Technically Speaking: A Humorous Yet Useful Guide To Technical Writing For Young Professionals

Technically Speaking
A Humorous yet Useful Guide to Technical Writing for Young Professionals
By John Krygiel
Technically Speaking: A Humorous yet Useful Guide to Technical Writing for Young Professionals A PRACTICAL CIVILIZATION ORIGINAL 2014 JOHN KRYGIEL Additive Credits: Cover photo: iStock Photo-Dmytro Cover Design: John Krygiel
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Table of Contents
(click to navigate)
Preface Chapter One: (Not Your Typical) Grammar School 1.1: Parts of Speech 1.2: Singular & Plural Nouns 1.3: Possessive Nouns 1.4: Pronouns 1.5: Verbs 1.6: Be Verbs 1.7: Action Verbs 1.8: Adjectives 1.9: Adverbs 1.10: Conjunctions 1.11: Prepositions 1.12: Interjections Chapter Two: More Grammar (And its Applications) 2.1: Noun Phrases 2.2: Verb Phrases 2.3: Prepositional Phrases 2.4: Clauses 2.5: Relative Clauses 2.6: Sentence Types 2.7: Active Voice 2.8: Passive Voice 2.9: Appositives 2.10: Common Usage Errors 2.11: Homophones 2.12: Misplaced Modifiers 2.13: Sentence Fragments 2.14: Spelling and Punctuation Chapter Three: General Tips for Writing Well
5 8 9 10 11 12 12 12 13 13 13 14 15 15 17 17 17 18 18 19 19 20 20 20 20 21 22 23 23 24
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Chapter Four: Cover Letters & Rsums 4.1: Having a Purpose 4.2: Purpose of Cover Letter 4.3: The Dos and Donts of Cover Letters 4.4: Cover Letter Examples 4.5: Purpose of Rsum 4.6: The Dos and Donts of Rsums 4.7: Rsum Examples 4.8: Content and Formatting 4.9: The Final Word Chapter Five: Academic Papers 5.1: Follow the (Basic) Rules 5.2: Idea Formulation & Initial Research 5.3: Purpose of Paper Sections Defined 5.4: Transitional Sentences 5.5: Quotation Usage 5.6: Quality of Sources 5.7: Closing Statements 5.8: The Final Word 5.9: Academic Paper Example 1 5.10: Academic Paper Example 2 Chapter Six: Proposals 6.1: What Is a Proposal? 6.2: Pre-Proposal Checklist 6.4: The Components of a Proposal 6.5: Proposal Example 6.6: The Final Word Chapter Seven: The Final-Final Word Sources Acknowledgements Further Reading and Resources
29 29 30 30 31 40 40 41 58 62 64 64 66 69 71 74 76 77 78 80 116 133 133 133 137 144 148 149 152 153 154
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Preface
Welcome! Ever feel like writing important documents such as academic papers, rsums, cover letters, and proposals is a massive pain in your ass? You are not alone. These documents are critical to your success as a student, business professional, or a well-spoken person in general. Often, they can be overwhelming to compose. I was once in the same boat. Im here to help guide you through the process of writing each of these documents extremely well. You will find this guide to be practical and uncommon at the same time. Uncommon due to some of the language used throughout. But you would rather I keep things light and fun right? Technical writing can be as exciting as watching plants growORit can be a way to express yourself and display your knowledge so that others will look at your work and weep from the beauty of it.
Who I Am
Perhaps youre wondering who I am to be giving you advice on how to write well. Thats a wise thing to ponder. After all, it would be good to know what a doctors success rate is before he performed an open heart surgery on you or if the pilot of your plane is an endurance whiskey drinker. For the past year, I have written and edited my own blog at practicalcivilization.com. Youre probably aware of this, as you probably found this book through the blog. Obvious point aside, I love to write. Quite frankly, on most occasions my blog posts write themselves. As far as academic backgrounds go, I have a B.S. in Technology Management. The classes I took for this major were technical and business savvy in nature. They required excellent quality technical documents to be composed. I excelled in this area of my studies. Ive found that I actually like to catch errors in my writing and have an astute sense of what looks and sounds good in a written document.
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Consider me one of those nerds who enjoy writing but also has a sense of humor. The two academic papers contained in this book both received an A in a 400 and 500 level class, I was the chief writer on my senior project in college, I wrote a grant proposal for my university that was passed, I wrote the brochure and website content for the solar panel company I currently work for, Ive created my own guide to playing guitar for my lesson business, published a short eBook for my blogand on and on. Being a natural introvert, Ive found solace in writing. The world is a loud place with everyone trying to shout at each other. Introverts listen. We listen to what people have to say and this (usually) translates into excellent writing.
Who This Book Is For

You get the picture. I like to write. You probably want to know whats in it for you. Who do I think you are? I think you are either a college student trying to improve upon your writing or a recent college graduate who is trying to put together a decent rsum and letter. In other words, you are a young professional about to make waves in the world! You have brilliant ideas, and I want to enable you to be in a position to turn your ideas into change. The world needs you out there to make change for the better, whether it is in a school or business setting. This book is perfect for you if you at least have some desire to improve your writing. You also have an inkling of how to write decent content. Perhaps its difficult for you, but Im here to help!
What You Will Find in This Book

In the proceeding pages, we will learn the ins and outs of how to write four different technical documents: academic papers, rsums, cover letters, and proposals. These are commonly found in an academic setting or in the so called real world. Like them or not, they must be done. My goal is to get you to feel confident in composing these documents.
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Through many examples and templates, you will be able to improve upon your writing of these four documents. We will begin by covering basic grammar and then get to concrete tips and examples. This book DOES NOT cover specific formatting styles such as MLA, APA, or AMA. If you are looking for a manual on how to format in these styles, return this book and look elsewhere. While the examples contained herein are formatted correctly in one of the aforementioned styles, the scope of the book does not detail these styles. If you are ready to put your writing caps on, lets dive in (if not, why the hell did you buy a book on technical writing?)! I hope we can have some fun!
John Krygiel
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Chapter One: (Not Your Typical) Grammar School

Why go over the basics of the English language? It may seem silly or redundant, but even published articles online tend to have grossly overlooked errors that make you wonder, How did someone writing for the Associated Press hit publish on this?! While reviewing grammar is often everyones favorite activity, it is essential nonetheless. And since you want to have the best written rsum, cover letter, academic paper, or proposal in any room within a fifty mile radius, its wise to brush up on your grammar! My intent is for you to use the following sections as a reference for your writing. Do you need to read this section word-for-word? Certainly not; you can skim and skip sections. Just keep in mind that the more time you spend reviewing, the more polished your documents will be. Its surprising how simple facets of writing can go unchecked and lead to errors. Theres your fair warning! Just a quick side note: the English language is fickle. Technically speaking, certain rules dont always apply in order to compose the written word. Its okay to have certain aspects of the written English language differ at times! Just bear this in mind when reviewing our grammar school. Ive broken down our grammar school into several sections: parts of speech, phrases, clauses, sentence types, and common usage mistakes. Each of these sections will have examples of course. Sound like a plan? Lets jump in!
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1.1: Parts of Speech

In the English language, there are basic building blocks that make up phrases, sentences, paragraphs, and eventually, final documents. We call these building blocks parts of speech. When writing technical documents, you want to ensure that you are correctly using these parts of speech at all times. In essence, you want a foundation that can support your eloquent thoughts, concepts, and goals.
Luckily, we no longer have to practice writing on typewriters anymore!
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1.2: Singular & Plural Nouns

A noun describes a person, place, thing, or idea. Nouns can be either singular or plural. Singular nouns describe, go figure, ONE person, place, thing, or idea! Plural nouns describe more than one person, place, thing, or idea by adding an s: Dove-doves Rifle-rifles Cardinal-cardinals Cub-cubs Politician-politicians Lie-lies
Plural nouns dont end there however. Certain rules govern different types of plural nouns. Nouns that end in a ch, x, or s sound, add an es to make them plural: Cashbox-cashboxes Match-matches Loss-losses
Nouns that end in f, or fe, change the f to a v and add es: Dwarf-dwarves Elf-elves Wolf-wolves Knife-knives
Certain nouns have different plural spellings altogether. Theyre pretty intuitive: Child-children Goose-geese Man-men
Others dont change at all and serve as both singular and plural nouns: Deer Fish Moose
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Nouns that end in o or y do not have definitive rules and depend on the word. These become more familiar the more you read and are exposed to them: Latino-Latinos Jalapeo-jalapeos Diversity-diversities Tea party-tea parties Anxiety-anxieties
1.3: Possessive Nouns

Possessive nouns indicate ownership. Depending on who is doing the owning, the nouns ending changes. For example, if one person is doing the owning, an apostrophe and s is added to the end: Johns bicycle Hanks truck Grandmas wisdom
When referring to group ownership, just add an apostrophe after the s: The blue collar workers experience The college graduates idealism The kids toys My parents house
If two people share ownership of an object, an apostrophe and s goes on the second name only: John and Yokos song Keenan and Kels burger Siegfried and Roys man-eating lion
If two people own separate things, an apostrophe and s are applied to each persons name: Toms and Nancys shoes Maliks and Avas board games
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1.4: Pronouns
Pronouns take the place of nouns but serve the same purpose. They come in three forms: first, second, or third person. First person: I took several shots of whiskey last night and regret it. Second person: You took several shots of whiskey last night and regret it. Third person: He/she took several shots of whiskey last night and regrets it. Third person neutral: The bar was primed and ready to take drinks from. It held the shots of whiskey while the recipients waited for them. It had no feelings as to whether or not the recipients would regret taking shots in the morning as it is an inanimate object.
1.5: Verbs
Verbs describe action, a state of being, or link a subject with its complement. Lets take a look at a few examples to ensure we are matching up the correct verb-subject usage. Verbs can be divided into two different categories: be verbs and action verbs.
1.6: Be Verbs
Be verbs describe a state of being or feeling: He is a very successful lawyer. He feels as if he compromises his morals each day.
Negative be verbs need the word not after them: She is not a Democrat. She does not support wasteful programs that encourage helplessness.
When asking a question, the be verb comes first in the sentence: Are you going to the Scarborough Fair? Is there going to be parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme there?
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1.7: Action Verbs

Action verbs express, you guessed it, action! These are the most commonly used type of verb: Tim works at a local coffeehouse. He grows a beard like many of his co-workers. I wink at people that pass by.
Again, for negative action verbs, do not, does not, or did not must precede the action verb: Ellen does not like to watch musical plays. She did not enjoy the latest showing of Hairspray. They do not perform on weekends.
For interrogative action verbs, begin the sentence with do, does, or did: Did the temperature reach 102 today? Do people deny that high temperatures in October are due to climate change? Does Jim think his low gas mileage truck has anything to do with climate change?
1.8: Adjectives
Adjectives describe or modify nouns and pronouns: A pretty girl works at the flower store. The blue shirt she wears matches her eyes. She is feeling glamorous by wearing her shirt.
1.9: Adverbs
Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, or other adverbs: The eagle quickly flew to catch a mouse. The mouse was dreadfully afraid of being eaten alive. Mice tend to move very hastily when they know there is a chance of being eaten.
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1.10: Conjunctions
What is their function (high five if youre old enough to remember School House Rock)? Conjunctions are words that link or connect phrases and clauses. Conjunctions can indicate the relationship between two words. There are three types of conjunctions: coordinating, correlative, and subordinating. Coordinating Coordinating conjunctions connect words or clauses that have equal grammatical functions. Coordinating conjunctions include: and, or, but, yet, nor, for, so. Connecting nouns: I will buy asparagus and alfalfa sprouts. Connecting verbs: I did not high-five or hug a tree today. Connecting adjectives: My body odor is neither offensive nor pleasant, it is somewhere in between. Connecting dependent clauses: If Bill OReilly makes an outrageous claim and tree-huggers are offended, there will be a peaceful protest. Connecting independent clauses: Bill Maher took a stance on gay marriage, but it fell on deaf ears.
Correlative Correlative conjunctions work in pairs to connect elements in a sentence. They are: eitheror, notbut, not onlybut also, bothand, althoughyet, whetheror, neither...nor. Connecting nouns: The name of the grocer is not Half Foods but Whole Foods. Connecting adjectives: Shoppers at Whole Foods are either pretentious or self-righteous. Connecting prepositional phrases: Shopping at Whole Foods can be done not only by credit card, but also by an arm and a leg. Connecting independent clauses: Not only did the price drop for a wedge of cheese at Whole Foods, but they also lowered the price of bluegreen algae.
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Subordinating Subordinating conjunctions connect elements with different grammatical functions, typically a dependent and independent clause. Subordinating conjunctions include: in case, after, although, in that, until, as, now that, as if, once, if, whenever, as though, since, where, because, so, whereas, unless, before, so that, whether, even though, than, which, except that, that, when, while, however, though, who/whom. Wal-Mart shoppers act as if the world contains infinite resources. Since shes taken a basic economics class, shes learned that in fact we have a finite amount of resources. Although low prices are nice, do they really benefit the greater good of society? Whereas an informed person cares about the local economy, a shopper at Wal-Mart tends to be oblivious to such matters.
1.11: Prepositions
A preposition is a word or group of words that shows the relationship between an object-in time or space-and another word in a sentence: In the hallway, I met a girl so fair. She handed her number to me after little effort. With her number in my pocket, I skipped back to my dorm.
1.12: Interjections
Interjections are words that express emotions, gain attention, or display surprise. They are typically placed at the beginning of sentences. Interjections stand alone from sentences. If they are removed, the sentence is still perfect grammatically. If the injection being used conveys something strongly, an exclamation mark follows it. If the interjection is intended to be soft or nonchalant, a comma is used. Darn! That was a tough test. Well, at least my grade was an A going into the test. Golly! What a difficult class! Boy Howdy! I agree with that sentiment.
Wouldnt it be funny if we still used those last two examples in everyday speech?
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That wraps up the basic building blocks of grammar! Its now time to move on to looking at how these blocks go together in the form of phrases, clauses, and sentences. Dont worry; this practice will be WAY more useful that the asinine tool of diagramming sentences in middle school!
A is for Apple. But you knew that already!
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Chapter Two: More Grammar (And its Applications)

