History of California

“The Op-Ed piece is a “real world” exercise that requires not only a thorough understanding of both sides of an issue, but an ability to understand the audience.”[1]

Imagine you are writing a “op-ed” response to a curated blog post catering to a college-educated audience (that’s you guys) of history hobbyists. The conclusion made in the blog is:

“Californians have consistently been ethnically progressive and environmentally conscious throughout history.”

Because you just took California History and want to move beyond the virtual shouting match of “I’m right, you’re wrong, so there,” prevalent across social media, you elect to write an op-ed response on your own website.

For this assignment, please do the following:

Within the context of what we have covered, consider the argument made above and decide whether you agree or disagree with the statement.
Using any available information from what we have covered in class please outline an evidence-supported persuasive response that clearly defines your position and then guides the reader through your reasoning. Use evidence from across our class timeline wisely and explicitly state how the evidence supports your conclusion for or against the statement. Please visit the Smith College Op-Ed Guidelines for some ideas.
Once you have an outline (optionally you can share it with me for feedback), draft your paper by expanding on the structure you built in your outline. Include additional details and/or evidence you found that supports your stance. (Hint: Primary sources are highly valuable and often persuasive as evidence).
You will be graded on the quality, specific concrete detail, and the coherence of your overall message (i.e. does your overall conclusion make sense?). Often having two concrete pieces of evidence to support your stance is the easiest way to tackle this type of assignment in a concise way. The rubric for this and similar written essays is provided in the Introductory Module in Canvas and in the Turnitin App space in Canvas.

As to formatting and length, I leave that up to you. Focus on crafting a paper that sufficiently addresses what you want to say. The finished assignment should be more substantial than a half-page, it would be a rare instance where such a short space would provide sufficient details for an evidence-based opinion considering eight weeks’ worth of material. If you are reaching more than three or four pages, it is time to trim it down and ask if you are being concise enough. Consider, ideally at the outlining phase, whether your argument is strong and addresses the general Written Assignment Rubric and sufficiently, convincingly supports your stance.

This assignment is purposefully broad because I want to encourage flexible thinking about the material and recognize the fact that not everyone structures their arguments in the same way. I feel rigid length and formatting rules, while helpful in some instances, can also limit where a student can go and, in history as in life, there are often no “right” or “wrong” answers. While this does open up the possibility for some to make a half-hearted attempt at completing it the day before it’s due, more often than not I’m pleasantly surprised by how different minds come up with creative and unique ways of addressing an issue. As we get into the material, feel free to discuss or ask your peers or myself in the General/Administrative forum in Canvas if you want to bounce ideas around for this assignment.