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The Short Proposal Genre 

In writing for publication, there are a number of related short proposals that you need to write, typically as part of the gatekeeping steps to getting your work out into the world. This includes conference abstracts or conference proposals (for gaining entrance to a conference), query letters (to test the interest in an article idea), and article proposals (for being included in a special issue or edited collection). Learning to master this genre is key to success within academia, as this meta-genre appears again and again as part of academic work. All these genres are quite similar and share many features (the need to describe the exigency and relevance of the project, the need to outline the project and its contributions. A key feature of this genre is the importance of brief, clear, and precise language. 

Most short proposals come in between 300–750 words and have the following features:

• Background / Literature Review: A few sentences to a paragraph that briefly situates the proposed project in the current literature and identifies a space and need for your research. Since you have very little space, your goal is to show the relevance of your work in line with the broader literature and also demonstrate that you are aware of the scholarly conversations taking place.
• Methods/Approach: A few sentences to a paragraph that describe your methods of inquiry (for qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods research) or scholarly approach(es) (for textual, historical, reflective, or other types of scholarship). 
• Findings/Analysis: A paragraph that describes the major findings or arguments that you are making in the work. What can be tricky here is that we often propose things before we’ve done the research—if that’s the case, just present your best guess as to what you will find, realizing that it may change (and there is an unspoken understanding among conference organizers and editors that this happens often).
• Implications and Takeaways: A few sentences to a paragraph that describes the key takeaways and what this research or scholarship means to the field, how it contributes, and what readers/attendees gain.  

Query Letter Specifics

The goal of a query letter is to introduce a potential submission to an editor of a journal in the hopes that the journal editor will indicate some interest before an article is submitted. While you do not have to write a query letter in most cases, there are times you might choose to do so. Here are some examples of those times: 

• You are working on a very novel project, something that pushes the bounds of the field, and you’d like to gauge interest from a journal.
• You aren’t sure if your project is a good fit for a journal.
• You are writing in a new subfield and don’t know the journals that well, so you might send a query.

As you can see from this list above, you would use a query letter to gauge interest in a particular topic with a particular journal. They aren’t necessary but can be helpful, particularly for the above areas.

Here are some of the specific genre features of a query letter (there is some flexibility about order, but all should include the following): 

• Query letters are typically formatted as a one-page letter (letter format, single-spaced, 12-point font). This includes a date, salutation, letter body, and signature. The main idea is that they are brief and can be read and responded to quickly.
• Begin by providing an introduction of the article—offer a clear purpose and overview of the article (think about this as a mini abstract). What does your article seek to accomplish? How will it accomplish this? 
• Offer an argument for why the project is a good fit for the publication. This usually includes citations for two to three previous articles and how the proposed project either extends, responds, or builds from these articles in some way. 
• Provide a clear sense of the contribution of the article—what does it offer readers? Why is it new, relevant, and important?
• Provide a sense of the timeline—when can the editor expect to see the completed work?
• Remember that you are writing this to a very specific person (the editor or editors). It should be addressed directly to them. 

Nearly all of the features of a query letter, except for the last bullet point, are also found in a letter to an editor when you submit a manuscript for consideration for publication.  

The Article or Chapter Proposal

Article or chapter proposals are almost always required for special issues of journals or edited collections. You can find these by browsing professional listservs, where you will frequently see calls for special issues or edited collections (called a “CFP” or “RFP” call for / request for proposals). 

 Article and chapter proposals typically introduce an idea or concept to editors, which will be completed and submitted at a later date. If you want to be part of an edited collection or special issue of a journal, you have to have your proposal accepted first. Thus, like a query letter, a short proposal allows you to contact an editor, and lets you see if your work can be submitted for the special issue or edited collection. Sometimes this can lead to feedback and further conversations with editors as you shape your work.