Honestly, the more you practice writing, the easier the following concepts become. At this point in your life, writing correctly probably comes somewhat naturally. Is it necessary to realize when you write an independent or dependent clause? Technically speaking, no. As long as your sentences are coherent and utilize the correct forms of the basic grammar weve already covered, you are good to go. In the following sections we will take a gander at phrases, clauses, sentence types, and common usage errors.
2.1: Noun Phrases

A noun phrase is made up of a noun and its modifiers. In a sentence, it can serve as a subject, object, or complement: To use a smartphone was the cavemans dream (subject). The caveman was intrigued by the shiny smartphone (object). The caveman learned that smartphones are often used as pointless distractions (complement).
2.2: Verb Phrases

Verb phrases contain a verb and helping verbs/modifiers. Typical examples include: to be (am, are, is, was, were, be, being, been), to have (has, have, had), to do (does, did, do): The geologist is going to the Arctic Circle to pull core samples of ice. He is aware that his findings will be debated in Climate Change circles. Climate change deniers have expressed their disregard for anything that has to do with science and the climate.
Other verb phrases include: may, might, must, can, could, shall, should, will, would. These verb phrases usually convey obligation, permission, or possibility: Geologists might display outrage that their research is being dismissed as bullshit.
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2.3: Prepositional Phrases

A prepositional phrase is a group of words containing a preposition, noun, pronoun, or group of words that serve as a noun. Prepositional phrases are usually fragments and do not stand alone in a sentence unless they are commands such as On your feet! or At once! Joe is the farmer with the best crop yield. In the secret laboratory, Monsanto works to make sure their seeds produce higher yield. Whole Foods shoppers do not like food that has been genetically modified by Monsanto.
2.4: Clauses
A clause is made up of a subject and a predicate. Just what exactly is a predicate? A predicate describes what is said about the subject. There are two types of clauses: independent and dependent. An independent clause can stand alone in a sentence and contains a subject, verb, and is a complete thought: She ran. She ran quickly. A bear chased her. He was hungry.
A dependent clause must be accompanied by an independent clause. It contains a subject and verb, but is not a complete thought. Because the bear was hungry(what happened?) Due to a shortage of salmon in the river(what was the bear looking to eat?) If a bear does not get his meal(will he starve?)
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2.5: Relative Clauses

A relative clause is used to add relative information to a sentence without having to start another sentence. Relative clauses contain a subject and a verb, and begin with a relative pronoun (who, whom, whose, that, which) or a relative adverb (when, where, or why): The kids who run in the street do not have a care in the world. Where the kids run does not matter, as they are always joyous to be running. The adults who marvel at the kids joy are also happy to see such fun.
2.6: Sentence Types

There are four types of sentences: declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, and imperative. Declarative sentences make a statement to relay information. They are punctuated with a period: Grammar class is a drag. Bloggers believe they can write eBooks making grammar fun. The bloggers need a reality check.
Interrogative sentences ask a question and end with a question mark: Do you have the book about Nietzsche that I gave you? Do wild black bears make good house pets? Why are you answering with a question in the form of an answer?
Exclamatory sentences express strong emotion or feeling. They always end with an exclamation mark (go figure). They are to be used sparingly throughout your writing as to add conviction: Stop right now you thief! Im not a thief; Im a U.S. political candidate!
Imperative sentences give commands or instruction. They can also express a wish or desire. Imperative sentences can end with a period or exclamation mark depending on what urgency you want to convey. Take this medication right now. Hold!
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Take immediately. Behave so we can both return to what we were doing.
2.7: Active Voice

Active voice is used when the subject (noun or pronoun) is the be-er or do-er of the sentence. The verb moves the sentence forward: Congress approved the bill after many months of worthless debate. The voters voiced their opinion on the matter.
2.8: Passive Voice

Passive voice involves an agent or do-er separate from the subject of the sentence. For example: Jake was given a new BMW from his parents. Jenna was gifted a Coach purse by virtue of her good deeds in the sorority.
2.9: Appositives
Appositives are groups of words that are placed together with a noun or pronoun to add clarity to the noun being described. Appositives can also be used improperly and cause redundancy in the sentence: Redundant: The guitarist Jimmy, a musician by trade, was quite fond of Jimi Hendrix (the musician by trade part is not needed). Correct: George W. Bush, the well intentioned President, was in over his head by the time he got in office (the well intentioned President describes George W.) Correct: Barack Obama, the President fighting for equality, put his health care reform in place despite little public support for such a bill (the President fighting for quality describes Barack Obama).
2.10: Common Usage Errors

When writing technical documents it can be easy to slip in vernacular language that may not be appropriate. In todays world of social media, texting, and general laziness, it becomes even easier to slip in ur instead of the proper youre. In the following sections well cover the common usage errors and what to look out for in your writing.
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2.11: Homophones
Homophones are words that sound alike, but have different spellings and meanings. They are not telephones that like the same gender of telephone. It can be very easy mix up these words in your writing: Theyre (contraction of they are): Theyre going to the fairgrounds today. Their (possessive pronoun): Their hotdogs are world renowned at the fair. There (meaning in that place): The juicy hotdogs are being stashed over there. To (preposition indicating a person, place, or thing): Give this book on personal finance to Jack. Too (adverb meaning excessive or inclusive): Jen could use the book on personal finance too. Two (noun or adjective indicating more than one): While were at it, why not give them two personal finance books! Your (possessive pronoun): Your hair is on fire! Youre (contraction of you are): Youre going to want to grab a fire extinguisher. Its (possessive neutral pronoun): Every dog has its day. Its (contraction of it is or it has): Its not clear which day is the dogs because they always lounge around, run, sleep, eat, and poop no matter the day. Principal (the head of a school or original lump sum of money): He invested his principal amount of money in the real estate market circa 2006. Principle (a moral or fundamental belief): Unfortunately, the principles of the financial advisors were not stable and the man lost all of his money. Affect (to influence): The rain affected our ability to build a campfire. Effect (a result of something): Being without a campfire, this had a negative effect on our morale.
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Accept (to receive): I accept your half-assed attempt at cleaning the kitchen, knowing that you are lazy. Except (to exclude): I like when the kitchen is clean, except when you clean it.
2.12: Misplaced Modifiers

Misplaced modifiers are words, phrases, or clauses that do not clearly point to the word or words they modify. Limiting modifiers should be placed directly in front of the word they modify (only, just, even, almost): Unclear: He will only have to get a D in one class to graduate college. Revised: He will have to get a D in only one class to graduate college (only modifies one).
Infinitives (to + verb) should usually not be split: Unclear: The student should try to, if possible, attend every class. Revised: If possible, the student should try to attend every class (to attend stays together and is clear).
Dangling modifiers are words that dont clearly modify the intended word or group of words, creating confusion as to what the modifiers are referring to: Unclear: Though only a teenager, the cop let Kelly off for recklessly driving (the cop is not a teenager in this case). Revised: Though Kelly was only a teenager, the cop let her off for reckless driving.
Lastly, sentences should flow from subject to verb to object without lengthy distractions along the way. Unclear: Joe, after joining the work force, decided 50+ hour work weeks were not for him. Revised: After joining the work force, Joe decided that 50+ hour work weeks were not for him (the subject and verb remain connected).
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2.13: Sentence Fragments

Sentence fragments are punctuated like a complete sentence; however they lack a complete thought due to a missing verb or subject: Fragment: As the climate warmed. Revised: As the climate warmed, scientists tried as hard as they could to convince the powers that be to take action. Fragment: When the debate began. Revised: When the debate began a slow roar began to grow in Congress.
2.14: Spelling and Punctuation

Even when writing with todays word processing programs, it can be easy to slip up with spelling and/or punctuation errors. Pay attention to the red, blue, green (or whatever color) lines your word processor shows you! Read your documents forward AND backwards to catch any mistakes! Have AT LEAST one other set of eyes look over your writing. We wont spend our time reviewing what a comma, period, or quotation mark does. Nor we will go over how to spell words. This is what online thesauruses and dictionaries are for. It would be a bit long-winded to list how to spell every word in the English language here. Instead, lets take what we have reviewed and begin to utilize it to expertly craft our technical documents. First, we will hit some general writing tips that apply to ANY type of writing, be it technical or creative in nature. Then we will cover the specific documents of rsums and cover letters.
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Chapter Three: General Tips for Writing Well

Just like anything else, writing comes easier with practice. A pitcher who has just come up from the minor leagues cant expect to crap gold and strike out every batter he faces in the big leagues right? It takes time to pitch at that level. And so does writing. Below you will find some general guidelines to help improve your writing. These apply to EVERYTHING in the world of writing whether you are penning a comic book or your cover letter.
Rule #1: Know Your Audience

This is a very important rule. Hence the #1. Having an idea of who will be reading your material is crucial. This is because the language you use with your friends is probably different than the language you want in an academic document that will be read by a professor. The language I use on my blog at times may be offensive to some, but given that people can choose to keep reading or go somewhere else on the web, it doesnt really matter what I say on it as my audience is potentially anyone who has an internet connection. In many instances however, we don't have that luxury. In other words, be mindful of how you will sound to certain people that will read your work.
Rule #2: Read a Lot, Repeat

If you want to produce works like the masters, you have to read the masters! Masters here is a broad term encapsulating published authors, not necessarily Henry David Thoreau, Shakespeare, or Tolkien (which are all very good in their own right or course). What Im getting at is this: if someone has worked to get his/her book published that means they have poured countless hours into researching, writing, and editing their work. So there is much to be learned from these authors because they are professionals after all. Quite simply, the more you read, the more material and ideas you will be exposed to. You will find new ways to phrase your concepts. You will learn how the written word can be used as a very eloquent form of expression. To become a proficient writer, you have to learn from those that came before you.
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Rule#3: Always, Always Have Multiple Drafts

Every time I write something, whether it is an article for my blog or this eBook, the finished product is much different from what started out at brain crappings into a Word document. This point may be obvious, but I can remember being a freshman in college and taking a gen-education writing course. Granted, this was a basic course for freshmen. Accomplished writers, we were not. But while I proofread several peers papers that they deemed the final draft, I couldnt help but think, really? Perhaps you missed the day in middle school where they taught how to write in complete sentences and string those together to form full paragraphs! So, be sure to get your ideas out in written format first. Perform a stream-of-consciousness exercise to start out and write up SEVERAL first rough drafts. These drafts will gradually be worked and molded into your finished product.
Rule #4: Be Open to Changes

Sometimes, what we write can be so personal or brilliant in our own minds, that ANY sort of suggestion from an outside source to change something can be taken as a disapproval of your work. In reality, constructive criticism is what makes your writing better! If someone makes a suggestion, be open to making a change for added clarity. If they think a sentence or paragraph is muddled and hard to understand, theres a good chance that other people will as well. Dont take it personally.
Rule #5: Use Transitional Sentences

Nothing makes concepts more incoherent than not transitioning from one paragraph to the next! Let me illustrate a transitional sentence: Technologically speaking, solar power has an advantage because it expanded alongside the computer industry, and can be made more efficient in a relatively short amount of time. Along with having a technological advantage, solar power also has an advantage in terms of when it can produce electricity.
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Because of the nature of solar power, it operates most efficiently during the summer months, when sunlight falls on the earth more often and intense than in the winter months. This correlates perfectly with demand. Demand for electricity tends to be highest on the days of summer when temperatures are the hottest. See how the italicized transitional sentence closes the previous idea and sets the table for the next one? It adds a natural flow from one paragraph to the next. Thus, you need to use them as much as you can in your writing.
Rule #6: Find Something Besides Clichs to Convey Ideas

Clichs are easy to put into your writing. But dont do it! People spot them right away, making you look uninspired. Heres an example of why you shouldnt use clichs, using clichs: To be honest, what Im basically saying is that giving it 110% in making sure you dont use clichs in your writing is what matters at the end of the day. See how annoying that sentence is to read? Its tough to even get through it. How about something more creative, such as: In the realm of writing, picture yourself as an ambassador of the Earth. Your writing abilities speak for themselves and do not contain any clichs whatsoever. You are a wise human being and your readers appreciate your writing skills. Now were talking. With a few sentences and some creative ways to phrase things, we have conveyed the importance of not using clichs in your work. People will recognize when an idea is original vs. recycled and clich. If you have trouble being original, luckily there are TONS of resources to get you started such as the internet, thesauruses, dictionaries, and other people who are interesting folks (like bloggers).
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Rule #7: Avoid Redundancy

Writing without redundancy provides clarity to your work. Instead of saying the same thing twice, its much better to describe it thoroughly once and then move on to your next idea. This applies to repeating sentences, similar adjectives, or similar nouns. Anytime you can effectively convey ideas in fifty words vs. one hundred, do so.
Rule #8: Know the Correct Format!

Depending on who you are writing for/to, it is CRUCIAL that you style the document in the appropriate format! Are you writing for a class? Be sure to read the assignment details and what format the instructor indicates for the assignment. Are you applying for a job in a particular industry? You better damn well be aware if your industry uses MLA, APA, AMA or any variation!
Rule #9: NEVER, EVER Plagiarize Your Work! Ever.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines plagiarism as: the act of using another person's words or ideas without giving credit to that person :the act of plagiarizing something1. In other words, CITE YOUR SOURCES! If you are unsure as to whether or not a paraphrased piece of information needs citing, its usually best to go ahead and cite it. This applies mostly to academic papers that we will cover later, but you can also slip up and directly copy a cover letter template online and accidentally leave some personal information on YOUR letter such as another persons PHONE NUMBER or E-MAIL ADDRESS! Do you think the potential employer will take you very serious after that if they contact the wrong person using the phone number or e-mail address you provided?
Rule #10: Proofread and Edit!

