Choose a problem, issue, or challenge that you know to exist in the workplace or at school Homework Help

Major Project One–Project Guidelines
For the Midterm Exam, read Chapter 8 in the textbook and any supplemental materials related to writing technical

reports.

Writing Technical Reports

Assignment:

1.Choose a problem, issue, or challenge that you know to exist in the workplace or at school. This can be a real

problem/concern that you have currently or can be one that you believe strongly is real but others do not seem to

be aware of it. It needn’t be a life-altering theme, but as with everything in this course, you should consider

covering something that might be useful to you in your career (current or future). Obviously, you needn’t write

about anything that makes you feel uncomfortable or get you into “trouble” should it be seen by your current

employer/classmates/professors. Think about audience, even a potential one that you didn’t intend to see the

work.
2.Imagine you’ve been asked by your supervisor or a formal committee to explain and analyze the issue and to

write a recommendation for your school or workplace to address the issue. This recommendation will go to your

supervisor/committee and to audiences higher than your supervisor/committee.
3.Write a technical report of at least five pages (more is ok, if appropriate). This is including illustrations,

but be sure to develop solid content overall. Don’t rely on a few graphs to do you work, for example. The bulk of

this assignment should be your writing. If you borrow illustrations or tables they need to be cited. If you

create your own, consider the ration of image to text, not only in terms of quantity but also in size.
4.Include research (with appropriate citations) as needed, which essentially means I will assume most of your

projects will need research of some sort, but I will not require a certain amount. Cite sources. Not every

profession uses MLA citations, so either look up what is appropriate for you profession or otherwise provide

clear, accurate attribution to the sources you’re using. Use the resources linked on Canvas and that are in your

book. Documentation And Style (Citations)
5.Using the list on page 154 in ETC, choose which kind of report is appropriate for what you’re writing.

Construct your document as such.
6.Summarize the issue, identifying key elements and the purpose for your report.
7.Offer your analysis of the issues, your conclusions and your recommendations (which becomes a proposal of

sorts), etc.
8.Don’t forget to include elements such as costs or materials needed, length of time to implement the

recommendations, parties who should/will be included in your recommendations, etc. Include any resources

(materials, links to websites, illustrations) that you might suggest be used in moving forward with your

recommendation. Explain what a link leads the reader to instead of simply dropping in a link.
In this technical report, you should also be employing the other elements we’ve covered so far in the class:

audience awareness, ethical writing, readability, appropriate word choice and sentence structure, document

design, etc. Feel free to consult the supplemental resources I’ve provided.

Examples—use these as ideas. You are not required to use any of these but may do so if you wish:

•A rise in student cheating and plagiarism
•Employee theft of office supplies
•Unethical reporting of data among colleagues
•Unethical behavior at work
•Poor employee morale
•Student alienation from a sense of campus community
•Students are not recycling as they could
•Co-workers sending passive-aggressive email messages
•Co-workers “spamming” the office with cat videos (aw! so cute!)
•New hires or part-time workers are under-trained for their positions
•Classmates or co-workers are spending too much time on personal devices or social networks, leading to

distractions among the class/office/etc
•Someone wears too much cologne or perfume
•Someone keeps stealing snacks from the honor box (jerk!)
•One or more supervisors are micromanaging to the point of hindering work for other employees
•Drug use on campus by students is obvious to other students but seems to be ignored by campus security or staff
•You need to decide on a location for employee training or a retreat (if you choose this one, use real locations

that you can visit. Don’t make it all up)
•Disruptive behavior at your child’s daycare or school
•There’s an Internet troll on the loose