The Article/Chapter Proposal is typically formatted as a one-paragraph or multi-paragraph (usually no more than three to five) introduction to your work. The genre features of the article/chapter proposal are as follows:

• Begin by providing an introduction of the article—offer a clear purpose and overview of the article (think about this as a mini abstract). What does your article seek to accomplish?
• How will your article accomplish what you are proposing? (e.g., here is where you would describe your methods, datasets, or other approaches). What are some findings you expect? 
• Provide a clear sense of the contribution of the article—what does it offer readers? Why is it new, relevant, and important?
• Provide a sense of the timeline—when can the editor expect to see the completed work?

Conference Proposal or Abstract

The goal of the conference proposal or conference abstract is to apply to present your scholarly work at a conference. These are typically 250–500 words and are written similarly to other abstracts (such as the abstract you would write for the opening of your article). Audiences and expectations for these proposals include:

• The work presented is of relevance, interest, and use to specific conference attendees.
• The work is read by a blind panel of reviewers, often who use a rubric to rate the different proposals. The highest proposals (rated by two or more reviewers) are accepted.
• Some conferences have a theme—if the conference has a theme, there should be some acknowledgment and connection to the conference theme in the description.
• Ensure that you have a balance of literature review, methods/analysis, and clear takeaways for conference attendees.  
• Read the conference guidelines to get a better sense of what the organizers are looking for. Some conferences are meant to be more for practitioners and interactive, and if that’s the case, you will want to include that in your proposal. 

Sometimes, you are organizing not a single presenter but an entire panel of speakers on a single project or related theme. In this case, you would apply the same organization as above. This handout includes a sample panel presentation. 

Examples:

Sample Successful Proposal for Special Issue of a Journal (500 words)

The relationship of writing transfer to emotions is only beginning to be understood by the field, although work on emotions and learning more broadly suggests a deep connection between how students learn and the emotions that they experience. Specifically, positive emotions are shown to improve students’ academic achievement and learning over time (Efklides & Volet, 2005; Linnenbrink-Garcia & Pekrun, 2011) while negative emotions are shown to have the opposite effect (Pekrun, et. al, 2011). The connection of emotions to writing transfer is still a very new area. Driscoll and Wells (2012) and Wardle (2012) raised the question of what dispositional qualities matter in regards to learning transfer: Driscoll and Wells specifically discuss value, a disposition strongly connected with emotion. Beyond this work, however, little has examined how specific emotions connect to writing transfer.

The present study examines the role of emotions and value in generating “transfer-focused thinking” and subsequent learning transfer. Transfer focused thinking is students’ ability to build connections and anticipate future uses of writing knowledge prior to actual opportunities to transfer; this may take place in reflective activity in an initial FYW course or subsequently at other points throughout a students’ college career. A newer theory of transfer from Perkins and Salomon (2012) suggests that students need to detect opportunities for transfer, elect to build the connection, and then connect the prior knowledge and experience to the opportunity. For this to happen, however, students must be in the mindset for transfer—and this is where the concept of transfer-focused thinking applies.

The data is drawn from a longitudinal study of student writing that includes surveys of 315 students enrolled in FYW classes at one institution and a subset of 14 of those students who were followed for a period of five years. The 315 students were surveyed at the beginning and end of the term to understand their beliefs surrounding transfer and related areas. A random sample of students were contacted for follow-ups in the term after their initial writing course. These students were interviewed for approximately 60 minutes each year and asked to discuss samples of their writing in various courses. 

Preliminary results suggest that FYW students’ initial transfer-focused thinking is based largely on their emotional connection to the material and their dispositions, specifically what they find interesting, what excites them, or what they can see directly connected to their majors. The interview participants, over time, manifest these same patterns, although students’ values about learning and emotions towards learning grow more positive, allowing for a broader sense of transfer-focused thinking in later years. Negative emotions also play a substantial role in dissuading students from engaging in transfer-focused thinking—results entirely consistent with the broader literature on emotion and learning. 

The article will conclude with implications for research and teaching in FYW and beyond, including a consideration of the role of emotion in fostering writing transfer and in understanding longer-term writing development. 

