looking for fair and balanced claims and evidence. Are there two sides to the story?  If so, then reveal both sides.  Part of refutation is fairly illustrating the side opposed to yours, but then arguing why that other approach is wanting. 
  
  
• Prose style is important.  Use complex sentences, appropriate figures of speech, and rich descriptive language dripping with interesting verbs and laurel-laden adjectives. 
  
  
• Talk the talk to walk the walk.  Again, write like an educated communication student.  Use the terms afforded you by the class you are writing for and the classes you have already had.
  
  
• Finally, just because your are writing for communication does not mean that the prose does not have to be grammatically perfect.  Click here to use the guidelines for mechanics and grammar on this Web site.