Justin had three WC conferences: one to brainstorm, the second to look over a draft, and the third to look at the final draft and answer questions about the course.

A brief description of the assignment is "to compare the ideas two of the philosophers we study this semester on one of the following subjects: Government, State of Nature, The Social Contract, Democracy, Sovereignty, Property, Freedom, or some other topic."

Justin chose to write about sovereignty because the American Presidency class he is taking at the same time uses a lot of literature that would be good sources for this paper.

In the first conference, Justin had a good idea of what he wanted to do with his paper and he explained those idea to me. I think it helped him organize his thoughts, especially in the first two conferences. He told me that just telling me his plans helped him focus on the writing process.

I asked him if there was any insider knowledge he could give to other students talking this course in the future:

"Insider knowledge...It's all about organization and simplicity. Need to state your interests in the introduction: especially when you [are going to] talk about and when... restate this in your conclusion (I thought this was just a think we were taught in high school, but also no. They still like it when you so it here too... As a matter of fact, I now realize that the paper that I read for other students are much more comprehensive if they reiterate their purpose in the intro and the conclusion. Other that that, focus on the content and try not to be too formal in phrasing...more formal speaking voice is best, I think."

I asked him how consultants can best serve political theory writers: What do they need to do to be effective in conferencing you?

"Focus on the content. I'm not sure how much grammar counts in this paper (but the prof does check for it just to see if you have any writing knowledge, if there are a lot f mistakes it make a paper harder to read, obviously). Make sure the organization of the paper follows some set or pattern of thought, perhaps one that they discussed in class, or maybe something as simple as chronology. I found that it helped to set aside the different sections of a longer paper as such with subtitle headings (ex: Introduction, Right to Revolution, Current Ideas, Conclusion...). Not only does this help the writer, but it makes it easier for the reader to remember the flow of ht paper that was presented first in the introductory part. Also, if you make up talk of the actually theory behind your ideas and conclusions it might bring out something les that might be profitable and beneficial to include in our paper...more clarification of ideas."
 

Assignment Description for POL-445: Modern Political Theory