Editing your work could very well be Rules #1-10. Throughout the entire writing process, no matter what you are creating, you need to proofread and edit! Multiple times. All of the above rules really come down to proofreading and making the necessary changes to your work. If possible, have your work read by multiple people to catch mistakes in grammar, punctuation, spelling, and format. The more trained eyes that see your work, the lesser the amount of error. Sometimes, you will be the only
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editor. If this is the case, try to walk away from your work for a few days and come back to it with a fresh set of eyes. Many times when we read our own work multiple times we dont catch errors because our brains fill in what we meant to say but it doesnt come out in our writing. Thats how to write well in a nutshell! Keep these ideas in the back of your mind when composing the technical documents we will look at for the remainder of this book. Up first are cover letters and rsums.
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Chapter Four: Cover Letters & Rsums

For many people, writing those oh-so-important documents known as rsums and cover letters is a frightening prospect. Similar to having your body hair pulled out one Duck Tape piece at a time. Fortunately, this doesnt have to be you! Wouldnt it be nice if there was one place you could go to get advice on writing these documents with real examples, rather than tidbits here and there on the internet? Lucky for you, I have reviewed examples of both good and bad rsums and cover letters, and compiled all of the information here. So dont sweat getting that next big job. When you walk in with the crme de la crme of a rsum and cover letter, they will have no choice but to take you as the most qualified professional theyve seen in decades.
4.1: Having a Purpose

Its important to keep in mind what these two documents are for. Essentially, your letter and rsum are your potential employer's first impression of you. Since these are the first documents you send them, you want them to be not just good or adequate but rather astonishing and knock-them-dead-with-your-qualifications. You want to astonish your future employer with your qualifications and ability to accurately articulate them on paper before you go in for the interview. But what if your qualifications are not so stellar? We will get to that in a minute. For now, just bear in mind that your letter and rsum need to sum up what your qualifications are RELATIVE TO THE JOB YOU ARE APPLYING FOR. If you are applying for a job that is technical in nature, the employer probably doesnt care that you helped save kittens or volunteered in a soup kitchen. While these things are nice and do benefit the community, be aware that the industry you are entering might not care. Every industry is different; just notice what they do in fact care about.
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4.2: Purpose of Cover Letter

Your cover letter needs to: 1. Introduce yourself. Greet employer and make a memorable introduction. 2. Provide a more detailed summary of your past accomplishments that are relative to the job you are applying for. 3. Complement your rsum. Do not simply regurgitate what is already on your resume in factual format. Rather, make the cover letter a more personal account of your biggest accomplishments. 4. Connect with the person on the other end on a human level. Do some research on the company and who works there. Make a note of something you admire that the company is working on. Everyone loves to have their ass kissed. Just be subtle about it.
4.3: The Dos and Donts of Cover Letters

A few of these points may be obvious, but if overlooked they will make you look like a high schooler applying for his/her first crap job. DO personalize your letter. Along with including a mini-story of your accomplishments, if you have the name of the person in charge of hiring, address the letter to this person! DONT send out generic letters to every employer. They will smell this a mile away like a bloodhound tracking a dead duck. DO keep it short. One page is all you are aiming for here. A pithy, peppy introduction and summary is all that is needed. DONT use ambiguous terms. Be straight to the point about what you have accomplished, what you have done, etc. Tangible results are always better than general terms like accomplished plenty of sales. DO edit your letter. Many times over. And then edit it again. Find another person to take a look at it. This is the first document the hiring manager will see remember!? If you cant spell or string
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together complete sentences, do you think you will be taken very seriously? DONT end the letter passively. Be sure to provide an action step so it is clear how they can further contact you. After some time has passed, call them to follow up and ask if they have in fact received your glorious letter and rsum (dont use the word glorious, but you knew that right?) DO use the same format as your rsum. Use the same font, header, paper, etc. The cover letter and rsum are compliments to each other. It needs to be obvious that they go together. DO state the purpose of your writing. Ie. Dear Jane Employer, Im writing in response to the job opening of __________. I would qualify for this position because DO sign your letter after printing it out. In blue or black ink. DO SEND A COVER LETTER ALONG WITH YOUR RSUM TO EVERY JOB YOU APPLY FOR! This shows that you took the time, every time, to research the job and personalize a letter. In some instances, employers will specifically state not to attach a cover letter. If this is the case, obviously do not send one with your rsum.
Now that we have discussed the purposes and guidelines of cover letters, lets take a look at both poor and incredibly well written examples.
4.4: Cover Letter Examples

Its important to note that cover letters usually fall into two categories: letters applying for a specific position or a letter of general inquiry. The specific-opening letter is exactly as it sounds. If you have found a job advertised, write specifically for that position. If you are simply inquiring about possible openings, aim to make a strong impression and get your name out there. Examples of both are below. Look at the following cover letters-both poorly and well written-to get started. Note that specific personal information such as phone numbers, names, and addresses have been altered for anonymity.
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Well Written Specific Job Opening Letter:

Date: March 25, 2013
Subject: Field Technician Job Opening Dear Kris, I am writing to you in response to the Field Technician position posted on the 123 Energy website. My preparation at Missouri State University, in combination with my professional experience and training, would qualify me for this position. I am a recent graduate from Missouri State University. Ive gained valuable experience from my time spent in college, both in and outside of the classroom. For over four years I was a member of an organization called Students for a Sustainable Future. Through the organization, I participated in recycling drives, helped organize a teach-in, and worked to raise awareness of sustainability issues on campus. I also personally headed a project that granted each on-campus resident an aluminum water bottle in order to reduce plastic waste. During my time at Missouri State, I also had the opportunity to complete an internship. During the winter/spring of 2011, I completed an internship at local solar panel installer XYZ Solar. Through my work both on-site and in the shop, I assisted with both installing solar panel systems and configuring battery boxes for the systems. This work involved both the technical aspects described and also communicating information to clients, in the same light that the energy audit process would require. I am currently training to become a certified BPI Analyst. My anticipated date to complete this certification is June of this year. I plan on having this certification in July, when I move to Denver. I recently spoke with Adam Smith and he recommended that I contact you all. I look forward to meeting you and speaking with you about my qualifications. I can be contacted in the morning, Monday through Friday at 636.555.5555 or via e-mail at applicant@hotmail.com. Sincerely,
John Krygiel
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Notice how this letter opens with the reason for contacting the company in the first place. It also has a specific person being addressed. Any time you can find the name of the person whom you are contacting, it makes it much more personal than the standard, to whom it may concern. The letter then goes on to highlight what the candidate has done in relation to the particular line of work he is applying for. Concrete examples are used to illustrate experience. When composing your own cover letter for a specific job opening, it is wise to do the same if of course you have relative experience. Lastly, the letter closes with a call to action. The candidate provides his contact information and expresses interest in an interview. It is important to put a line or two with this information, but you also have to call the recruiter yourself and show that you are serious about wanting the job! Now that weve examined a specific job opening cover letter, lets take a look at a general inquiry letter that serves the purpose of introducing yourself to a company and possibly getting a lead for a job.
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Well Written General Inquiry Letter:

Date: 5 November, 2013 Subject: Job Opening Dear Mr. Smith, I am writing you in regards to a potential administrative job opening at XYZ Elementary that will become available next fall. Independent schools such as XYZ Elementary require a hardworking, organized administrative staff to ensure that the school functions successfully and efficiently. My administrative experience and organizational skills would help contribute to the long history of success at XYZ Elementary. I have extensive administrative experience in an academic setting. For the past seven years I have worked at the Early Childhood Center at XYZ College, where I alternated between running activities for the children, answering phone calls, scheduling parent-teacher meetings, and performing other organizational tasks. I also served as an intern for the principal of 123 Elementary School, undertaking a variety of office assignments while also observing firsthand the day-to-day duties of an academic administrator. I have attached my rsum, and would love to speak with you regarding how I could make a significant contribution to XYZ Elementarys daily operations. I will call you within the next week to discuss arranging an interview. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
Susan Smith Enclosures (1)
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Again, notice how the general inquiry letter begins with a greeting to a specific person and then goes on to highlight the candidates expertise. The candidate highlights tangible numbers in the letter. Any time you can list specific experience from the past, do so. The applicant ends the letter with an action paragraph explaining how she will contact the recruiter and introduce herself. Even if this doesnt lead to an interview, the applicant is making an effort to build rapport with certain people at the school. In many cases, building rapport can go a long way. When applying for jobs, its important to keep in mind that even if you dont get a particular job somewhere, its still prudent to actively try to meet people in the industry and get your name on their minds. They might have connections elsewhere that could lead to a job. So far, we have seen two well-written cover letters. Now lets go over a few poorly written letters to see what NOT to do when crafting this important firstimpression document.
No hand-written letters on parchment paper!
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Poorly Written Specific Job Opening Letter:

1/23/2012 J.P. Morgan Dear Sir or Madame: I am an ambitious undergraduate at NYU triple majoring in Mathematics, Economics, and Computer Science. I am a punctual, personable, and shrewd individual, yet I have a quality which I pride myself on more than any of these. I am unequivocally the most unflaggingly hard worker I know, and I love selfimprovement. I have always felt that my time should be spent wisely, so I continuously challenge myself; I left Villanova because the work was too easy. Once I realized I could achieve a perfect GPA while holding a part-time job at NYU, I decided to redouble my effort by placing out of two classes, taking two honors classes, and holding two part-time jobs. That semester I achieved a 3.93, and in the same time I managed to bench double my bodyweight and do 35 pull-ups. I say these things only because solid evidence is more convincing than unverifiable statements, and I want to demonstrate that I am a hard worker. J.P. Morgan is a firm with a reputation that precedes itself and employees who represent only the best and rightest in finance. I know that the employees in this firm will push me to excellence, especially within the Investment Banking division. In fact, one of the supporting reasons I chose Investment Banking over any other division was that I know it is difficult. I hope to augment my character by diligently working for the professionals at Morgan Stanley, and I feel I have much to offer in return. I am proficient in several programming languages, and I can pick up a new one very quickly. For instance, I learned a years worth of Java from NYU in 27 days on my own; this is how I placed out of two including: Money and Banking, Analysis, Game Theory, Probability and Statistics. Even further, I am taking Machine Learning and Probabilistic Graphical Modeling currently, two programming courses offered by Stanford, so that I may truly offer the most if I am accepted. I am proficient with Bloomberg terminals, excellent with excel, and can perform basic office functions with terrifying efficiency. I have plenty of experience in the professional world through my internship at Merrill Lynch, and my research assistant position at NYU. In fact, my most recent employer has found me so useful that he promoted me to a Research Assistant and an official CTED intern. This role is usually reserved for Masters students, but my employer gave the title to me so that he could give me more work.
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Please realize that I am not a braggart or conceited, I just want to outline my usefulness. Egos can be a huge liability, and I try not to have one. Thank you so much for your time, and I look forward to hearing from you. Best, Mark Yikes! Where do I even begin with this one? Funny enough, this letter is rumored to have ACTUALLY CIRCULATED throughout firms on Wall Street1. Probably the most glaring mistake in this cover letter is the applicants obvious conceitedness. He offers the line, I am unequivocally the most unflaggingly hard worker I know, and I love self-improvement. Oh really? Hes the hardest worker according to whom? You never want to offer subjective opinions about yourself, always try to provide tangible outcomes you have achieved (see the dos and donts of writing cover letters above). Aside from the ridiculous claims and self-promotion, the formatting on this letter is a nightmare! The paragraphs are enormous. Why did he even bother to put new paragraphs in at all? Why not just have one giant block of text!? Simple is always best when it comes to composing letters. A one page summary of why your potential employer should pick you out of a sea of idiots is all that is needed. Lets observe another poorly written letter, this time for a general inquiry.
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Poorly Written General Inquiry Letter:

Date: September 26, 2013 To: Hiring Manager From: Joe Blow Subject: Job Opening To whom it may concern, I am a junior at Salisbury university, working toward my bachelors degree in Marketing. I discovered your internship program and I am writing to inquire about potential positions with Under Armour. My courses in marketing have convinced me that sales and marketing is a career option I would like to explore. More importantly, an internship with Under Armour would be mutually beneficial and i would like it very much. Your company has an excellent reputation for customer satisfaction. I know that the combination of my education and motivation to excel will make me an asset to your marketing department. My enclosed resume provides additional details about my background. If possible, I would like to call you next week as to follow up to see if you would review my qualifications and consider me for a position for your company. If so, I hope to schedule an interview at a convneint time. I look forward to speaking with you if Im not too busy. Should you have any questions before that time, you may reach me via phone (555.555.5555)or via email (joeblow@hireme.edu ).
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
Joe Blow
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As you can see, our friend Joe Blow had a tough time using spellcheck. Hes also not one to check for proper punctuation. He attends Salisbury university. Its the only University in the country that does not capitalize the word University. Besides the obvious spelling and punctuation errors, does reading this letter get you excited to meet Joe Blow? Im guessing it doesnt because its very generic and lacks any kind of emphasis. It kind of seems as if Joe is doing the company a favor by being able to work for them. This is NEVER the way you want to present yourself! Instead, perhaps if Joe Blow had read a little more about the internship and company he is applying for he could have included some specific information. For example, maybe the company runs a clinic for kids to get them excited to play and exercise. Joe could have included this in the letter and mentioned how he has younger cousins/nephews/nieces and he loves getting them active. Any time you find some kind of common ground with a company and its activities, its wise to include that information in a letter. It shows that you have done your homework and actually care about what the company supports in its daily operations. Its always better to be over prepared vs. presenting yourself as a half-asser! Now that weve taken a look at some cover letters and what makes them great or not so great, lets move on to the meat and potatoes of your application documents: the rsum!
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4.5: Purpose of Rsum

You rsum needs to: 1. Highlight your past accomplishments. This is a simplified version of what you may have mentioned in the letter. 2. Describe your skills in a manner that is not clich. 3. Present a snapshot of you are: where you have worked in the past, the college you attended, and any relevant volunteer or work experience. 4. This may be obvious, but the ultimate purpose of your rsum is to get you the job! So dont list items that are not RELEVANT to the specific job you are applying for. I really want to emphasize this point. We now have an understanding of the purpose of a rsum. Just a side note: you should make sure you have the accent marks on rsum anytime you communicate the word to employers. They will notice. Otherwise what are you RESUMING? Playing a computer game? Resuming a YouTube video you had on pause? Lets move on to the dos and donts of crafting these documents.
4.6: The Dos and Donts of Rsums

