MEDAILLE COLLEGE
AGASSIZ CIRCLE
BUFFALO, NEW YORK 14214

COURSE SYLLABUS

Course Number and Title ENG 260 Business and Professional Writing

Sections    03 CRN 10091 Tuesday and Thursday 12:45 pm - 02:10 pm room Main 310

Semester Fall 2011
Number of Credits 3
Prerequisite ENG 200

Instructor Douglas Anderson
Office 85 Humboldt, second floor at the end of the hall
Hours before, between and after classes as well as Monday and Wednesday 2:45 - 3:45 and Tuesday and Thursday 2:15 - 3:45
email anytime at eng260f11 at gmail.com

Please note: Grading of student papers will reflect standard English usage. The MLA and APA bibliographic styles are generally used at Medaille.

Catalog Description of Course

This course explores the different types of business and professional writing, helping students to recognize the variety of career options for and responsibilities of professional and business writers and the most important resources in the field. Students review and learn how most effectively to implement the basic grammar and usage rules they have studied in other courses, as well as how to incorporate graphs, pictures, and other visual information effectively into their written texts. Students also investigate the necessary relationship between audience and style, and the ethical implications of business and professional forms of communication, while learning how to apply persuasive writing strategies to different professional contexts. Students produce a portfolio in both print and web-based media that will include a resume, letters, memoranda, brochures, instructions, and short reports.

Objectives

After completing this course, you will be better able to control the content, structure, language, and mechanics of the research, writing, and presenting that professionals do on computer networks. You will be able to:

* Identify career opportunities for professional writers
* Identify and employ the basic genres of professional and business writing with an understanding of the major similarities and differences among them
* Access and use the research tools in various fields of professional and business writing
* Solve problems in specific writing situations using rhetorical, critical thinking, and problem solving strategies
* Analyze audience, purpose, and style to produce professional-quality documents
* Define and apply general theories of rhetoric and communication in specific organizational settings
* Use power point and web-based media to produce and print web-based publications and confident oral presentations
* Work effectively and professionally to delegate responsibility and meet deadlines for production of professional-quality documents
* Apply multiple and diverse perspectives, and the concerns of different kinds of audiences, to produce professional writing assignments

Course Content

New Media Ventures, LLP

You are working for New Media Ventures, LLP, a business research and analysis company whose slogan is "the right information to the right people at the right time, their way." New Media Ventures' clients come from the growing industries sparked by digital media, especially the Internet. New Media Ventures blends the power of human experts with the latest technologies to turn raw data into valuable, relevant, accurate, reliable and (most importantly) useful information. Using this information, New Media Ventures' clients, all businesses themselves, can make better decisions.

To that end, New Media Ventures (NMV) is always exploring better ways to package and present this information. If its utility (its "usefulness") is most important, then how it looks makes a difference.

Your job is to help NMV's clients decide what looks good and is useful. Each of you will find a client with a need for NMV's services, but you don't have to actually find this client. You can make up a client and the client's needs as long as they are plausible.

By Thanksgiving, you will develop for your client a short, sample report in a variety of digital formats. If the client likes what you do, NMV will get that client's business, and you will continue to remain employed, which we assume is a good thing. NMV's management team expects to hear oral reports on your efforts in the first week of December.

Because "usefulness" is so important, New Media Ventures' analysts (you) need to present their work in whatever format clients want it. We have identified four for you to concentrate on:

* simple ASCII text for email and database-driven content management systems such as discussion forums, blogs, and wikis

* word processed for printing (ink on paper)

* web pages for desktop, laptop, and mobile browsers

* multimedia for viewing on screens and to accompany oral presentations

All four of these need to accommodate images (still and moving), audio, tables, and a wide range of charts and other graphics.

Your task | write, package and re-package a report with two goals in mind:

* accessibility

* attractiveness

It must be easy (or as easy as the medium allows) to get information and it must look good.

Textbook

This is a learn-by-doing course built around your projects. All the materials we need are available online, much of it on this course web. You will access it by following the links and doing your own searches.

Evaluation

I try to engage each of you in an ongoing discussion of your learning. If you aren't getting enough feedback from me, ask for more. As you'll see, I'm big on formative feedback and Socratic questioning.

I expect you to participate in our physical classrooms and our digital classroom. At a minimum, you should:

* come to class
* complete all the deliverables on time
* follow all the links on the syllabus

You will have two dozen or so assignments. Some won't be graded, but on the table below, you'll see the ones that will count toward your final course grade.
Note: I'm assuming that you will do all of the project's deliverables as specified on the case page. If you don't do them all, you can't pass the course.
Your course grade will be based on the following tasks. At the end of the course, you will make an oral presentation of your portfolio.

