Course Description

3 credits; 3 hours

In this course, students engage in the process of developing an independent academic research project. The course emphasizes strategies for selecting an appropriate academic research topic; formulating research questions; conducting, integrating and citing research; and developing an argument. Students deepen their sense of audience awareness, as they engage in the recursive writing process and consider different genre conventions and rhetorical appeals.

Prerequisite: CSE099, ENA/ENC/ENG101

Pathways Student Learning Objectives: ENG 103 is not a Pathways course, so Pathways SLOs are not required on the syllabus.

Course Learning Objectives:

1. Reinforce students’ abilities to identify a text’s audience, voice, context, and purpose inorder to enable students to apply these concepts to developing and organizing their ownwriting.
2. Provide students with an understanding of how to select an appropriate academic researchtopic and formulate research questions.
3. Enable students to identify, locate, and interpret print and online sources in order to uselibrary and archival resources successfully.
4. Reinforce students’ skills in evaluating and synthesizing primary and secondary sourcesin support of a well-reasoned argument.
5. Reinforce the practice of writing as a process and enable students to produce a minimum of 4,000 words of writing, including a minimum of one research paper of at least 1,300 words that integrates multiple sources.
6. Reinforce research as a staged process.
7. Provide students with an understanding of ethical citation and MLA/APA documentation.
8. Enable students to annotate and interpret sources, using summation, paraphrase,quotation, and analysis, as well as parenthetical citation.

Program Learning Objectives

PLO 1: Evaluate and synthesize sources using summary and/or paraphrase and/or quotation.

PLO 2: Engage critically and analytically with a text’s major assumptions and assertions.

Course Resources 

Faculty-Facing Introduction To Sheet–About Teaching This Course

Click below to download the faculty introduction sheet.

Student-Facing Introduction To Sheet–About Taking This Course

Click below to download the student introduction sheet.

Sample Syllabi

Naomi Stubbs 

A clear, concise model

Naomi Stubbs–ENG 103 Syllabus

Deirdre Flood 

Great organization and communication for a fully asynchronous class

Deirdre Flood–ENG 103 Syllabus

Sample Syllabus Sections

This link will take you to sample syllabus sections you might use for inspiration in writing your own syllabus:

Sample Syllabus Sections

Sample Sections include:

• Attendance/Engagement Policies
• Class Environs policies
• Explanations of synchronous and asynchronous meetings
• Statements of Support
• Grade Breakdowns
• Journal Entries/Weekly Responses
• Revision Policies
• Assignments Sequences
• Miscellaneous 

Latest ENG 103 Posts

• High-Stakes Career Research Paper for ENG 103 by Ting Man Tsao
• OER Freewriting Activity in conjunction with James Baldwin’s short story, “Sonny’s Blues,” developed by Alice Rosenblitt-Lacey for either ENG 102 or ENG 103
• ENG 103 Sources Activity by Kelly I. Aliano
• Spring 2022 Syllabus Updates
• Deirdre Flood–ENG 103 Syllabus
• Naomi Stubbs–ENG 103 Syllabus
• Elliot Hearst: Basic In-text Citation Formatting and Works Cited Pages
• Judith Nell Foster: Substitute Introductory Questionnaire
• Sample Syllabus Sections