DO use the correct format. Get to know what rsums look like in your industry. Ask people who work in your industry (or professors) what the standard is. DONT use clich buzzwords! Please. We will get to these in a minute. DO toot your own horn. There is a careful balance to this. You want to list OBJECTIVE goals you have accomplished. Ie. list increased sales by 500% at Dunder Mifflin Company or generated over 1,000 leads at Dunder Mifflin in one year. Which goes hand in hand with... DONT list SUBJECTIVE opinions about yourself. Ie. Im great at increasing sales at Jack-Of-All-Trades printing or I have excellent writing skills. You will come off as arrogant or pompous and if you are a great writer, your cover letter and rsum will show that, right? DO lead with action words. For example: led, organized, built, drove, orchestrated. More on these action words in a minute.
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DONT lie. If they ask you about something you have accomplished, you better damn well be able to back it up. As the old saying goes, To tell one lie is to tell a thousand. DO keep it to one page. Unless you have a doctoral degree, are a published author with many works, have won a Nobel Award, or have worked in an industry for 30+ years, you probably only have accomplishments that can be summed up in one page. This isnt a bad thing, just keep in mind the awesome relevant things you have done. DONT get crazy with fonts. You can choose a font besides Times New Roman, but make sure it is easy to read. DO emphasize what you can provide the company. Keeping it less me-centric is better. Instead, state what your awesome expertise can bring to the table. They are (hopefully) paying you for a reason.
Once you start to look at numerous examples of rsums from peers or on the internet, the above dos and donts become somewhat intuitive. The greater the exposure to these word-pictures known as rsums, the easier it becomes to know what to include on your word-picture! And you want to paint a stunning word-picture of who you are, correct!?
4.7: Rsum Examples

Onward to the rsum examples! First, we have well-written industry specific rsums. Second, we see crap rsums. Note the differences! Feel free to use the good examples as templates for your own rsum. As always, skim through the following section as much as you want or read every item on the rsums. Notice the common elements of both the well-written and poorlywritten rsums.
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Green Tech Rsum:
John Krygiel
123 E Elm. St. Springfield, MO 65806 417.555.5555 John@hotmail.com
Professional Experience
Brighter Side Energy Springfield, MO February 2013-Present Installed residential solar systems Met with clients to give on-site evaluations Fielded inquiries regarding solar systems Springfield, MO February-May, 2011 Installed solar panels and components Assisted with battery box assembly
Power Source Solar
Education
Missouri State University Bachelor of Science, Technology Management Springfield, MO Area of Focus: Energy and Sustainability
Organizations
Students for a Sustainable Future Missouri State University, Springfield, MO August 2007-May 2011 Passed and implemented a program which granted each on-campus resident one aluminum water bottle in order to reduce plastic waste
Other Experience
Online Entrepreneur Personal Blog Writer January 2013-Present Actively write and edit for personal blog on a weekly basis Started guitar lesson business Teach Me Six String October 2013-Present Taught students age nine to twenty five Wrote curriculum in beginners guitar guide
Guitar Instructor
Skills
Capable at evaluating, selling, and installing solar panel systems Excellent technical, creative, and musical writing ability Practiced computational and estimating skills 42 | P a g e
Theater & Arts Rsum:
Stephen Milosevich
AEA Stage Manager
(636) 555-5555 StageBoss@gmail.com
Broadway
Production Assistant
Rocky Winter Garden Theater Dir. Mike Smith 2013
Off-Broadway / NYC
Assistant Stage Manager
Mr. Burns Playwrights Horizons 59E59 Theaters Bespoke Theatricals Playwrights Horizons Playwrights Horizons Playwrights Horizons HERE Arts Center The Flea Theatre Manhattan Theatre Club Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith 2013 2013 2013 2013 2012 2012 2013 2012 2012

Witnessed By The World
Bull Durham Lab
Stage Management Resident

The Call The Great God Pan Detroit

Trade Practices These Seven Sicknesses
Regrets
Regional
Production Stage Manager
Mister Roberts (Reading) When Youre Here Snowman Untitled Camp Play Its Only A Reading GTP One on Ones Williamstown Williamstown Williamstown Williamstown Williamstown Williamstown Theatre Theatre Theatre Theatre Theatre Theatre Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Dir. Mike Smith Springfield, MO Springfield, MO Springfield, MO Chesterfield, MO Chesterfield, MO 2013 2011 2011 2011 2011 2011 2011 2010 2010 2010 2009 2008

Three Hotels Williamstown Theatre Tent Theatre Tent Theatre Tent Theatre Spotlight Productions Spotlight Productions

Guys and Dolls Noises Off! th The 25 AnnualSpelling Bee
Production Stage Manager

Willy Wonka the Musical Beauty and the Beast
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Theater & Arts Rsum Contd.: Skills

Certified in CPR and First Aid. Fireguard, Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite and Final Draft. Knowledgeable in Vectorworks 2010, ETC Lighting Consoles, Scenic Painting, Stage Makeup and Carpentry. Drivers License.
Education
Missouri State University BFA in Theatre St. Charles Community College Associate of Arts Degree
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Public Broadcasting Rsum:
Richard B. Brandow
123 Smith St. Grandview, MO 64030 816.555.5555 Ben@gmail.com
Career Focus
To sustain and develop a growing means of support for public broadcasting in a fast paced and everchanging media industry, while securing ties which bolster both the station I represent and the public it serves.
Education
Missouri State University Bachelor of Science, Mass Media Media Production Springfield, MO
Relevant Experience
Assistant to Administrative Clerk - Ozarks Public Radio (May 2011 to August 2012) KSMU - Ozarks Public Radio, Springfield, MO Entered pledges and recorded donor-specific notes and comments in Allegiance fundraising database. Prepared bulk mailings for direct mail initiatives and prepared and insured premiums. Compiled program issues for the FCC mandated public file each quarter. Provided support with front desk reception, routed telephone calls and facilitated guests as they arrived. Intern - Ozarks Public Television (January 2012 to May 2012) OPT - Ozarks Public Television, Springfield, MO Collaborated with upper-level management on the development of initiatives such as American Graduate and Women and Girls Lead. Operated camera and assisted in floor directing for a multiple hour live auction. Utilized Avid, Photoshop and other editing software as needed for assigned tasks. Senior Caller - Missouri State University Foundation (January 2009 to May 2011) Missouri State University Foundation, Springfield, MO Successfully solicited pledges from major donors and increased the number of active donors. Acknowledged donor gifts through written correspondence. Created rapport with Missouri State Universitys donors, students, alumni and parents. Served as an ambassador to the university and answered donor inquiries and concerns. Trained new employees and served as an example for shadowing during training sessions. Volunteer - Ozarks Public Broadcasting (Fall 2008 to August 2012) Ozarks Public Television & Ozarks Public Radio, Springfield, MO Acted as host to volunteers during pledge drives and answers inquiries from donors and volunteers. Assisted in special drives and events such as the Radioactive and Wine and Food Celebration 45 | P a g e
Esthetician Rsum:
T I F FA N Y S M I T H
Licensed Esthetician 123 Smith St. Springfield, MO 65807 417.555.5555 Tiffany@gmail.com
OBJECTIVE
To work in a professional environment performing elite esthetician services.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
2011-Current Frost Salon and Spa Head Esthetician Provided guests with knowledge of skin care Performed relaxation massage Perfected bridal make up for models featured in 417 Magazine Customized facials to feature specialty products Specialized in Brazilian waxes for men and women while treating ingrown hair issues Make Up Artist for FashioNation 2012 & 2013 Make Up Artist for Gynecological Cancer Association Fashion Show 2012 & 2013 Volunteer at Harmony House, a shelter for battered women Volunteer at Hulston Cancer Center, in support of Breast Cancer Awareness 2009-2011 Skin Blends Customer Service Success Manager Assist in teaching other estheticians on advanced waxing techniques at Les Nouvelles Esthetiques Trade Shows Received training in Jet Facials Blended custom serums for use in the Jet Facial machine Blended custom skin care for clients Provided customer service and took orders over the phone Filled and packaged orders to be shipped all over the nation
EDUCATION
2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 National Aesthetic Spa Network (NASN) Continuing education and networking 2009 New Image School of Cosmetology Esthetic License
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Biological Sciences Rsum:
THOMAS P. RADOMSKI
123 Easy Ave. St. Louis, MO 63109 314.555.5555 radomski123@hotmail.com
Objective: Attain a graduate student position at Ohio University in Dr. Smiths lab
Education
Missouri State University, Springfield, Missouri B.S., Wildlife Biology Anticipated Graduation May 2014 Current Cumulative GPA 3.71, Major GPA 3.72
Professional Experience
Intern, Center for Hellbender Conservation, St. Louis Zoo, St. Louis, MO, Summer of 2013 Recorded data on hellbender feeding behavior Anesthetized adult hellbenders during surgery Tested water quality Tested for embedded tracking chips Sorted larval hellbender by size Cleaned tanks and fed hellbenders Lab Assistant, Behavioral Ecology Lab, Missouri State University, April 2012present Conducted research on chemical communication in salamanders Collected and maintained salamanders Maintained Drosophila colony Nature Director, Camp Arrowhead, Marshfield, MO, Summer 2012 Taught environmental science merit badge Lead nature walks Identified taxa in the field (mainly reptiles and amphibians) Managed four other workers who taught merit badges in the Nature area Maintained Nature Lodge Science Tutor, Missouri State University, January 2011-present Tutored basics in the natural and applied sciences, including geology, biology, chemistry, and physics
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Biological Sciences Rsum Contd.:

Student, Study-Away Field Course in Ecuador, Missouri State University, August 2011 Sustainability focus: observed rural farms and an eco-lodge Field project: surveyed several frog species in the rainforest along the Napo River
Extra-Curricular Activities
Students for a Sustainable Future, Representation to Student Government Student Government Association Sustainability Committee, Sustainability Commission Alpha Phi Omega (service group) Student Government Association Representative
Honors and Awards

Missouri State University Board of Governors Scholarship Missouri Bright Flight Scholarship Alpha Phi Omega Brother of the Month for November 2011
Skills & Certifications

Basic biology and chemistry lab skills Basic statistical analysis (Minitab, SigmaPlot, Excel) Practiced organizational skills CPR certified
Volunteer Experience
Planted trees and constructed hiking trail at the Watershed Center of the Watershed Committee of the Ozarks Performed recycling services at Missouri State University home football games Sandbagged during flood on the Mississippi River Served food at St. Vincent DePaul Society soup kitchen Packaged food for needy families at Ozark Food Harvest Assisted with tornado cleanup in Joplin, MO Fundraised for Alpha Phi Omega, Students for a Sustainable Future, Childrens Miracle Network, Bears Illuminating Japan
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General Laborer Rsum:
John Doe
123 Apple Ave. Anytown, USA johndoe@hotmail.com 417.555.5555 Objective: To obtain management position with an industrial services company
utilizing exceptional physical abilities, proficient computational skills, and practiced technical skills.
Certifications & Qualifications:

ISO 9001 certification CDL drivers license Five years of industry experience as a laborer Demonstrated ability to calculate purchase orders Ability to follow oral and written instructions, short letters, and memos
Work Experience
May 2009-Jan. 2013 General Laborer- TruGreen Inc. Minnetonka, MN Performed maintenance on various work vehicles: pickup trucks, sweepers, mowers, and trimming equipment Fueled vehicles and equipment Cleaned and organized shop tools and workspace Operated fork lift Followed and enforced all safety policies and procedures Fielded incoming calls from customers
Skills
Ability to change workflow and tasks on demand Practiced technical skills with motorized equipment and repair Responsive and cordial customer service
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Information Technology Rsum:
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All-Purpose Rsum:
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So far, we have seen rsums that are well-written, concise, and have a clean format. Now its time to take a gander at rsums that are poorly written. You will notice that these rsums share glaring and absurd mistakes: misspellings, not capitalizing appropriate words, formatting issues, clich words or phrases, wild fonts, reasons for leaving last job (dont ever list these!), and redundant or vague information (rang up customers payments). However, a few of them contain mistakes that are a bit harder to catch: not listing previous jobs in chronological order beginning with the most recent, commentary that needs to be omitted (XYZ experience was a fun time), continuity in spacing for paragraphs and sections, and information that is too lengthy and therefore overcrowds the page (remember we talked about keeping it to one page unless you are a doctor or published author!?). Some of the following examples are downright funny. In other words, these are the types of rsums that serve as the archetype of what NOT to do when trying to impress an employer.
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Poorly Written Retail Rsum:
Tricia Makinmelaugh
123 Apple Blossom ln. Two Ville, CA 333.333.3333 T@hotmail.com Objective
To get a challenging job as a Customer Service Manager so that I can learn more and excel in my career.
Work Experiencee
Green Clothiers of Northern California, Two Ville, CA Customer Service Manager 5/23/2003 - Present Recruited, trained and managed 15-member team Ensured continuous delivery of outstanding customer service Assisted customers when and where needed Fine Sports Wear International, Two Ville, CA Customer Service Manager 3/2/2001 - 5/13/2003 Recruited and managed 35-member team, it was a challenge! Ensured continuous delivery of outstanding customer service Designed, developed and implamented employee training program which increased sales revenues Assisted customers when and where needed Exceeded annual goals Customer Service Representative 7/12/1997 - 2/29/2003 Awarded Salesperson of the Year in 1999 and 2002 for exceeding set sales productivity Trained 14 new representatives functioning as lead trainer, providing ongoing guidance and constructive feedback Achieved lowest returns percentage than all other cooworkers
Hobbies
Skiing, hiking, cooking, Karate, playing with my two cats and shopping!
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Poorly Written General Laborer Rsum:
Al K. Holic
123 Easy St. San Jose, CA 333.333.3333 ilikebeer@gmail.com Carrer Objective: Seeking a position with a respectable company! Qualifications:
Drivers license I am a people person Practiced skills in construction and surveying I like assisting customers and geetting down to the heart of the problem Ability to obtain building materials for cheap
Work Experience
June 2007-Jan. 2011 General Laborer- Keg Construction San Jose, CA Performed basic surveying techniques Worked as a laborer with my hands Installed structural components in residential Operated backhoe on site Followed and enforced all safety policies and procedures Did good quality work on installing drywall
Education
San Jose So High School, San Jose, CA G.E.D- May 2009
Skills
Proven experience with e-mail software and tex messaging Ability to take calls on cell phone while working-a real multi-tasker! Powerful physical ability to lift heavy weight Practiced technical capentry skills
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Poorly Written Esthetician Rsum:
Taylor T. Slacker
123 Slackoff St. Trenton, NJ 777.333.3333 couchpotato@gmail.com Education
Trenton School of Fabulous Cosmotology- Jan 2008 Area of focus: making clients fabulous of course!
Work Experience
Hair Sytlist- Barbie and Kens- June 2009-July 2011 New York, NY 1. Cut peoples hair 2. Styled fingernails 3. Assisted the owner with bookkeeping duuties 4. Changed light bulbs in the salon and made sure the floor was clean 5. Rang up customers payments Hair Stylist- Smiths Wild Hair- July 2011-present The Jersey Shore, NJ 1. 2. 3. 4. Orchestrated removal of troublesome employees Managed bookkepping records I styled Katy Perrys hair once! Increased client base to include not only people from the block but also models in NYC!
Skills
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Good with customers! I love to talk Ability to check phone without anyone catching me Strong communication skills A real team oriented person Personable and outgoing
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Poorly Written Biological Sciences Rsum:
Audra A Hole
123 Milky Way Atlanta, GA 234.222.2222 audraahole@gmail.com
Education
University of Tennessee, Go Vols! Bachelor of Science: Biology Education GPA: 3.8
Work Experience
-August 2008-December 2008: I worked in Dr. Lectors lab performing research on plants, fungi, and animals. It was a good experience! -May 2009-August 2009: Tennessee Stream Team -Helped clean up our rivers -Organized floats and fun outings! -Rescued more salamanders than anyone else! -August 2009-July 2011: Chipotle Mexican Grill -Worked with Mexicans and conversed with them in Spanish -Setup and organized the restaurants very first recycling program!
Volunteer Experience
Going to school in the Volunteer Steate has really opened my eyes to volunteering! I have: -Volunteered in Dr. Morans lab. The students here were really messy! -Volunteered as a front desk worker in my dorm -Raised the MOST money at a fundraiser for BioClub -Devoted time to spreading awareness about biology issues -Tutored biology 101 on the weekends. This was a very nice experience that allowed me to reach out to others in the biology department!
Awards & Accolades

