My peer reviewed draft lacks many aspects that my final draft has. It consists of an introduction and the first body paragraph. Therefore, it lacks the two additional body paragraphs, conclusion, works cited page, title, and many in-text MLA citations that I added in the final draft. The second body paragraph I wrote in the final draft of my essay states that “the working class is an important foundation of a functioning society; individuals that lack a four-year or two-year liberal arts degree are equally functional to those who pursue a liberal arts education” (Final Draft 3). Initially, I did not have this paragraph in my essay. However, the first paragraph addresses only the possibility of students from lower-income families pursuing a degree outside of the liberal arts (more specifically, a STEM based post-secondary education). The second body paragraph allowed me to expand my argument to not only those from lower income families who pursue a higher education outside of the liberal arts, but also those who do not pursue a postsecondary education. The third body paragraph I added served as an extension of the ideas I expressed in the second body paragraph. It helps to support my argument by providing an anecdotal portion of evidence. The conclusion I added pushes a very abstract view on the argument, allowing the audience to think deeper about my ideas. It is also worth noting that I changed around the thesis statement (claim, found at the end of the introduction), allowing better flow and a more specific view directed towards argument and evidence.
Throughout this essay, I utilize quotes from “7 Major Misperceptions About the Liberal Arts” by Sanford J. Ungar and “Critical Thinking and the Liberal Arts” by Jeffrey Scheuer. I briefly introduce these texts in the introduction of my essay: “An interesting pair of ideologies is that of Sanford J. Ungar’s misperceptions of the cost of a liberal arts education in his ‘7 Major Misperceptions About the Liberal Arts,’ and Jeffrey Scheuer’s ideals of what makes a productive citizen in his ‘Critical Thinking and the Liberal Arts’” (Final Draft 1). Establishing these authors, their texts and their ideals allowed me to refer to them with brief signal phrases throughout the rest of the essay. In the previous essay I wrote, I made a lot of hit-and-run quotations. However, in this essay, I consciously avoided these errors and thoughtfully explained each of the quotes as a part of my own argument. This allowed me to make this essay more about what I wanted to say, with the quotes as support, rather than making an argument from the quotations. Additionally, in regards to my argument, I added my own ideas to each paragraph, woven into the quotes. However, I also added a personal anecdote as my last body paragraph before the conclusion in order to further support my argument. I utilized different ways to form and introduce quotes. An example of this is when I utilized two elipses in one of my quotes: “‘the STEM disciplines are obviously important to economic productivity, but … the liberal arts embody precisely the skills a democracy must cultivate to maintain its vital reservoir of … productive citizens’ (Critical Thinking and the Liberal Arts)” (Final Draft 2). By manipulating quotes without changing their meaning, I effectively utilized larger quotes in order to best support my argument, rather than the quotes overpowering my own voice.
During the peer review portion of the writing process, one of my peers commented on my initial claim, which stated this: “Focusing on these texts, I say it is crucial to examine what truly makes a productive citizen, and if pursuing a specific degree such as a focus in the liberal arts truly holds greater weight over those who choose a different path” (Peer Reviewed Draft 1). She said that “Considering how you mentioned cost before this I would try to elaborate on that here as well, connect the two in some way, or go back and add this so it isn’t as much of a jump from cost to citizenship/degree choice.” She was essentially saying that I was saying too much in my claim and it was hard to follow. What I needed to fix was to connect my ideas in a way that made sense, given the fact that I referenced the sources already before I stated my claim. So, in my final draft, I reworded my claim: “Especially for individuals from lower-income families and first-generation college students, I say it is crucial to examine what truly makes a productive citizen; a liberal arts degree does not always set lower-income students up for success the same as it would for those from wealthier backgrounds.” Utilizing the semicolon to separate my related thoughts and directing the claim towards a specific group of people (students from lower income families), allowed me to set up the rest of my essay in a more organized and effective way.
To control local errors, I always make sure to read my essay out loud a number of times. Wherever there is a local error, it is made easily apparent when I read the essay to myself. This is what I did for this essay. One of my peers (Emily), also made a lot of useful comments on my Peer Reviewed Draft about local errors that were especially prevalent, which I then fixed for my Final Draft. As for documentation, Jeffrey Scheuer’s online article did not have pages. So, I initially introduced Scheuer and then only referenced his name or title of his article for the in-text citation. If I used a signal phrase to introduce one of Scheuer’s quotes, I simply wrote “(n.p.)” for the in-text citation. I referred to “The Little Seagull Handbook” (Bullock et. al) for writing the Works Cited page of my essay in order to properly format references to online articles.