Publication: Composition Forum, Special issue on Emotions

Driscoll, D. L. and Powell, R. (2016).  States, traits, and dispositions: The impact of emotion on writing development and writing transfer across college courses and beyond. Composition Forum (Special Issue on Emotions) 34.

Successful Conference Proposal – Single Speaker

Symposium Title: Exploring, Integrating and Modeling Internal Learner Characteristics in Long-Term Writing Development

Previous longitudinal studies of writing (Beaufort, 2007; Sommers and Saltz, 2004; Herrington and Curtis, 2000; Eodice, Geller, and Lerner, 2017; Oppenheimer, et. al., 2017) have revealed that both external factors, such as such as curriculum, instruction, and learning environment, as well as an internal facets, such as an individual’s internal orientation toward learning, or dispositions (Driscoll and Wells, 2012), can impact an individual’s ability to develop as a writer. Research has also explored more deeply the ways in which a learner’s previous knowledge, experiences, dispositions, and identities contribute to their growth. Thus, a growing discussion is taking place about the complexity of writers’ development and the factors that shape it (Donahue and Foster-Johnson, 2018; Anson and Moore, 2016, Bazerman et. al, 2017).  Yet, there is still much we don’t yet know about how these internal and external factors interplay, interact, and shape each other and a writer’s long-term development. How specifically individuals’ characteristics shape long-term development? How can external structures be strengthened to support the positive growth of the individual? This symposia takes up these important questions.  Presenter one explores two longitudinal case studies, presenting nine years of data including interviews and writing samples.  Through these case studies, Presenter 1 demonstrates the critical importance that individuals’ knowledge, experiences, dispositions and identities have on long-term writing outcomes.  Presenter two offers an operationalized model for understanding the role of individual learner characteristics in writing development. To support this argument, Presenter two offers an analysis of corpus of 267 writing samples (gathered from a 9-year longitudinal study of 13 writers) is presented with an analysis of which writing experiences had long-term developmental influence on writers. Presenter 3 explores the practical applications of attending to individual learner characteristics by sharing three years of case study research on a course which was designed to help undergraduate students develop beliefs and behaviors to better support their own undergraduate research writing. Findings revealed that students in the course reported improvement in procrastination, perfectionism, writing related anxiety, motivation to write, and resilience.  At the conclusion of the seminar participants will have the opportunity to brainstorm and discuss ways to adapt this research to their own local contexts.

Successful Panel Presentation Proposal: 

Three Speakers on One Larger Multi-institutional Project

In 2007, Bergmann and Zepernicks’ article “Disciplinary and Transference” offered scathing evidence that few advanced undergraduate students recognized that introductory composition courses taught them anything, if at all, about writing. This study, along with Downs and Wardle’s “Teaching about Writing, Righting Misconceptions,” set the stage for the field to explore, theorize, and develop pedagogies to directly address the “transfer problem.”  And for the last 14 years, the field has largely embraced this call to consider writing transfer as a central pedagogy. 

Theories of transfer have been widely discussed, from Beaufort’s (2007/2012) knowledge domains and Tinberg’s assertion that the classroom must be saturated by specific writing terms (2017), to Hayes et. al. (2017) assertion of the need for an “environmental” approach to support prior knowledge and create dynamic transfer. Classrooms have adopted Downs and Wardles’ (2007) “Writing About Writing” (WAW) model as well as the Teaching for Transfer (TFT) and Threshold Concept models (Adler Kassner and Wardle 2015; Tinberg, 2017; Yancey et. al., 2014). And the importance of applying reflective practice to writing transfer has been repeatedly asserted (Adler-Kassner et al., 2017; Taczak, 2011; Tinberg, 2017) and become standard.  Further, many scholars/researchers have shown that specific curricular practices lead to transfer (Adler-Kassner et al., 2013; Fraizer, 2010; Hayes et al., 2017; Nowacek, 2011). Researchers assert students transfer information more readily from FYC when they use the language of writing as a discourse community (Fraizer, 2010; Nelms and Dively, 2007; Wardle, 2012), and when students understand that transfer is a learning outcome in itself (Driscoll, 2015; Hill, 2016). There is now a robust body of work in practices that lead to transfer.  That is, transfer pedagogies have woven themselves deeply into the fabric of our discipline. 