-On the Deans List EVERY SEMESTERR I went to school! -Best and Brightest award at nation-wide science fair -Im pretty cute and outgoing!
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Poorly Written Rsum (Overall Bad):
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4.8: Content and Formatting

You get the idea. As you can see in all of the rsum examples, correctly formatting and listing pertinent information is crucial! Its common knowledge that hiring managers only skim your rsum for a few seconds to look for key attributes, rather than actually read the thing. So if yours is hard to skim or contains unrelated information, your rsum goes straight to the trashcan! That means you dont have much time to impress them. But Ive got you covered. Lets summarize important qualities of our coveted rsums.
The Header
This is the one spot on your rsum where you can add a little personality. Refer to the examples for specifics. In general, the header includes your name (duh), address, e-mail, and phone number. Here you can pick a different font from the body that makes your name stand out, but nothing too crazy. Make your name the largest item on the page at a font of 16-24 pt. A splash of color is also acceptable if you like. The line separating the header from the body is a good place to put some color. Again, dont go overboard and make it neon green or pink!
The Body
For the body of your rsum, an item of first concern is the type of font you should use. There are differing opinions on this as to whether you should stick to a widely used font such as Times New Roman, Arial, Georgia, and Verdana or go for something a little more unique such as Bookman Old Style (my personal favorite) or Tahoma. This is up to you, but as a general rule of thumb make sure your font is VERY readable. You could also consult career centers, professors, etc. about which fonts and formats are typically used in your industry. Sizing needs to be 12-14 pt. As for the actual content in the body there are several sections typically included: professional experience, employment history, education history, RELEVANT achievements/accolades, skills, and volunteer experience. They usually go in that order too. Again, bear in mind that every industry is different. But generally, you want to lead with your professional experience (if you have any) in your particular industry. Next, list your past employment. Dont include every crap job youve ever had. If thats all youve done up to this point, list the past two places of employment at max. Do include dates for them as well. ie. March 2011-present.
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After your employment history, list your education. Undergraduate stuff and up is all they are looking for. List your college/university, years you attended, your degree, and your GPA (if needed and at LEAST a 3.0). If you are yet to graduate, put an expected date of graduation next to your degree. Honesty is the best policy here! If you havent graduated yet, you simply havent. Next, list your RELEVANT achievements/accolades. Notice how I keep bolding that word? Thats because you will have to tailor and tweak your rsum for EVERY job you apply for. Perhaps not every single one if they are in a similar industry. But the HR folks at Computing Solutions 123 dont care if you had the best looking dress design in fashion class, for instance. They are probably looking for other skills, such as JavaScript programming or anything else related. Speaking of your skills (programming or not), list them at the end of your rsum, after your achievements and accolades. Lastly, if needed at all, mention your volunteer experience. Again this is industry specific and there are some industries that will appreciate your efforts more than others. You know more about your particular industry than I do. Now that we have a basic idea of what information to summarize on our rsum, lets take a look at words to avoid (found on the poorly written examples) as well as words to enhance it (found on the well written examples).
Clichs to Avoid:
The following are enough to make any HR peoples bowels explode with frustration. Okay, maybe thats an exaggeration, but arent even YOU tired of seeing/reading them right here? Team Player [Good, excellent, fantastic] communicator, writer, bullshitter Results Oriented (let your results speak for themselves in the Accomplishments section) Dedicated individual Detail oriented Driven Multi-tasker Go-to person Self-starter Good with numbers
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Im a people person Im a problem solver References available upon request (hiring managers know this already)
Power Words to Include on Your Rsum:

Now that we know what to avoid, on the contrary, the list below will make your rsum shine brighter than Ke$has overly-glittered body. Sprinkle these words throughout your rsum and cover letter. You dont want to be over the top with them or it will look like you are full of shit or just trying too hard. Notice that these are all in the past tense as they require you to list what you have accomplished at your previous workplace. ie. ADVANCED our computer modeling software to include XYZ functions, doubling the efficiency of our systems. Heres the cherished list of power words in alphabetical order: Absorbed Advanced Approved Attained Began Bolstered Championed Closed Conceptualized Critiqued Declared Delivered Detected Dispatched Enforced Evaluated Executed Financed Formulated Granted Helped Improved Innovated Instituted Launched Accelerated Advocated Arranged Balanced Benefited Boosted Clarified Coached Consolidated Cultivated Defined Demonstrated Developed Edited Engineered Examined Expanded Focused Fostered Guided Hosted Increased Inspired Joined Learned Accrued Appraised Assembled Bargained Benefited Certified Classified Collaborated Constructed Decided Delegated Detailed Devised Educated Enriched Excelled Facilitated Forecasted Generated Handled Implemented Influenced Instigated Justified Led
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Maintained Mediated Multiplied Opened Originated Projected Pursued Recommended Refined Repaired Resumed Saved Secured Solved Supported Tested Triumphed Uncovered Upgraded Verified Witnessed
Measured Mentored Observed Operated Presented Provided Qualified Recovered Regulated Restored Retained Scheduled Segmented Sorted Targeted Transmitted Troubleshot United Utilized Volunteered Wrote
Measured Monitored Obtained Organized Programmed Purchased Quantified Recovered Reinforced Restructured Revamped Screened Simplified Streamlined Taught Transported Tutored Updated Validated Weighed Yielded
By using some of the above mentioned words in a smart way, you can start to differentiate yourself from the pack. And thats the whole point!
What about My Qualifications?

A common fear/issue with writing a cover letter and rsum is: What if I dont have desirable skills or past experience? I dont even know where to start! Not to fear, Ive also put together some ideas to get you thinking about what you can talk about. Its not as hard as one might think. Lets brainstorm what you can brag about! Have you... Completed any internships? Externships? Shadowed anyone in your profession? Worked for your schools newspaper? Written for a blog, journal, or newsletter? Volunteered for a non-profit? Heres where that optional section of volunteering can pay off.
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Been a member of any student organizations? Led or made significant changes within those organizations? Been a part of a group involving a long-term commitment? (Bands, sports teams, etc.) Been a member of student government? Worked within a similar industry? Studied abroad? Tutored students? Fine-tuned a marketable skill? Learned a second language? Ran your own small business? Had any profession-related hobbies: photography, music, sports training, any other hobby that allowed you to learn something new? Failed at a venture and learned from it? Surprisingly, this can present your confidence in a light that employers find worthy.
If you cant answer yes to any (or very few) of the above questions, its time to check out Your schools career center Campus organizations Professional seminars and networking groups/events Community job posting boards Your schools clubs and organizations Your professors labs Free library events Faith based organizations Career fairs Entry level job postings on indeed.com, monster.com, craigslist, and careerbuilder.com Online career blogs: rich20something.com, chrisguillebeau.com, themiddlefingerproject.org, thehuffingtonpost.com, and askamanager.com
4.9: The Final Word

Weve covered a lot of ground! I hope this whole rsum and cover letter writing thing is less like trying to piss from space and hit a thimble on the ground and more like breathing--you dont have to think about it!
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In general, you want to bear in mind that these documents are your first impression to a potential employer. Make sure they look nice! Use spell-check. Have at least one other person take a look at them. Remember that every potential position you apply for is different. Therefore, its wise to tailor your writing to include things that are pertinent to the position. Its okay to have more than one version of both of these documents saved somewhere (in fact its a pretty damn good idea!). Dont be afraid if you think your qualifications are unsatisfactory, look at our list above and really rack your brain on what to include. Lastly, be confident in what you write. It can be a bit strange having your life summarized on a few pieces of paper, but you need to convey to your potential employer that you are absolutely certain you are the man or woman for the job! This concludes our discussion of cover letters and rsums. We will now move on to examining academic papers, often the dreaded misery of every college students existence! SPOILER ALERT: Writing academic papers is not that difficult, Ill explain in the next section!
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Chapter Five: Academic Papers

Academic papers are perhaps the archetype of procrastination in the college or post-grad world. This could be for any number of reasons but the idea of, Why procrastinate now when I can put this off later? is the modus operandi for many students. At the heart of this line of thinking is the fact that writing of any type, especially academic papers can be a serious, difficult, and maddening undertaking. But luckily, youre reading this book on how to write better, academic papers included. Beethoven had his 5th symphony. Michelangelo sculpted the statue of David. Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa. And now...you will be given the tools to accomplish similar (albeit slightly lesser) greatness with your stunning paper on [insert subject here]. Your peers will have no choice but to weep when they glance at the layout and content of your paper, both of which are far superior to theirs. Now that we have the dramatic introduction out of the way, lets get to work!
5.1: Follow the (Basic) Rules

As much as I like to tout the fact that gatekeepers and rule masters are a dying breed, there are still some guidelines you need to follow, especially when it comes to an academic setting and writing papers. This is because your instructor (or his/her grad assistant) is the one grading your paper. If your paper is not the correct length, format, or subject matter, no points for you! In the academic world, two common types of paper exist: explanatory and argumentative (more on this later). MAKE SURE TO FOLLOW these guidelines for both types of paper (these come from observations in my own college experience): 1. Ensure that the topic you are writing about is what the professor has asked for. If the range of acceptable topics is so boring that you would rather pull your teeth out one by one with pliers, ask if you could write about something a bit out of the box but is still relevant to the class. You never know, if you show a passion for something that your instructor respects, he/she might bend the rules and revel in your different ideas. 2. Proper length. If it is specified that a paper must fall between five and eight pages, dont make it any more or any less!
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3. Staple your pages together. BEFORE CLASS! Seriously. I can remember classes where people would show up asking, Do you have a stapler I can borrow? Why no, no I dont. I took care of this basic task before I came to class. 4. Write in complete sentences. Kind of an obvious point, but it can be easy to have a sentence fragment if you arent careful, especially since we are so used to texting people. 5. DO NOT include vernacular that you would use while with friends. This may go without saying, but sometimes it can be easy to let yourself write what you are most used to speaking out loud. 6. Include a cover page. Make sure it is formatted according to the professors specifications. Typically it includes the title of the paper, your name, the professors name, the class code and section, and sometimes the date. These are usually centered on the page; you will see how this done in the examples I have provided. 7. If necessary, provide a table of contents. This will depend on the length of your document, but if needed it adds professionalism to your work. 8. Provide proper citation of your sources within the paper and on the bibliography page based on what format you are following. Are you writing in MLA, APA, or AMA? Find out by referring to the assignment sheet. While proper citation is often a pain in the ass, websites such as citationmachine.net and easybib.com have made this process (almost) effortless. Which means 9. NEVER PLAGIARIZE! If you dont cite your sources, theres a good chance you will be found out. In an academic setting, if plagiarism is discovered, you will receive an XF which basically means your grade has been honor killed by a samurai, minus any honor whatsoever. 10. Have a clear and concise flow to your thoughts. The introduction thesis--subtopics--closing statements format is wise to follow if you ensure that TRANSITIONAL sentences are used! More on this in a minute. Those are the basic guidelines for academic papers in a numbered-list nutshell. Keep in mind that these guidelines are generally followed to provide you a chance to accurately and persuasively articulate your perspective on a topic. With that in mind, lets discuss what to do before anything gets written.
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5.2: Idea Formulation & Initial Research

