Tip #1: Figure out exactly what the professor wants. Read the assignment sheet very carefully. If you have any questions, ask your professor for clarification. Visit your professor at office hours, and discuss your paper plan to make sure you understand the directions. At a guess, I'd say that at least 10% of my students over the years were downgraded because they did not follow directions.
Tip #2: Brainstorm a great topic that is appropriate for the assignment. Students often are uncreative when thinking of topics. I recently assigned students to write about international media coverage of a current event, and over half of them wrote about North Korea! Stand out from the crowd and write about something unique. You definitely want to write about something that interests you, or else this paper assignment is going to suck. If you're not sure what to write, visit the professor to get some help with brainstorming.
Tip # 3: Write an outline. Professors always tell you this, and students often don't listen. We mean it. Good organization is one of the keys to success in a college term paper, and it's very difficult to be organized without an outline. It doesn't have to be a very detailed outline, and you can certainly deviate from the outline as you write the paper. Consider showing your outline to the professor before you write the paper.
Tip #4: Make sure you back up claims in the paper with sufficient evidence. A claim is a statement of fact. Evidence is material that lends support to that claim. For example, let's say you want to claim that hot dogs are linked to child leukemia. If you're going to state this, you need to back up your claim with evidence. Discuss some medical studies and statistics, and include a quote from a credible pediatrician. When using evidence, be sure not to rely too heavily on examples. You can find examples of just about anything, and isolated examples are rarely good evidence. For example, a story about your cousin who has childhood leukemia and ate a lot of hot dogs is not strong evidence to back up your claim. Feel free to use this example, but use it alongside more general evidence, like statistics or medical studies.
Tip #5: Write a cool introduction. A creative introduction is one of those things that separates an A paper from a B paper. Start out with an interesting anecdote, a startling statistic, or something that draws the reader into the paper. Use your imagination.
Tip #6: Write a very clear thesis statement, and use the thesis statement to preview what's in the paper. This is very important. A good thesis statement is like a road map. For example, a good thesis statement might read, "In this paper, I am going to discuss the economic challenges facing three Canadian provinces: Ontario, British Columbia, and Manitoba." Your paper should then provide information about the economic challenges of these three provinces in the order you listed them in the thesis statement. Make your thesis statement as simple as possible, and don't deviate from it.
Tip #7: Use good sources. Students sometimes see sources as a hoop to jump through in order to get a decent grade. But good sources lead to good papers, so take the time to find them. Choose credible sources (i.e. written by people who know what they're talking about and who don't have a strong bias). Avoid outdated sources. Use sources rich with facts and ideas that you can use in your paper. Don't rely too heavily on one source. And never list sources in your bibliography that you didn't really use to write the paper, because that's academic dishonesty that can get you in a heap of trouble. A little tip: if your professor asks for a minimum of six sources, she doesn't want you to use six. She wants about ten.
Tip #8: Lose the B.S. Professors are smart. We know when a student is adding mumbo jumbo in order to reach the page limit. Introductions sometimes become storage places for B.S., so keep your introductions short.
Tip #9: Never ever, ever, ever plagiarize. Here's a definition of plagiarism, and some very good reasons to avoid plagiarism.
Tip #10: Get help if you need it. If you're just not very good at writing term papers, help is available on your campus. But you need to seek it out. Find out if your school has a study center, a writing center, remedial courses, and other resources for writing help.
