What most affected how you think about the criminal justice system?

This paper is purposely open-ended and meant to be driven by your own interests and concerns as these relate to the topics in the class. It’s meant to be a low pressure, thought-provoking exercise for you, one that might even be fun.
Your main task is to write a selective course reflection paper, where “selective” refers to the selections that you make within the guidelines that I’m about to stipulate. Your paper should focus on four topics in the course that were most important to you, and that you believe should also be of interest to anyone who cares about the workings of the criminal justice system. You choose the four topics, but, in order to meet the requirements of the paper, your choices must be made within the following constraints:
at least 1 topic from Weeks 2-6
at least 1 topic from Weeks 7-10
at least 1 topic from Weeks 12-14
That’s 3 total. The fourth topic may come from any of the above weeks. If you find yourself wanting to discuss more than four topics, then creatively combine topics to get the number down to four.
Note: If you want an exception from the above constraints, there is a decent chance that I will allow it as long as you make a good case for the exception. For example, someone might have a good reason for wanting to focus only on Weeks 2-6, or only on Weeks 7-10. In general terms, the good reason would be that you want to dive deeply into certain topics that are confined to those weeks and you have a plan for doing so. If you find yourself in this situation, please send me a statement of what you want to do as soon as possible. I will let you know if your alternative plan is acceptable.
By the word “topic,” I don’t necessarily mean weekly topics, although you are free to use a broad weekly topic as one of your topics for the paper. At the same time, you are also free to choose more specific topics.
For example, Week 6, “Mass Punishment, Race, and the Drug War,” dealt with many specific topics, including (1) the role of drug convictions in mass punishment and (2) the racial dimensions of the Drug War.
To provide another example, Week 8, “Police Use of Deadly Force–Law and Policy,” dealt with many specific topics, including (1) the 21-foot-rule and fatal shootings of people with knives by police, (2) the case of Breonna Taylor and Louisville, Kentucky, and (3) variation between the 20 largest cities in terms of fatal shootings by police.
Some questions that might help you identify topics for discussion include: What do you most want to remember? What most affected how you think about the criminal justice system? What is an area of criminal justice we examined that most needs reform? What is a topic about which you feel the general public is less informed than it should be? What is an issue we examined that troubles you for whatever reason (e.g., because it gets less attention in public discussion than it deserves, or because you disagreed with one or more aspects of how course material presented the issue)? What is a course topic about which you have additional knowledge that you would like to share?
Scoring
This paper is worth 150 points. I will be grading the papers based on the following:
an Introduction that stimulates the reader’s interest and provides an overview of the paper (one paragraph)
discussion of 4 topics * 4 points for each topic (about 1.5 to 2 pages per topic, although writing more is okay as long as it is focused and coherent).
a Conclusion that summarizes your paper and highlights the implications for the criminal justice system (one paragraph)
This will be assessed on the basis of how cohesive and compelling is your overall discussion. As this implies, you should strive to connect the topics that you discuss to one another.
Your paper won’t be evaluated based on the topics you choose, except with respect to the constraint stipulated above.
Your paper will be evaluated based on how well it:
elaborates on the topics you choose to discuss, using specific course materials and your own thoughts;
discusses the topics in a way that would be interesting and compelling for a reader who is curious about the criminal justice system;
demonstrates understanding of the material discussed; and,
ties together the various topics into a cohesive discussion.
Writing Quality Expectations
The writing should be clear and coherent, and it should use correct spelling, grammar/syntax, capitalization, and punctuation (“correct” in terms of conventional academic standards; for guidance, see the Grammar and Editing sections of this website)Links to an external site.. Papers that depart from these guidelines may be marked down a letter grade. More consequentially, writing that departs from these guidelines will be harder to understand and therefore will result in writers’ earning fewer points than they might have earned had they conveyed their ideas clearly.
Transition words and phrases are essential tools for clarity and coherence. For guidance, see this resource (Links to an external site.) and this resource (Links to an external site.).
Citations
Citations are essential for avoiding plagiarismLinks to an external site.. Cite readings using author, year, and page number(s) in parentheses. Cite lecture slides using either the week and slide number(s), or the module and slide number(s); in either case, place a comma before the slide number(s). Papers that don’t do this consistently may be marked down a letter grade, assuming the more serious shortcoming of plagiarismLinks to an external site. has been avoided; plagiarism may result in no credit and other serious consequences.
If you use a quotation, then the citation must include a page number and be placed in the sentence that contains the quotation.
If there are no quotations in a paragraph, then list the sources used for each paragraph in parentheses at the end of the paragraph, separating each source by a semi-colon.
To cite a fellow student’s discussion board contribution, include their first and last name and the week of the discussion.
You don’t need to provide a bibliography unlessyou use sources from outside the course (which are neither required nor necessary for success).

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