Before any kind of written work begins, whether it is a paper on an endangered species of kangaroo or a poem about honeybees, ideas begin in the creators head. Ideas are then formed into concrete examples and we must connect the dots for the reader(s). Within the confines of academia, at times ideas for the subject matter we are told to write about do not come with ease. Lets take a look at a method to ensure ideas flow without having to succumb to the dreaded writers block. I like to use a simple method for idea formulation and research that follows six steps: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Choose an acceptable topic for the class/paper Brain-storm and conduct initial research on topic Prioritize and narrow down brain-stormed concepts Create your thesis statement or topic sentence Organize concepts into an outline Research your topic in depth Lets examine each of these steps in detail. 1. Choose an acceptable topic for the paper (We will use solar power as our example for the remaining steps). a. As mentioned previously, if the available topics do not interest you in the least bit, inquire about a topic that is a bit out of the box that is at least relevant to the class. If a professor knows you are passionate about a topic that is somewhat outside the parameters, he/she will know that you will put your best effort forth in researching/writing about it. The topic I choose for the first paper presented in this book was solar energy. 2. Brain storm ideas about your topic. a. Using a pen and paper, I wrote down everything I knew about solar power. A stream of consciousness is what I did at this stage. Even if you think an idea is mildly related to the main subject, jot it down! b. There are TONS of resources at your disposal in order to generate ideas for your topic: periodicals, TED Talks on YouTube, news
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articles, books, industry workers, Google search, teachers, family and friends. 3. Next, I prioritized and narrowed down each of the brainstormed ideas. a. I put these ideas into an idea-web format on paper.
b. In case you were wondering, I did not put this image here so you could marvel at my nice handwriting! But I did want you to take note of how sub-topics and further corresponding sub-sub-topics go together. Honestly, you can organize and prioritize your concepts anyway you want: visually, bullet point format, mind mapping, etc. The point is to narrow down the concepts that came from your brainstorm.
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4. Form your thesis statement. a. If writing an argumentative paper, you must take a stance on the topic with evidence to support your claims. Your thesis statement should reflect your stance. b. If writing an explanatory paper, a stance is not required and you are simply explaining a topic to the reader(s). In this case, your thesis statement simply lists what you will be explaining. c. In the case of my explanatory paper on solar power, my thesis statement read: Solar energy will be looked at in the proceeding discussion. Through the findings in this discussion, the following aspects of solar energy will be discussed: how it works, its advantages and disadvantages, its various uses around the world, and what it holds for the future. d. Notice how each of the underlined words is a sub-topic I had written down in my idea web. The order of these sub-topics is important and therefore my papers sections are presented in this order. 5. Create an outline for your paper. a. Begin by listing your main topic. Include a brief description of your introductory statements on the main topic. b. After the introductory remarks, list your thesis statement. c. Next, you want to prioritize your sub-topics and corresponding sub-sub-topics in a structured list format that will become the framework for your paper. d. Ask yourself a few questions about the sub-topics. For example: Logically, which sub-topic should come first, second, etc.? Does X sub-topic deserve more explanation and length than Y sub-topic? How many sub-sub-topics should I devout to each sub-topic? e. Then ask yourself a few questions about the sub-sub-topics. For example: Which details need to be included and discussed on each sub-sub-topic? Remember, each sub-sub-topic is giving legitimacy to a sub-topic that was mentioned in your thesis statement. Some will require more depth of explanation than others. 6. Research your topic in depth. a. Its extremely important that you give yourself plenty of time to properly research your topic!
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b. Depending on your papers length, several months of reading/research may be required. c. Segment your research by doing small amounts every week. Dont overwhelm yourself with the research AND writing until a week before the paper is due. d. My report on solar power took me a semesters worth of time to research! But, the paper had to be at least thirty pages and the grade I received on in was the grade I received in the class. e. The point is to understand the grade importance your paper carries and plan your time accordingly!
5.3: Purpose of Paper Sections Defined

As we know, academic papers usually fall into one of two categories: argumentative (a paper that takes a stance on a subject and provides supporting evidence) or explanatory (a paper to explain/define a subject). Lets look at both types of papers and their corresponding sections. Introduction The introduction of a paper is meant to...you guessed it...properly introduce your reader(s) to your topic and spark their curiosity to read on! This can be accomplished in a number of ways including, but not limited to: posing a question, dropping an intelligent quote from a well-known expert, or including historical examples of why your topic has been proven to be true (or false) time and again. Note that an introduction begins with broad statement(s) about your topic and gradually leads your thesis statement at the end of the introduction section. Heres an explanatory paper introduction and thesis statement: 1. Introduction 1.1 Opening Statements
Today, the issue of global warming has become a hotly debated and discussed topic. The reason for debate on global warming is whether or not humans are causing seasonal climate change in certain parts of the world. Because of the climate change debate, alternative energy has begun to garner attentionthese are broad statements leading up to thesis statement...Solar energy will be looked at in the following discussion. Through the findings in this discussion, the following aspects
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of solar energy will be discussed: how it works, its advantages and disadvantages, its various uses around the world, and what it holds for the future. As you can see, the last two sentences in the paragraph make up the papers thesis statement. These types of sentences serve to list what your subtopics will be about. Notice how both advantages and disadvantages are listed without any additional commentary favoring one aspect over the other. This is in contrast to an argumentative paper that would take a stance and mention whether solar energy was more beneficial or detrimental to society. Lets look at an example of an argumentative introduction and thesis statement. 1. Introduction 1.1 Opening Statements
Today, the issue of global warming has become a hotly debated and discussed topic. The reason for debate on global warming is whether or not humans are causing seasonal climate change in certain parts of the world. Because of the climate change debate, alternative energy has begun to garner attentionmore broad statements leading up to a stance and thesis statement...With these realities in mind, a smart and promising method of producing energy that doesnt put more pollutants into the atmosphere lies in solar power. Through the findings in this discussion, the following aspects of solar energy will be discussed: how it works, its advantages and disadvantages, its various uses around the world, and what it holds for the future. See how the thesis statement takes a positive stance on using solar energy and then frames the reasons why? You want your thesis statement to do the same thing with your topic if writing an argumentative paper. Body/Main Points After you have composed your impressive, gripping introduction complete with a thesis statement and stance/no stance, its time to get to the meaty (yum!) points of your paper. The sub-topics we dealt with earlier in the brainstorming session and subsequent outline for our paper need to be discussed in the order they are listed in your thesis statement. Your sub topics will comprise the bulk (think an MLB player using steroids) of your paper and have various sub-sub-topics within them.
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Continuing with an example from my solar report we see one of my sub-topics (advantages of solar power), and its corresponding sub-sub-topics. 2.1 Advantages of Solar Power
While solar power is not perfect, it does offer several advantages when compared to traditional methods of power generation. Solar energy offers technological, national security, and environmental advantages, when compared to others forms of power generation. These advantages will be the subject of the following paragraphs. This method of writing academic papers is common and contains a wellknown pattern. The pattern is main topic-sub-topic supported by three or more sub-sub-topics. In an outline format, it would look like this: I. Solar Power (main topic) A. How it works (sub-topic) 1. Energy from sun (sub-sub-topic) 2. Panels host electrons B. Advantages 1. Environmental 2. Technological 3. National security C. Disadvantages 1. High cost 2. Electricity must be used immediately 3. Etc. etc.
If you follow this method, your paper practically writes itself because you have many ideas to expand upon. In this case the three supporting sub-subtopics are technological, national security, and environmental advantages. By providing three or more ideas to my sub-topic, I added credibility and detail to support my thesis statement.
5.4: Transitional Sentences

I cant stress enough how important it is to have transitional sentences that lead from one concept to the next. Transitional sentences provide a natural flow and coherence that is greatly appreciated by the reader. Heres how I transitioned from talking about technological advantages to national security advantages of solar energy:
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Solar energy is a technology known as distributed power generation. Distributed power generation means that the energy used is generated within a close distance to the user...Overall, individual systems allow for more flexibility than a centralized (coal) system (Uses of solar energy, 2010). Distributed power generation, if used on a national level, can also be a security advantage, which is the next topic of discussion. Having a strong sense of national security is something that many nations strive for, including the United States. An aspect of national security is energy usage. Whether energy resources come from outside a nations borders or within them can play an important role in terms of national security. See how transitional sentences work? If you are still fuzzy on this, lets look at a few more examples. In this example, I am discussing a few disadvantages of solar power. Notice how I use transitional words: It is clear that solar energy is still an expensive technology to produce electricity, even when compared to other renewable energies. As mentioned before, the technology is being developed at a rapid rate, and as efficiencies improve the costs to produce electricity from the technology will fall. Along with having a current high cost of production, solar energy also has a disadvantage because it relies on sunlight, something that is not always available depending on the weather. It has been discussed that during the summer months, solar energy thrives due to the fact that sunlight is abundant. However, there are also times of the year when sunlight is not abundant and is blocked due to weather patterns. See how nicely those ideas flow together? This is a good time to bring up what we learned in our grammar school at the start of the book (you read some of that section right!?) Remember our friends the correlative conjunctions? Here they are in case you forgot. They work great to transition sentences: eitheror, notbut, not onlybut also, bothand, althoughyet, whetheror, neither...nor.
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Lets look at one more example and really drive home the idea of transitional sentences. In this example, the subject matter is tropical rainforests. I transition various reasons for rainforest degradation: With so many fast food enterprises in the U.S., it becomes easy to see why rainforest nations devote so much land and time into cattle ranching. Much like cattle production, land is also cleared for the production of paper products. The production of paper products begins with the felling of trees. The wood within the trees is what is used to make paper. Trees are either made up of hardwood or softwood, and depending on what kind of paper is desired, this will determine which kind of wood is used. That should do it for transitional sentences. Remember, they are utilized in academic essays, and any writing for that matter, to connect your ideas. In the case of academic papers, we are typically connecting sub-sub-topics or sub-topics to one another. If you are careful to follow the format of: main topic-multiple sub-topics-three or more sub-sub-topics, you will have a wellcrafted paper. Again, in an outline this format would be as such (insert your topic): II. Solar Power (main topic) D. How it works (sub-topic) 3. Energy from sun (sub-sub-topic) 4. Panels host electrons E. Advantages 4. Environmental 5. Technological 6. National security F. Disadvantages 4. High cost 5. Electricity must be used immediately 6. Etc. etc.
Now that we have the paper format and transitional sentences down, lets look at how we can enhance our documents credibility and accuracy with quotes and paraphrasing.
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5.5: Quotation Usage

When was the last time you bought a new gadget or piece of clothing because you saw your friends using/wearing it? Regardless of your answer, the point is that we crave social proof. If something is cool to have, its much easier to justify buying it. In other words, if someone we know and trust has a product first, it adds validation to that product. Because after all, who are you going to trust, a salesman at the store or someone who is your friend? The same is true of academic papers except in this instance, quotes or paraphrases are the cool gadget. They lend credibility to our sub-topics. Pick a topic, say physics. Who would you trust to know more about the subject, a student with an opinion or an accredited physicist with peer-reviewed published articles? Any rational person would take the physicists word over your own. The good news is that we are able to pull physicists quotes directly from books, articles, and magazines they have written. This can be done either with a verbatim quotation of the authors words or by paraphrasing. Lets look at how both methods support our written ideas. Reminder: As stated in the introduction, the scope of this book does NOT cover specific styles such as MLA, APA, or AMA for correctly citing quotes. However, it does demonstrate how to correctly use quotes and paraphrases below. Direct Quotation Using my trusty solar report as an example again, here are a few ways I utilized a direct quotation: In the United States, a growing interest for home based solar panel use has led some states legislators to revise laws on energy use in order to encourage home owners to buy solar panels. For example, in New York State, condo owners can receive a reduction on their state income taxes if their building uses PV panels. A community in Massachusetts has taken another approach to encourage solar panel use. Columnist Y. Chernova (2009) states, In Massachusettsthe new Green Communities Act, which went into effect in July, requires utilities to allow neighborhood net metering, which would permit residents of several housing units to band together to be co-owners of a solar power system and use the power to offset their individual bills (R:5).
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If a quote is particularly long, (five or more lines, in most instances) it needs to be put in a block format, offset and indented from the other lines of text. Heres how to write a block quotation: In a recent article published in The Nation magazine, columnist Christian Parenti explores the dynamic between the U.S. government and the development of technologies. The underlying argument made by Parenti is if the government was to implement and use renewable technologies on a large scale, eventually the private sector would follow suit. Software billionaire mogul Bill Gates is mentioned in the article, providing his view of how the government helped spark the computer and microprocessor boom. Parenti (2010) summarizes: The Internet and the microprocessor, which were very fundamental to Microsoft being able to take the magic of software and having the PC explode, were among many of the elements that came through government research and developmentwhen it comes to developing new sources of energy, I believe the federal government needs to play a more active role than it does today. (p. 16) By using a long quote in a block format, we are able to provide detailed information that cant be broken down into a smaller quote. This adds in-depth validity to the claims we are making in our paper. Lets move on and take a look at how paraphrasing information can also be an effective method of adding legitimacy to our papers. Paraphrasing Instead of providing a word-for-word line from an author, we can paraphrase information and summarize it in a way that is easy to understand for the reader. When paraphrasing, its important to make sure that you still provide credit to the author! Otherwise, you are plagiarizing. Simply because you are not using their exact words doesnt mean that suddenly their thoughts are your own in the form of a paraphrase. Heres an example of paraphrasing:
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The common unit of measurement used for electricity is the watt. A watt is an amount of energy used per unit of time and is equal to one joule of energy used per one second. A kilowatt hour (kWh) is the typical billing unit of electricity for utilities companies and is equal to 1,000 watts used over a period of one hour. A megawatt is a unit commonly used to measure output from power plants and is equal to 1,000 kilowatts (Krupp, & Horn, 2008). Notice how the authors names come at the end of the paraphrase. This is common and is in contrast to the direct quotations we looked at. Lets look at one more paraphrase: Whereas coal has to be mined, transported, and then burned in order to produce electricity, solar energy eliminates these steps. The upfront costs of installing a solar power plant or home solar panels will be substantial; however it costs the owners of these systems nothing to harvest the energy from the source (Uses of solar energy, 2010). Essentially, we are using paraphrased information to explain a concept in (usually) simplistic terms to the reader. While quotes work great for providing very specific information, paraphrases usually describe broader, easy-to-understand ideas. A common question that arises when providing a paraphrase is: what if the information is widely known and understood? In other words, the information is considered to be public domain. The lines tend to get blurry if this is the case. But a good rule of thumb is that if you are asking yourself if you need to provide credit at the end of a paraphrase or not, its probably safe to assume that you DO in fact need give credit to an author. Its always best to err on the side of caution! Speaking of being cautious, lets pay mind to where we pull paraphrases and other information from.
5.6: Quality of Sources

