Write an unbiased research paper comparing and contrasting at least two different viewpoints on a topic of your choice. Your essay should be approximately 1250 words plus a Works Cited page.

Your audience for this assignment is someone who is unfamiliar with your topic.

This challenge focuses on four major goals:

Discover an opportunity for learning based on academic research

Select a topic for which there are multiple, diverse perspectives and arguments

Create research questions to guide your exploration of these diverse perspectives

Narrow your topic appropriately. The goal is offer an in-depth examination of small part of a broader, more complex topic.

Collect, document, and integrate evidence from research material

Research and summarize expert knowledge and diverse perspectives on the topic to develop a mediated argument that clarifies your understanding and contributes to the conversation

Identify and present the reasons why some people think one way and others think another way

Remain unbiased and understand the issues that impact how people view this topic without arguing for a side.

CO 1: Collect, document, and integrate evidence from research material.
CO 2: Design and compose communication that is based on a well-defined purpose.
CO 3: Identify rhetorical strategies and apply rhetorical theory to read, interpret, and analyze a variety of texts.
CO 4: Design cohesive arguments based on credible sources using framing and support.
Module-Level Skills

MO 4.1 Select and use reliable resources to determine research questions (CO 1).
MO 4.2 Draw critical connections between different sources and arguments (CO 1, 2, 3).
MO 4.3 Evaluate effectiveness of essay using analytic support (CO 3, 5).
MO 4.4 Compare and contrast different authors’ purposes, rhetorical strategies, and motivations (CO 2).