ENGLISH 1302: INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH STUDIES

PROJECT ONE: PROPOSAL

Plan of Attack
Developed by Shoney Flores

Introduction
There’s always something about the word “proposal” that has a tendency to confuse students into
what exactly it should consist of. Perhaps it’s because the times it has been done in the past, it’s
usually done orally and without even realizing we’re doing it. To illustrate what a proposal should
do, I titled this project “Plan of Attack” because it is essentially a document in which you will talk
specifically about the work you’re doing for your research. If your main project is a house, your
proposal is made up of the blue prints and eventually the foundation.
After coming up with a specific research question, you may find that you are ready to begin
drafting this project. The proposal is really designed to:
1. establish a solid plan for your main essay, emphasizing the research choices you’ve made, will
make, and the direction your research will take;
2. make you conscious of the research you’ve done (primary and secondary) by engaging in
conversations with them within the proposal itself;
3. serve as an area where you can discuss your research question/topic in detail and why it’s an
important search to pursue.

Basic Contents
Throughout the semester, you’ll be given several opportunities to put rough drafts of parts of the
proposal together—either through in-class reflection or in- or out-of-class activities, which is
probably why it’s important to keep all of your notes. Your Plan of Attack will be made up three
different drafts that will be due at different times throughout the semester. I will be looking at
one of these drafts (more than likely the second), and you will be workshopping the rest. Your
Plan of Attack should contain the following elements so that it:
• discusses your research question and why it is an important one to pursue;
• explains the major ideas about your research question that you’ve uncovered;
• explains future directions and plans for your research; and
• includes an up=to-date Bibliography (or works cited, if appropriate) of your sources.

Detailed Contents
Again, your proposal is your main plan, where you highlight what you’re researching, how you’re
researching it, and why you’re researching it. I’m providing an outline for you below with space
for you to write notes. Don’t think of this as guidelines, where you must follow this to the dot, but
rather think of it as a guide. The information below is what should go in your proposal.

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 ENGLISH 1302: INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH STUDIES

PROJECT ONE: PROPOSAL

1. Introduction (400-500 words)

1. Your topic area: What does your topic deal with? Also, what is it? Is it an essay? Is it a
class? What are you “proposing” here? Why is this something you’re looking into?
What is your hypothesis (or hypotheses) of the research question?

2. Research question and its significance to knowledge: What is your research question?
Why is it important for people to know about this? In other words, why should your
audience know about your research? What is the purpose for this? How should your
audience react to your project?

2. Literature review / discussion (600-700 words)

1. Previous research: What are other people saying about your topic? What do they
believe about it? What other research has been done on this topic? What did that
research show? How will your findings be different? What new information will you
bring to the plate?

2. Your preliminary work on the topic: What have you started doing to bring that new
information forward (before or during the semester)? Did you experience something
dealing with this?

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 ENGLISH 1302: INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH STUDIES

PROJECT ONE: PROPOSAL

3. Reprise of your resulting question: How does your question fit into this context?
How does it relate to the research that has already been done?

3. Methodology (600-700 words)

1. Approach to answering the question: What type of research will you be doing? What
type of primary research (surveys, interviews, studies) will you be focusing on? Why
are these ideal avenues for your research? How will they be helpful towards your
goals?

2. Data needs: What type(s) of data are you looking for? What do you need to
accomplish your research? Why?

3. Analytic techniques: How will you analyze your research data? More specifically, how
will you interpret the results of your primary research? Hypothesize here and what
you’ll receive and how you’ll read into those results and formulate conclusions.

4. Results (400-500 words): What results were you expecting to get from your research? Why
did you believe this? How did they compare to what you eventually found?

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 ENGLISH 1302: INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH STUDIES

PROJECT ONE: PROPOSAL

5. List of references / works cited

Some Final Thoughts

If you have any questions about this project, please feel free to ask in class, before or after class,
through email, on the blog, or come by to see me. I would also encourage you to talk through
your ideas, drafts, etc. with your fellow students, with me, or with a librarian, who I’m sure will
be just as interested to see what ideas you can come up with and can give you suggestions.

Project Expectations
Your proposal should:
Meet each requirement in length for each part and be double-spaced in MLA style.
Have each part revised when the next part is due.
Have a Works Cited page separate from the 1,000 words, and it should have at least four
scholarly sources at work with your research. You may have more than four sources—some of
them not of the same quality or appropriateness for your project—and you can certainly use them,
but you must have the four scholarly articles. I can’t imagine anyone being as successful with less
sources. If you’d like to argue why your two or three sources are enough, though, you can try, but
only if you do so ahead of time.

Due Dates
Part One:


__________________________

Part Two:


__________________________

Part Three:


___________________________

Complete, revised:

___________________________

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