The portfolio will be on the web server (username: mba600 pwd: geek13) at http://toLearn.net/eng260/f11/. It will have a welcome page that has links to a .pdf file of your report as well as your graphics assignments and the slides that accompany your final presentation. You will get full credit if the information is legible and the links work.

Written report. You will write and package a professional report to help a specific audience solve a problem or make a decision. See below for criteria.

Graphics. While the reports will contain many images, tables, and charts, you will complete five graphics tasks as separate assignments: image, table, chart, animation, screenshot. As long as you do them and they are on your portfolio web, you will get full credit.

Gateways. You will go through two gateways to help assure the timely completion of your portfolio. You will get less than full credit if your assignments are not completed.

Tests. You will take two tests, one on the structure and functioning of the Internet and the other on social media.

Oral reports. You will make two presentations, one about a a social media application and the other about your report. See below for criteria.

Attendance. While attending class is always a good idea, the final week of classes in December when you will be making your final oral reports are especially important. You will get at best a B+ in this course if you miss any of those final classes.

Timely completion. 1 or 2 assignments late (L), no change. 3 or more late, subtract one point from final grade for each late assignment and one more for each late week.

graded assignments

portfolio page on course web (.html) - 5
report (.txt, .doc, .pdf, .ppt) - 30
5 graphics - 5
2 gateways (timely portfolio) - 10
2 tests - 30
2 oral reports - 10
attendance final week of class - 5

Report grades

It comes down to this: Does your work exhibit a command of business communications and its conventions, especially digital?

If I were your boss, I would want to see paper and screen documents that are attractive and accessible. Having your work available when the boss needs it affects the quality component of the boss's assessment. The quality of your writing can be important at raise and promotion time.

These reports are all going to be publicly available on the course web, so I expect the exposure and your personal pride will motivate you as much as any threat of low grades. I also recognize that there are multiple "correct" ways to complete these assignments.

These are ambiguous and subjective words: attractive and accessible. Such holistic characterizations come from observations colored by assumptions and prejudices. However, there are some generally agreed upon professional standards. We will discuss them in class in great detail.

If the assignment is complete, it will get an A-. I will reserve the very occasional A for an assignment completed with extraordinary flair and enthusiasm. If you haven't done part of the assignment, you will get proportionally less than an A-.

The gateways will also move you along. If you have not completed the assignments due at the three gateways, you and I will have a discussion about your progress, and I will probably in any case submit an official academic warning.

Course grades

The numerical values above give you a sense of what I consider the rough proportioning of your energy during this course. Your personal experience will differ.

If you are sufficiently engaged and do everything on this list, you will get an A or A- for the course. If you are sufficiently engaged and don't do one or more, you will get a B or lower. If you aren't sufficiently engaged, even if you do everything else, you can't get an A or probably even a B.

Course Attendance Policy

You should come to class. I'll do my part to make it worth your while. I expect you to do your part to get something out of it.

In my experience, students who miss class also have other problems. I encourage you to keep me notified, especially via email, about your absences. I reserve the right to lower your final course grade for absences in excess of four, whether excused or not.

Attendance at the final classes when you and your classmates are making oral reports is especially important.

If you know ahead of time that you are going to miss more than four classes, especially because of sports team commitments, let me know ASAP.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS OF COURSE

In order to prosper in business, you must be able to do many things other than write. These four also apply to meeting the course objectives listed above.

manage digital information
explore and discover
tolerate ambiguity
think big

Statement on Disabilities

Any student with a disability who believes he/she needs accommodation(s) in order to complete this course should contact the Office of Disability Services as soon as possible. The staff in the Office of Disability Services will determine what accommodations are appropriate and reasonable under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The Office of Disability Services is located in the Main Building, Room M031, and can be reached by phone at (716) 880-2391.

Academic Integrity

Medaille's faculty and administration expect all students to complete their academic assignments with honesty and integrity. Students who engage in any form of academic dishonesty (e.g., plagiarism, cheating on a test, forging a signature or an entire college document) will be dealt with severely, with penalties ranging from an F on a given assignment to failing a course or even academic suspension. Students should consult their Student Handbook for full details on the college's policy and procedures for handling formal charges of academic dishonesty.

Campus Emergency Closure

In the event of a campus emergency closure, please log onto your BbVista course link at http://learning.medaille.edu to continue with your course requirements and to communicate with your instructor. You should access this course link early in the semester to familiarize yourself with it. Report any access or usage problems to the course instructor.