Marybelle C. Keim

As an undergraduate and as a grad-
uate student, I wondered why
term papers were so popular with
my professors. These so-called re-
search papers were always due at the
end of the term and were heavily
weighted in the awarding of a final
grade. In most cases, these papers were
hastily written, because three, four, or
even five such documents were expect-
ed, one for each class. Occasionally
topics were assigned, but the usual di-
rections were, "Research something re-
lated to this course and write about it."
At no time did anyone ask to see my
note cards or give any feedback on an
early draft of the paper. Consequently,
most of my peers and I became expert
at finding appropriate references and
stringing them together into a coherent
but lackluster paper. At the beginning
of the next term, the papers could usu-
ally be retrieved from the professors,
often with no comments or marks, save
for a letter grade. I really did wonder if
anyone had even given the papers a
cursory glance, let alone a careful re-
view.

As a fledgling professor in the early
1970s teaching graduate courses in
higher education (e.g., college teach-
ing, higher education curriculum, or-

Marybelle C. Keim is an assistant profes-
sor of higher education in the Department
of Educational Administration and Higher
Education of Southern Illinois University at
Carbondale.

ganization and administration, com-
munity college), I too, assigned term
papers. I knew from reading McKeachie
( 1969) that term papers were supposed to
employ the powers of analysis and inte-
gration and that understanding and
original thinking were the outcomes of
such assignments. So I reasoned, "If
it's good enough for McKeachie, it's
good enough for me."

At the end of my first quarter, stu-
dents dutifully handed in heavily refer-
enced papers. There would be a topic
sentence, followed by numerous quotes
and paraphrased ideas, then another
topic sentence, followed by more refer-
ences, and so and on. Often, I won-
dered if the students had used a com-
mercial term paper company or had re-
typed an old paper from a sorority/
fraternity file. Others bordered on
completely plagiarized ideas. During
the next quarter, I painstakingly dis-
cussed commercial term paper outfits,
originality, and plagiarism, but in spite
of my exhortations, the final results
were not much better.

I continued to read about college
teaching. New Directions for Teaching
and Learning did not come into exist-
ence until the 1980s, so the best sources
at the time were the many volumes of
Improving College and University Teach-
ing. I found some apparently excellent
advice about term papers by D. Cunningham
( 1975). Among his suggestions
was to have "students submit written
proposals for their topics by the end of
the second or third week. This will en-
courage them to start their research early
and will allow you to check their prog-
ress" (220).

The next quarter, I followed Cun-
ningham's advice. Some apsects of the
papers improved, but the products
were still disappointing. By then, I was
aware that most professors who pub-
lished rarely wrote very much during
academic terms. They did most of their
writing during leaves, breaks, and holi-
days. So, I pondered, "If professors
can produce only one or two publisha-
ble articles/chapters a year, how can
students write three, four, or more
long papers each term?"

I went back to the literature again.
McKeachie ( 1969) confirmed my suspi-
cions when he wrote that his experiences
with term papers had "not always been
happy ones" (120), and Eble ( 1976) de-
scribed the term paper as a bad assign-
ment. Eble ( 1988 :133) pointed out five
major problems with term papers: (1)
teachers do not give enough specific at-
tention to the nature and aims of the
paper, (2) "too much weight in the
course is given the term paper," (3) stu-
dents can get others to prepare their
papers for them, (4) students have too
many papers to write each term "to do
any of them justice," and (5) faculty do
not "provide the feedback that serious
written work deserves."

At this point, I completely revised all
my courses to eliminate term papers.
Instead I gave numerous written as-

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