English 102/102e

Student Course Description

Freshman English 102 is a more advanced course in critical reading and writing than 101; it is intended to help you prepare for your upper level courses and the Writing Proficiency Requirement. If English is not your first language, you may be placed into 102E which will serve your language needs directly and meet the same graduation requirement. The following description therefore applies to 102 and 102E.

English 102 introduces you to more complex discourses through sequenced assignments that allow you to sustain inquiries on particular themes or issues. These assignments ask you to treat subjects from different perspectives, including your own. Through frequent reading and writing assignments, you learn to analyze the structures of essays and arguments so that you are able to develop informed responses to them. As in English 101, you learn to advance your work with readings through a variety of methods including glossing, double-entry notebooks, rereading, peer reviewing, drafting and re-drafting. The course requires 3-5 formal essays, depending on the individual teacher’s use of drafts, informal writing and revisions. One of these papers must be a researched essay that builds on course themes and issues. Be assured that our excellent composition faculty designs their 102 courses to make your success possible as long as you participate in a consistently committed way.

 
Standard Policies

While each instructor articulates specific requirements in a course syllabus, all courses in the Freshman English program adhere to the following general guidelines:

• Students will do substantial daily homework, including weekly writing of extended prose, toward the shaping of formal, revised papers. Students write 3-5 formal papers, depending on the number of working papers and readings that precede them and revisions that follow. One of these papers must be an analytical essay referring to multiple sources of at least 5 pages, suitable for the portfolio option of the Writing Proficiency Requirement.

• Students must meet due dates and keep up with the work as planned; late paper policies make it impossible for anyone to hand in a term’s work all at once. Students who fall substantially behind in their work should not expect to pass the course.

• Attendance is required. Students with more than 4 absences in Tuesday-Thursday or Monday-Wednesday classes should not expect to pass the course. Students with more than 6 absences in Monday-Wednesday-Friday classes should not expect to pass the course. Students with more than 2 absences in courses that meet once a week should not expect to pass the course.

• Students are expected to come to class with all necessary materials for participating actively. Cell phones should be off and headphones put away.

• Students must abide by the University’s code on plagiarism and academic honesty. (See UMB Catalogue, pp. 332-35.)

Satisfactory Completion of 102

To receive a C- or better, you must fulfill your specific instructor’s course requirements, including attendance, paper completion, and class participation. Over and above these basics, you must have course materials that demonstrate the following outcomes:

1. You can work with three or more texts accurately and analyze the relations among them.

2. You can build arguments and perspectives with an awareness of a reader’s expectations for sequentially developed ideas in paragraphs.

3. You can shape a question or problem for inquiry and pursue understanding through independent research culminating in a documented essay.

4. You demonstrate an understanding of how to participate in written academic discussions through paraphrase, quotation, in-text citation, and a works cited page, using the MLA format.

5. You demonstrate an understanding of the composing process, including exploratory drafting, consideration of teachers’ and peers’ suggestions, revision, editing and proof reading.

6. You can punctuate most sentence boundaries and self-correct most errors.

7. Having fulfilled the above outcomes, you will have at least one paper that meets the Writing Proficiency Requirement for a 5 page, analytical essay that works directly and accurately with a number of readings. To complete 102 successfully, you must have one paper that can be certified by the instructor for WPR portfolio submission.