Students will complete research papers on their research topic. Students will practice formulating a research question, reviewing literature, synthesizing information, and using statistics to guide social work. The paper length is set to 8-pages maximum.
Page 1: Introduction – Introduce your topic and setup what the paper will include moving forward.
Pages 2-4: Literature Review – Discuss articles in full detail, including statistics, main findings, and gaps/limitations. Always connect the information to the field of social work as directly as possible to show its relevance. Make sure to insert your new research question derived from the gaps/limitations of your articles at the very end of the literature review section. Students may need to include additional literature at this point to bolster their findings.
Pages 5-7: Discussion – Discuss the importance of your new research question, how you may approach a study that attempts to answer that question in simple terms, what the answer could mean for a social worker and/or the field of social work, and give specific examples of how your research may fit into the field of social work overall. Does this research take us to a new place where we will learn new information to use in practice or create a new pathway for alternative research? This section will be theoretical in nature since we are not carrying out the study at this time. Students should discuss the research from multiple angles. It is important for students to remain neutral about their question and to be able to write about the perspective that you desire as well as the perspective that you do not. Show that you can consider a reality where your hypothesis is incorrect and work with that potential outcome from your study.
Page 8: Conclusion – The conclusion will briefly summarize the key points throughout the paper at first. Then, it will consist of implications of this work and specific action steps or items for social workers. Try to apply the work to both social work practice and research. If possible, apply the work to policy-level action as well. Remember to write from multiple angles, given different potential study results.
Rubric for Assignment
15 points – Correct article selection
15 points – Adherence to APA formatting in text – this must be perfect to earn points.
15 points – Adherence to APA formatting in references – this must be perfect to earn points.
15 points – Integration – discussing what was learned from the articles, especially the statistics and data.
20 points – Discussion – providing a thoughtful discussion that hits all points outlined by instructor.
10 points – Students must check for spelling, grammar, and general formatting errors.
10 points – Adherence to page limits, overall instructions, and delivery of an original research question.