NOTE: Your Final Draft must be a minimum of 1,700 words (not including the Works Cited page).

For the Problem/Solution Research Paper, you are going to construct an audience-based argument that presents a claim about your topic and integrates the research you have done this semester to support your claim. In addition, the claim must involve arguing a solution to a problem. Your paper will explain the problem, propose a solution, and address objections to the solution. Your solution might be one that you have discovered during research or one that you have come up with on your own. 

The problem/solution topic must be on some aspect related to crime or criminal justice. There are many areas to investigate under this very broad topic. For example, you might consider specific topics related to reforming prisons, changing unfair laws or unfair penalties for specific laws, enacting laws for practices that should be illegal, changing the training of law enforcement officers, or suggesting ways to prevent specific types of crimes such as mass shootings or Internet stalking. The main point is that the topic must be arguable. You are not writing an informative paper but one on which reasonable people might disagree with your claim. 

Your readers would be the people who are affected by your claim. For instance, if you are writing regarding ways to prevent mass shootings, the audience might be educators, psychologists, politicians, a parenting magazine, police officers, etc. The audience you choose would be the people who can approve and/or implement the solution you come up with. You would not be writing to “anyone who has been affected by crime” or “the general public.” 

Think carefully about your readers’ knowledge and interests. Consider these five questions:

What do you want readers to do or think?

Why should they do or think that?

How do they know that what you say is true?

1. What should readers know about counterarguments?
2. What larger principles or context grounds your argument?
3. You may also have to consider secondary audiences, the stakeholders. Who is most impacted? Most invested? Who can be the agents of change? Who is in the most powerful position to effect change? Note: stakeholders and agents of change are not always the same group of people. For instance, if your proposal is that anyone who posts false but defaming information about a minor in a social media site should be penalized with a prison sentence of up to one year, your primary audience is the state legislature (who has to pass the law), while the stakeholders include prison officials, who need to find room for the new group of criminals and social media executives, who will be required to provide evidence from postings on their site as part of the criminal proceedings. 
4. Whatever your goal for your audience, you must choose and evaluate evidence accordingly. What evidence does the audience need? To what would they respond best? What most aligns with their own goals and agendas? Here, a careful consideration of ethos, pathos, and logos is critical. How are you going to appeal to your reader in a way that persuades them to proceed according to your recommendations?
5. Your paper will include the following parts:

INTRODUCTION: Use an attention-grabbing introduction that gives an overview of the topic and speaks to the specific sentiments or concerns of the audience you have chosen whilst also indicating your position

THESIS: Develop a clearly formulated, arguable thesis, including reasoning to support your position. In other words, your thesis should concisely give readers the reasons why your claim should be believed or why they should think/feel/act differently. 

TOPIC SENTENCES: Each paragraph should begin with a clear and effective topic sentence that foregrounds for the reader what is discussed in the subsequent paragraph.

EFFECTIVE PARAGRAPHS: The paper must include ordered, developed, cohesive, and coherent paragraphs that develop the argument by offering evidence and explanation in support of your position. Every sentence should contribute to the argument of its paragraph and the paper as a whole. Make sure, too, that the logical relationship between sentences is always clear and that body paragraphs identify supporting reasons, ideas, or examples for the claim.

COUNTERARGUMENTS: The essay must present and then respond to one or more counterarguments to your claim.

1. CONCLUSION: End with a conclusion that emphasizes the importance of taking the action or making the change recommended by the claim.
2. ACADEMIC STYLE: The essay should follow coherent organization between and within paragraphs, maintain appropriate style and tone suited to the purpose and audience of the argument, adhere to proper, ethical, and correct documentation for ALL sources (sources that have been carefully evaluated, of course), and observe correct grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization throughout
3. Requirements for the Final Draft
4. Minimum of 7 sources, including 4 scholarly sources 
5. Minimum 1,700 words 
6. Correct MLA formatting
7. Correct MLA in-text citations

Correct MLA Works Cited