While a lot has changed since 2007, have the inclusions of these theories helped shift students’ perceptions of transfer? Even as certain practices enhance writing transferability, how much of what instructors teach in FYC is truly being carried into writing in the disciplines? In this CCCC Research Initiative Grant supported presentation, this concurrent panel offers a replication and multi-institutional study that explores and extends Bergmann and Zepernick’s foundational study, 14 years later. Through interviews and focus groups of advanced writers at four diverse US institutions, all of whom have embraced transfer pedagogy to some degree, we re-examine Bergmann and Zepernick's’ questions to see what has changed in this common place of composition research. 

Presenter 1 helps set the stage for the panel by first discussing both aspects of writing transfer and offering insight as to why replication studies are critical to understanding the potential influence of movements like writing transfer on practices in the field (drawing upon foundational replication studies like Lundsford and Lundsford, 2008). In our case, we have taken a single-site foundational study and explored it from a multi-institutional perspective. Presenter one next offers the methods for our CCCC grant-supported study: a discussion of our 12 focus groups at 4 institutions, profiles of our institutions and their representativeness, the focus group process and script, data analysis, and key limitations to the study.  Finally, presenter 1 offers a comparison of our study with the original Bergmann and Zepernick (2007) study, taking the three core themes from the 2007 study and showing how they map onto the present findings. These original themes are: 1) Literature and FYW courses are indistinguishable from each other; 2) Student perceptions of themselves as writers limited to classroom discourse communities and genres; 3) Where students learned to write were largely based in their disciplines, not in FYW.  Preliminary findings from our study suggest that while some of these themes are still present in focus groups of advanced writers, students also demonstrate a deeper understanding of core aspects of learning to write tied to writing transfer, such as advanced understanding of genres, discourse communities, and writing practices and they do attribute some of these practices to FYW.  Implications for practice and a call for the work we still have left to do as a field, concludes this presentation. 

Presenter 2 examines students’ dispositions and how they affect transfer in this multi-institutional study, which expands on the original themes and findings of Bergmann & Zepernick (2007). Dispositions, or the individual, internal characteristics like motivation or learning styles have been shown to impact writing transfer because without positive writerly dispositions students don’t engage in writing transfer (Driscoll & Wells, 2012; Driscoll & Powell, 2016). Preliminary results show that sometimes students have positive writerly dispositions and other times they do not. Students' dispositions depend on a host of contextual factors such as assignment, genre, teacher, etc. Furthermore, because writerly dispositions are so individualized, they manifest themselves in different ways depending on each individual. Presenter 2 ends with specific pedagogical implications for having students continue to interrogate their writerly dispositions in individualized ways for a variety of future professional, personal, and academic contexts. 

Presenter 3 pushes the boundaries of transfer by exploring the role of student writerly identity and connecting transfer to identity studies. Bergmann and Zepernick (2007) hypothesized that identity may be a contributing factor to “box under the bed” syndrome, but that area was not fully explored. Student’s writerly identity has often been referenced in literature and writing studies (Bickerstaff, 2012; Bosanquet, & Cahir, 2016; Dasbender, 2017; Driscoll & Powell, 2016; Jarraway, 2002; Leung & Hicks, 2014; Nowacek, 2011; Michaud, 2013; Zamin, 2018), but it has just begun to be discussed as a potential contributing factor to student success in first year writing. Here, presenter 3 offers an operationalized definition of writerly identity in the liminal space of first year writing to extend the conversation around transfer and dispositions (Driscoll & Wells, 2012). Finally, Presenter 3 will discuss the connections between identity and transfer, and how those connections might be made stronger in pedagogical practice.