This probably goes without saying, but using quotes and paraphrases from sources that are crap will leave you with a crappy paper. Not all sources are created equal. This is ESPECIALLY TRUE in todays digital world.
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While Wikipedia may be a good place to start researching a topic, do not pull any quotes from it. For various reasons, Wikipedia has become the whipping boy of professors when it comes to sourcing credible information. Honestly, I dont know why this is. Sure, anyone can write an article and put it on there. But the articles are peer-reviewed for accuracy and content. The point is this: use Wikipedia if you must as a good launching base for ideas. It will point you to more official sources of information for your paper. In summation, the most trusted and official sources for information to back up your paper are: 1. Books, 2. Periodicals/Journals, 3. Interviews with industry experts, and 4. Online articles for big name magazines or blogs (ie. The Huffington Post). The more you use these sources, the better. Always have a devils advocate approach when reading ANYTHING. Its wise to constantly question the sources you are reading for their credibility. After all, you dont want to be mistaken and quote someone who is a fool! That wraps it up for the body section of our papers. Well now move on to how to close out our paper and leave the reader starving for more of your writing because it was just that damn good!
5.7: Closing Statements

The closing statements of your paper serve the purpose of telling your readers what you told them. Sound a bit redundant? In order to spice things up, its wise to end with a few questions or include a quote from a high-profile and well-respected person. Your closing paragraphs/statements need to reinforce the sub-topics in your thesis statement, but you need not use the same exact phrasing. Heres how I did it in my solar report: Various aspects of solar energy have been discussed: how it works, where it is used throughout the world, and what it is used for. Solar energy has the potential to have social, economic, and technological impacts on the future. Ultimately, solar energy will take change. It will take changing the way the world thinks about electricity and resource use. Change never comes easy, but it is something that humans are very adept to do. It would be hard to imagine not being able to use the
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internet hundreds of years ago. Since its inception, the internet has changed the way the world communicates and gathers information. Solar energy has the potential to have just as great of an impact on the world. Famous architect and inventor Buckminster Fuller once summed up the unique relationship humans share with the Earth: We are on a spaceship; a beautiful one. It took billions of years to develop. We're not going to get another. Now, how do we make this spaceship work? Making the spaceship work is something that the human race has been trying to figure out for a long time. Technology will always be a part of human ingenuity and spirit. When it comes to solar technology, the breadth of human ingenuity is yet to be fully realized. In summary, summarize what you have been talking about the whole time! After you have done that, leave your readers with a few statements to make them curious to read more about your topic.
5.8: The Final Word

