Among all the writing assignments given in college, some are so important in terms of grades, that working on them is always an oppressive responsibility. For instance, term paper writing is one of the most dreadful tasks for students of all departments, as it is decisive for the final score and requires the most profound and in-depth research. Nevertheless, it is impossible to avoid this challenge, and everyone has to face it more than once during the student years. That is why, learning how to write a term paper properly is obligatory for every college student.
What Is a Term Paper?
Term paper can be defined as a written work prepared at the end of every term that demonstrates how well the student knows and operates the material learned during this term. Clearly, it is based on the topics covered in class and on the practical assignments that you were given during the semester, so basically nothing new is required, but rather an overview of the learnt information in a single paper is expected.
How to Write a College Term Paper
Since this kind of assignment is rather complex, it needs to be done in several consecutive stages. You will need to choose a topic, make a research on it, collect materials, make an outline, and then do the actual writing. As you can see, most of the work lies before the writing process, so do not rush into composing an introduction to your paper, and take an ample time to do the initial research.
Stage 1. Choose a topic
Out of all the existing term paper topics, you will need to choose the one that you prefer, or sometimes the one given to you by your professor. If you have the freedom of choice, make sure to pick a topic that meets the following criteria:
- Has enough literature available on it;
- Is contemporary and relates to the existing problems in the sphere;
- Is within the frame of your personal interest;
- Is related to the themes covered in class during the term;
- Is narrow enough and focuses on an aspect that can be researched within one term paper;
- Matches your level of skills and knowledge.
Just like any research paper topic, yours needs to suggest a profound research work that is valuable from the perspective of the subject. In case no good ideas come to your mind, you can opt for one of the research essay topics suggested below.
Business Topics:
- Cybercrimes: how safe is it online?
- Online businesses: the growing sectors.
- Ethical policies of the most successful modern corporations.
- Gender equality at work: statistical analysis.
- Offshore accounts and their regulations.
- Office ethics.
Law Topics:
- Animal rights protection.
- Employment law gaps.
- Professional responsibility and legal malpractice.
- The role of bias in law firm employment.
- Internet law: regulation of online violation of human rights.
- Classification of crimes in Europe.
- Terror acts in 21st
- Gang crimes in the U.S. today.
- The current practices of capital punishment.
- Identity theft prevention.
- Sex offences: a statistical overview.
- Relation between bullying and suicide rates among teenagers.
- Mental illness as a contributing factor in court.
- Ethical principles of police interrogation.
- Criminology and its role in crimes’ solution.
- Insanity defense.
- The relation between crimes and substance abuse.
Education Topics:
- Offline vs. online learning effectiveness.
- Handwriting in the modern learning process.
- Grading systems of the most developed countries.
- The role of technology in learning.
- ROTC programs for students.
- Cheating in exams.
- The rate of literacy in the U.S.A.
- Public vs. private colleges: the quality of education.
- Readiness to college: the defining criteria.
- Student’s loans.
- The most popular degree programs in Europe.
Environment Topics:
- Alternative fuels: the recent solutions.
- The current state of coastal ecosystems worldwide.
- Policies regulating low carbon.
- Eco trends in the U.S. culture.
- Renewable energy sources.
- Nature restoration programs.
- Protected areas and their role for preserving biodiversity.
Health Topics:
- The recent tendencies in mental disabilities.
- Technologies that changed the healthcare approach worldwide.
- Allergy and the genetic factors.
- The recent advances in diabetes treatment.
- Metabolism: the major factors.
- Recovery from surgeries.
- Brain tumor treatment for children.
- Immunogenetics and its role in individual health.
- Bipolar disorder and its genetic pattern.
- Gynecological cancer and specificities of its treatment.
Media and Communications Topics:
- Formation of aesthetic perception through mass media.
- Importance of censorship for online resources.
- What is “hype” and how it forms the culture.
- Exclusive information: does it exist in the modern media?
- Freedom of speech in developing countries today.
- Mass media as a factor in education.
- Reliability of online journalism.
- Entertaining sector and its content.
- Blogging as a phenomenon of the 21st
- Psychological tools used for advertising.
Politics Topics:
- The relation between a country’s economy and international relations.
- Positivism as a political facilitator.
- Electoral system in prosperous countries.
- Unitary political system and its organization.
- Wars as a part of political process.
- Pluralism of political views in the U.S.
- The phenomenon of nationalism.
- Political shifts in Europe for the past 20 years.
Psychology Topics:
- Phobias in early age.
- The concept of leadership in groups of children.
- Ethical principles of psychological consulting.
- Aggression as an important tool of self-defense.
- The roots of prosocial behaviors.
- Early signs of depression in teenagers.
Stage 2. Make a Research
As soon as the topic is picked and approved by your professor, you need to collect all the materials related to it. At this stage, you need to read the scientific articles, books, class notes, and any other information that is credible and relates to the topic of your paper. Remember to highlight the important arguments and data and take notes in the process of reading. By doing so, you will collect the major part of your term paper, which later will only need to be arranged.
Stage 3. Make an outline
When the majority of sources are read, you can start to make the outline. Define the key ideas that you would like your paper to focus on, and include them in your paper’s plan. Typically, a term paper’s outline would contain the following elements:
- Introduction;
- Argument #1
+ Supporting sentences
- Argument #2
+ Supporting sentences
- Argument #3
+ Supporting sentences
- Conclusion
Sure, the number of arguments will depend on the overall word count required from you, but the general organization of the text should be just like in the above mentioned plan. However, you should be guided by your professor’s instructions. The rubric received in class may contain some other requirements to the structure, so clarify how to write a term paper with your teacher. You can also find some good examples of term papers online or in your college’s library to see how it should be arranged.
Stage 4. Write
Now that you have tons of information and an outline, your task is to deal with the actual writing. Distribute the collected materials among the subsections of your plan and work on your work’s text. The data collected from different sources will help you to formulate arguments and provide illustrations to the ideas you express. Remember to stay consecutive and follow the logical order.
Stage 5. Proofread
Once the text of your term paper is ready, take your time to read it and see if everything is in place. Pay attention to the following aspects:
- Coherence;
- Style;
- Grammar;
- Punctuation;
- Format;
- Referencing.
Make sure that your paper is flawless and contains no typos or other minor mistakes. After all, it is a shame to lose points because of some overlooked details after working so hard on this assignment.