Weve covered a lot of ground! I hope you are at least a little more comfortable with how to go about writing that next big academic paper. Lets summarize what we went over and then Ill turn you lose to read (or not) two academic papers from my college career that both received an A. 1. Follow the basic rules mentioned on pages 63-64. Essentially, use common sense. If youre reading this book, youre bright anyway so this should be a breeze. 2. Utilize the six steps I detailed for idea formulation and research: Choose an acceptable topic for the class/paper Brain-storm and conduct initial research on topic Prioritize and narrow down brain-stormed concepts Create your thesis statement or topic sentence Organize concepts into an outline Research your topic in depth
3. Be aware of what each section of your paper is for: Introduction: Introduce your topic and present thesis statement
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Body: Support the sub-topics of your thesis using the format of sub-topic-three or more supporting sub-sub-topics. o Use transitional sentences. o Properly cite quotations or paraphrases. Closing: Summarize what you have said throughout the body of the paper. Reiterate your thesis using different words. End with a strong quote or thought-provoking question.
The next fifty or so pages contain two academic papers. The first one is an explanatory report about solar power and contains many of the examples we have been using. The second paper is argumentative and covers tropical rainforests. Again, this book is not a style manual, but the solar report is in APA format and the tropical rainforest report is done in MLA format. Use these as a template for your own papers or skim through them as needed. Under no circumstances can you copy/paste and use these thoughts as your own! It you do, its at your own risk of having your instructor run your paper through turnitin.com or a similar cheatypants checker. So go forth and write that badass paper! I know you can do it.
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5.9: Academic Paper Example 1
Solar Energy: A Future Alternative John Krygiel Dr. Sean Smith TCM 497
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Table of Contents 1. Introduction 1.1 1.2 1.3 2. Opening Statements Uses of Solar Energy Electricity Basics p. 82 p. 82 p. 90 p. 92 p. 92 p. 97 p. 102 p. 109 p. 109 p. 113 p. 115
An In-Depth Look at Solar Power 2.1 2.2 2.3 Advantages of Solar Power Disadvantages of Solar Power Solar Energy Use throughout the World
3.
Solar Energy and the Future 3.1 3.2 Let the Light and Money Pour In Closing Remarks
References
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1.
Introduction 1.1 Opening Statements
Today, the issue of global warming has become a hotly debated and discussed topic. The reason for debate on global warming is whether or not humans are causing seasonal climate change in certain parts of the world. Because of the climate change debate, alternative energy has begun to garner attention. Alternative implies that the energy consumed comes from a source that has not yet been used on a large scale, such as wind, solar, tidal, geothermal, and biomass. These alternative sources of energy are renewable because they are available forever in nature, regardless of human actions. Alternative energy is being widely discussed today because these energies are clean; they do not put carbon and other clouding elements into the atmosphere, which are a debated source of global warming. It makes sense to develop these alternative energies because regardless of the global warming debate, fossil fuels will inevitably be exhausted at some point in the future. One of the alternatives that has great potential is solar energy. Solar energy will be looked at in the proceeding discussion. Through the findings in this discussion, the following aspects of solar energy will be discussed: how it works, its advantages and disadvantages, its various uses around the world, and what it holds for the future. 1.2 Uses of Solar Energy
Today, the primary uses of solar energy are to generate electricity and to heat or cool air within buildings. The generated electricity can be used to power homes, buildings, cars, traffic signals, and other structures needing electricity to operate. The heated or cooled air is used in buildings mechanical systems in order to adjust the level of comfort within controlled spaces. Solar energy can be used in a large, centrally located system or by many individually distributed
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systems. Both will be discussed in the following section. Currently, there are two widely used methods for harnessing the power from the sun: photovoltaic and solar thermal technology. In the following section, these two solar technologies will be discussed, along with the varying methods used in each type of technology. Photovoltaic technology operates by converting the light energy from the sun directly into electricity. Solar energy comes from the sun in the form of light photons. Light photons contain electrons which are the key ingredient in creating electricity from the energy. In order to catch the electrons from the light photons, photovoltaic (PV) cells with semiconductor materials must be used. According to energy experts J. Wilson and G. Burgh, Different semiconductor materials are used to absorb different colors of light. The range within which a material can absorb light is called the band gap, which refers to the energy level of each incoming photon and the kinetics required to displace a semiconductor valence electron. In order to improve efficiencies of PV cells, layers of differing semiconductor materials are stacked together in order to absorb different spectrums of light. Photovoltaic cells containing semiconductor materials are arranged in silicon wafers, thin film compounds, or dye-sensitized solar cells. Several types of silicon compounds may be used to harvest light energy from the sun. For silicon panels, three types of silicon are commonly used: amorphous, single-crystalline, and polycrystalline. Amorphous silicon generally has a large number of structural bonding defects, and therefore has a mixed reputation for field durability. Amorphous silicon cells are used mostly for low power devices such as calculators, wristwatches, and battery rechargers. Singlecrystalline silicon is the most efficient of silicon choices, but also the most costly to produce. In order to produce solar panels, high purity silicon must first be melted in a vacuum. The material must then be solidified using a chemical process. Finally, the solidified silicon is cut into a wafer
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using a laser. The single-crystalline panels are commonly used today for residential applications. Lastly, polycrystalline silicon may be used in constructing solar panels. Polycrystalline silicon is typically less efficient than single-crystalline silicon, however it is less costly to produce. The most common production method for polycrystalline silicon is to cast molten silicon in square ingot molds. The silicon then hardens in the square molds, producing solidified silicon that can be cut into smaller square cells which will fit into residential-use PV modules (Wilson, & Burgh, 2008). Just as several types of silicon compounds may be used in solar panels; there are also several options for panels made from thin-film compounds. The three leading thin-film materials are copper indium diselenide, copper indium gallium diselenide, and cadmium telluride. Copper indium diselenide (CIS) has an extremely high photon absorptivity, with up to 99% of the light shining on the CIS being able to be absorbed in the material. CIS units are typically heterogeneous structures, consisting of layers of cadmium sulfide as well as zinc. The layers of thin-film CIS are adhered together and then housed in a window-like aluminum frame. Copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) is a variation on the CIS technology. CIGS systems have achieved efficiencies in the range of 20%, meaning that they are able to convert 20% of the light shining down into electricity. The main drawback to the CIGS technology is high cost and complexity of construction. Lastly, cadmium telluride (CdTe) is an option when considering thin-film materials. Similar to CIS cells, CdTe cells are generally designed using heterogeneous configuration. The layers are combined in an aluminum housing unit, much as the CIS structures and typically contain layers of cadmium sulfide and tin oxide. These layers will improve the absorptivity of the device, increasing overall electrical efficiency (Wilson, & Burgh, 2008). Authors M. Horn and F. Krupp further explain the electron displacement process in their book Earth: The Sequel. Both silicon and thin-film solar
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systems operate using the same principle of PV cells. In order to create an electric current, electrons present on PV cells must become excited; in other words, they have to be displaced from their original position. The electrons on the PV cells become excited when the electrons from the incoming light photons shine down on the cells. The incoming electrons displace the electrons already present on the PV cells, in turn creating an electric current which flows up a conduction band. When this process takes place with thousands of electrons, the electric current becomes powerful enough to provide a significant amount of electricity. The option yet to be discussed for producing solar cells is that of dye-sensitized solar cells. Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) operate on the principle of artificial photosynthesis, and are a promising development which could have low production costs in the long run. DSSC are made up of a transparent conducting electrode coated with a dye-sensitized film of Titanium Dioxide particles, an electrolyte containing a redox couple, and a counter electrode. In order to create electricity, the DSSC first rely on photo excitation of electrons caused by the dye. The electrons are then injected into the Titanium Dioxide layer which harnesses the energy from the electron flow. To finish the cycle, the electrons are then run through the counter electrode, completing the electron cycle. Much like thin-film technologies, DSSC requires layering of the described TiO2 particles, the electrolyte, and the counter electrode. The layers are sandwiched together between two layers of conducting glass and then affixed to a metal housing unit. While DSSC technologies offer a promising future due to the fact that they are low cost, light weight, and have a wide variety of applications, they also have an efficiency level of about 9%, lower than many of the aforementioned silicon and thin-film photovoltaics. There is also the fact that the dye present in the DSSC tends to degrade over a period of several years. Scientists are working on developing DSSC in which the degraded dye would be able to be removed and
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replaced, fully restoring the cells. This would allow for the technology to last for over thirty years, surpassing the life span of most silicon PV cells (Wilson, & Burgh, 2008). Now that the various types of photovoltaic technology have been discussed, attention will be turned to solar thermal technology. While photovoltaic technology operates by converting light energy directly into electricity, solar thermal technology operates by transferring light energy through several mediums to create electricity. Solar thermal energy operates the same way a thermos would when keeping a beverage warm. Water is warmed and insulated via the sun in order to create electricity. The difference being of course, solar thermal energy operates on a vastly larger and more complicated scale than a simple thermos. On a large scale, solar thermal can be used to create large power plants, whereas PV power tends to be made up of many individually owned residential systems, making it a distributed power source. Solar thermal power plants have the potential to replace coal fired power plants, due to the fact that they can produce massive amounts of electricity, the only problem being that costs are still greater than those for coal-fired plants (Krupp, & Horn, 2008). Solar thermal technology may also be used on a small scale residential basis, and will be described in a subsequent section. To function, solar thermal power focuses the massive flow of light photons from the sun. In order to focus the light photons, curved mirrors known as parabolic troughs are used. The
Solar Thermal Pipes Heated by Parabolic Troughs, Source: flickr.com
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parabolic troughs borrow the curved parabola shape from mathematics. The mirrors are designed like a curved parabola in order to focus the light from the sun more intensely than a flat mirror would. The mirrors are arranged underneath long double layer pipes. The inner pipe is made of stainless steel and holds water. The outer pipe which surrounds the steel pipe is made of glass and holds synthetic oil. The process of producing electricity through solar thermal power begins when light photons hit the parabolic mirrors. First, light photons are reflected and focused on the pipes. The outer pipe is heated by the light photons, in turn heating the synthetic oil. Next, the oil heats up the water in the inner pipe. Last, the water becomes steam, which travels to a steam turbine to produce electricity (Krupp, & Horn, 2008). Now that the large, centralized method of thermal solar power has been discussed, attention will be turned to distributed residential use of solar thermal collectors and active hot water systems. For residential use, solar thermal collectors are used to heat water. The hot water can be used in either the plumbing fixtures of the house when it is needed or it can be used to power a small scale generator to produce electricity. There are three commonly used types of solar thermal collectors, with variations on each. The three types of collectors are formed thermal collectors, flat plate collectors, and evacuated tube collectors. Formed solar thermal collectors use either an inexpensive plastic or EPDM rubber material to cover tubes or formed panels through which water is circulated. The water is heated in the tubes by the Suns radiation and then transferred to a storage device such as a water heater. In cold climates, formed solar thermal collectors are not very efficient due to the lack of insulation on the devices. Flat plate collectors are made up of a thin black absorptive sheet of a highly conductive material such as copper. The conductive material is placed on top of an insulating casing with a clear plastic or glass cover. Inside the insulating casing are glass tubes which house the fluid to be heated. Once the fluid is
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heated, it is transferred to a storage device such as a water tank or heat exchanger. Evacuated tube collectors are generally the most efficient of the thermal collectors, but also tend to be the most expensive due to their complexity. J. Wilson and G. Burgh (2008) explain the complexity of evacuated tube collectors: Evacuated tube collectors minimize heat loss to the ambient air temperature, and therefore generate higher water temperatures than flat plate collectors. Unlike a flat plate design, each tube incorporates its own collector, usually of painted or specially coated copper, housed inside two glass tubes, which hold a partial vacuumfluid is circulated inside the collector through two tubes, which feed a manifold and circulate to the hot water storage tank that may employ a heat exchanger to separate the circulated fluid from the useable hot water. (p. 214) In order to fully utilize solar thermal collectors, residential systems typically combine the collectors with other components to create active hot water systems. Active hot water systems give the owners of the system more options in terms of what can be done with the solar thermal energy. Active hot water systems combine solar thermal collectors, pumps, valves, storage tanks, and heat exchangers. J. Wilson and G. Burgh articulate that the system can be used to heat the desired spaces within a home or building, provide hot water, or even provide cooling for the desired spaces in a home or building. In order to understand how cooling can be achieved by warm thermal energy, a basic knowledge of air conditioning is needed. Cooling a space relies on the vapor compression cycle. Authors R. Janis and W. Tao explain how the cycle works. The vapor compression cycle uses temperature differences in order to heat a refrigerant fluid. In an active hot water system the vapor compression cycle would be as
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follows. First, air is warmed by evaporating the hot water from the solar thermal collector. Then the warm air passes over cooling coils filled with a refrigerant. The heat from the warm air is used to boil the refrigerant housed within the cooling coils. When the refrigerant evaporates, it cools the surrounding air. The air is then transported throughout a building using the installed ductwork. Active solar heating methods have been described. The final use of solar energy within a home or building is passive solar heating. Unlike active solar heating, passive solar heating does not use mechanical or electrical devices. In order to benefit from passive solar heating, buildings and homes are designed carefully with regards to local climate patterns. A structures windows and walls can both play a part in terms of how much the inside living space is heated or cooled. Using the passive heat gains for a structure will reduce the dependency on mechanical systems for heating or cooling. In order to control the passive heat gains several aspects of design must be considered such as window glazing type, insulation, and sealing of thermal envelopes (Energy savers: passive, 2010). For a complete passive system, five elements of design are considered: aperture (collector), absorber, thermal mass, distribution, and control. The aperture or collector is a large glass window area through which sunlight can enter. Typically, the aperture(s) should face within 30 degrees of true south and should not be shaded by other buildings or trees from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day
Five Elements of Passive Solar Design, Source: energysavers.gov
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during the heating season (Energy savers: five, p. 1, 2010). The absorber is a hard, darkened surface, typically a masonry floor; which sits in direct path of sunlight. The sunlight hits the surface and is absorbed as heat. Thermal mass is combined with the absorber and helps to retain the heat gained by it. Often, the thermal mass lies below the absorber surface. The distribution of passive solar design is simply the mode of transport by which the solar heat circulates throughout a space. Distribution is achieved via conduction, convection, and radiation. Lastly, the control structure of passive solar design is used to shade the aperture. The control is typically a roof overhang or awning. When all five of the described elements are designed carefully, a complete passive solar system will be achieved (Energy savers: five, 2010). The various uses and forms of solar energy have been discussed. For the modern world, solar energy is used for two main purposes: electricity production and heating or cooling. Solar energy systems are generally organized via large, centrally located plants; or by individual, distributed systems. Currently, solar energy is most widely used to generate electricity. Electricity is the focus of the next section and will be discussed in order to tie solar energy in with more widely used forms of electricity production. 1.3 Electricity Basics
Before proceeding further, it would helpful to know some basic information on how electricity is used and measured, in order to demonstrate how solar energy compares to other conventional methods of electricity production. The common unit of measurement used for electricity is the watt. A watt is an amount of energy used per unit of time and is equal to one joule of energy used per one second. A kilowatt hour (kWh) is the typical billing unit of electricity for utilities companies and is equal to 1,000 watts used over a period of one hour. A megawatt is a unit commonly used to measure output
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from power plants and is equal to 1,000 kilowatts (Krupp, & Horn, 2008). Put in perspective, a households average monthly use of electricity is 936 kWh; however, electricity consumption varies from region to region depending on the typical electricity use habits in each (Questions about electricity, 2009). As mentioned, the megawatt is the typical unit of measurement used when examining electricity output from power plants. A typical coal fired power plant will produce 500-600 megawatts of energy annually. This is enough to power around 200,000 homes a year (Carmichael, 2007). A solar power plant typically produces 100-200 megawatts of energy a year (Hudson, 2008). The difference in output lies in the forms of energy each plant converts to electricity. Coal fired power plants create energy by burning either crushed coal powder or liquefied coal. Coal is a fossil fuel; this means carbon and other energy containing elements from organic matter have been compacted, stored, and concentrated underground for hundreds or thousands of years. The carbon containing organic matter was originally grown using energy from the sun. When the matter has been stored underground for many years, the energy becomes concentrated. Solar power operates using the raw light energy from the sun, it has not been allowed the time to store energy as coal has. This allows for coal to produce energy at a higher efficiency than solar power, the main drawback being the fact that burning coal pollutes the planet. Solar power is a technology which produces electricity in a cleaner fashion than coal. Aside from being cleaner than coal, solar power has other advantages which will be looked at in the following section.
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2.
An In-Depth Look at Solar Power 2.1 Advantages of Solar Power
While solar power is not perfect, it does offer several advantages when compared to traditional methods of power generation. Solar energy offers technological, national security, and environmental advantages, when compared to others forms of power generation. These advantages will be the subject of the following paragraphs. A great advantage solar power possesses can be summed up in one word: abundance. The sun has and always will provide the Earth with the ability to harbor life. This is because all energy, no matter what form, originated from the sun. Every hour, the sun provides the Earth with as much energy as all of human civilization needs for an entire year. F. Krupp and M. Horn estimate that if a solar power system were operating at 10% efficiency, a 100 square mile plot of land could produce enough electricity for the U.S. in a year. Today, the solar power industry is still in its infancy. However, the industry continues to grow as climate change continues to draw more attention worldwide. In 2005, the worlds solar energy generating capacity grew by 44%. If this pace was sustained over the next several decades, the sun could supply 10 times the total amount of energy the Earth needs. This may sound like a stretch, even in the most optimistic thinking. However, the human race has a skill for developing technology and developing it quickly. Take the personal computer, for example. In thirty years, personal computers went from 0 to over 1 billion units worldwide. Not only were computers produced at such a fast rate, the computers processing speeds were doubling every two years or less, while at the same time costs were falling to make the computers. Journalist Oliver Morton wrote in his September 7, 2006 issue of Nature, If Silicon Valley can apply
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Moores Law* to the capture of sunshine, it could change the world again (Krupp, & Horn 2008, p 18). Morton was referring to the fact that the computer industry boomed so fast due to the fact that technology was being developed at an alarming rate. If this was the case for solar energy, it becomes feasible that the technology could become widely used in the future. Technologically speaking, solar power has an advantage because it expanded alongside the computer industry, and can be made more efficient in a relatively short amount of time. Along with having a technological advantage, solar power also has an advantage in terms of when it can produce electricity. Because of the nature of solar power, it operates most efficiently during the summer months, when sunlight falls on the earth more often and is more intense than in the winter months. This coincides perfectly with demand. Demand for electricity tends to be highest on the days of summer when temperatures are the hottest. Hot temperatures tend to drive consumers to cool their homes, often all at once, putting a burden on utility companies (Krupp, & Horn 2008). The greater the amount of sunlight that reaches either solar panel or solar thermal systems, the greater the amount of electricity output from the systems, as the systems will operate more efficiently. This increase in efficiency allows for solar power to produce more electricity, while also making the technology more economically feasible. The cost of producing electricity from solar energy is often a center of concern because fossil fuel technologies have been used for many years, at very low costs to consumers. However, out of any alternative energy source, solar energy has one of the fastest declining operating cost rate of producing electricity, that of about 4% each year. Another factor which makes solar energy economically friendly is the fact that once installed, solar power systems
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*See Intel.com: In 1965, Intel co-founder Gordon Moore saw the future. His prediction, now known as Moores Law, states that the number of transistors on a (computer) chip doubles about every two years . (Krupp, & Horn 2008, p. 14)
have close to zero variable costs. This means that it doesnt cost anything to actually harvest the energy. Whereas coal has to be mined, transported, and then burned in order to produce electricity, solar energy eliminates these steps. The upfront costs of installing a solar power plant or home solar panels are substantial; however it costs the owners of these systems nothing to harvest the energy from the source (Uses of solar energy, 2010). While being among the most economically feasible of various alternative energies, solar energy also has an advantage in terms of how the energy reaches consumers. Solar energy is a technology known as distributed power generation. Distributed power generation means that the energy used is generated within a close distance to the user. This is achieved in large part by home solar panels in which individual owners have control of the systems. The advantage of having many individually owned systems as compared to a central power system is the fact that the electricity does not have to travel long distances. This reduces the need for transmission lines and increases the reliability of a central grid network, as the demand for grid electricity will be reduced. Lastly, the individual solar systems can be configured to meet each owners personal electricity needs. Overall, individual systems allow for more flexibility than a centralized (coal) system (Uses of solar energy, 2010). Distributed power generation, if used on a national level, can be a security advantage, which is the next topic of discussion. Having a strong sense of national security is something that many nations strive for, including the United States. An aspect of national security is energy usage. Whether energy resources come from outside a nations borders, or within them can play an important role in terms of national security. In the case of the United States, around 51% of all the oil consumed is
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imported (Crude oil faq, 2010). This means that the U.S. has to rely on other countries for over half of its total consumption of oil. Many of the countries, such as those located in the Middle East are not particularly fond of the U.S. and its way of life. Having to rely on a hostile nation for a significant amount of oil resources is something that doesnt promote strong national security. Oil is one energy resource among several that is used to make the United States infrastructure and cities work. Alternative energy offers the benefit of not having to rely on other nations for energy resources, since the energy does not have to be physically extracted and transported. Solar energy is one of the alternatives which, when combined correctly with other alternatives forms of energy, could lead to a greater national security in the United States. Former CIA director James Woolsey tends to agree with this notion and shared his thoughts in a speech given at the University of California-Davis in March 2010. In his speech, James Woolsey provided insightful reasons as to why alternative energy may be able to improve the national security of the United States. Woolsey makes a point that if developed properly, a portfolio of several kinds of alternative energy could be beneficial to the nations energy future. He also says that the sources of energy would have to be large enough to do the job of running the nation; however developing each and every alternative energy source would be too costly on the whole. While alternative energy companies would much rather convince the public that the opposite is true, Woolsey disagrees with that notion. Among the mix of alternatives he mentions is natural gas, solar power, tidal, and biomass. Since all of these sources do not have to be extracted and transported from a foreign country that is hostile towards the U.S., it makes them safer to use in terms of national security (National security, 2010). The last advantage of solar power to be presented is the environmental benefits of using the technology.
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An advantage of solar power is that the technology is clean; it doesnt degrade the environment as is the case with fossil fuel technologies. Fossil fuel technologies gradually degrade the environment due to extraction methods, accidents, and burning the fuel to generate electricity. A recent example of an accident of massive proportions occurred this past summer. British Petroleum (BP) is a London based petro company which has holdings and resource extraction wells in six continents worldwide. The company made headlines on April 20, 2010 when one of its off shore drilling rigs, the Deepwater Horizon, exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. The explosion caused several deaths as well as a leak dispersing massive amounts of crude oil into the Gulf. The estimated leakage of crude oil into the Gulf was said to be around 185 million gallons (Pidd, 2010). This accident of massive proportions bears economic and environmental costs to society. Some of the costs to society include the ecotourism and fishing opportunities lost to the Gulf Coast region of the U.S. These costs tend to get overlooked when considering producing energy from fossil fuels. Economist Pavan Sukhdev offered his explanation of the accident and its associated costs in the months during the spill. The economic invisibility of ecosystem services and biodiversity- clean air, fresh water, healthy oceans, fertile soil, stable climates; must be addressed with urgencyWe cannot manage what we do not measure, and we are not measuring either the value of nature's benefits or the costs of their loss (Ecosystem damage to, 2010, p. 1). In the case of the BP oil spill, the company is working to compensate the many residents of the Gulf Coast region, so the people dont have to bear all the costs associated with the spill. What Sukhdev was really getting at is that firms which control and sell depletable fossil fuels often dont have to bear the real costs of extracting and selling the fuels. If the real costs for extracting and selling oil were factored in, oil prices would be much higher. For example, when crude oil is refined to usable forms such as gasoline, it creates pollution.
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Pollution tends to create health problems such as respiratory diseases. When people have to go to the hospital to be treated for respiratory illnesses, the oil companies which helped contribute to the pollution arent paying the hospital bills, the sick patients are. With alternative energies, little to no pollution is created, which means less illnesses caused by poor air quality. Various advantages of solar energy have been presented and discussed, with its greatest advantage being left out. The greatest advantage of solar energy is that it is a long term source of energy. As long as the sun shines there will be energy; there are few other sources of energy which can make the same claim! While solar energy has several advantages compared to conventional methods of producing electricity, it is not perfect. The disadvantages of solar energy will be looked at in the following section. 2.2 Disadvantages of Solar Power
As a fairly new technology, solar power is still trying to overcome several disadvantages when compared to traditional methods of energy production. At the heart of its disadvantages is money. In order to understand the money disadvantage of solar power, it would be helpful to have a basic knowledge of economics. Economics is the study of people and their financial interaction with society. In a sense, it is a behavioral science which tries to predict how people will spend their money. A phrase which applies to economics is every dollar spent is a vote. This is true because every time people choose to buy goods or services from a firm, they are voting as to which particular good or service they would like to support. Currently, people are voting to support coal-fired electricity generation, as it is among the cheapest and most reliable forms of providing electricity. Today, the cost per kWh of producing electricity from solar energy is over twice as much compared to producing electricity from coal. It costs about 20 per kWh if solar energy is used to
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produce electricity and around 2 to 8 if coal is used (Sweet, 2009). The table below compares the prices per kWh of various renewable energies, along with coal.
Energy Source Typical Installation Size Cost per kilowatt peak and per kilowatt hour*
Solar Energy (Photovoltaics)
1-100 kilowatts
$6-10 000 per kWp or 20-40 cents per kWh
Microturbines
30-300 kilowatts
$1 000 to $1 500 per installed kWp or 10 to 15 cents per kWh
Wind Turbines
10 kilowatt -2 Megawatt
$1500-$3000 KWp
Central Power Generation
500-3000 Megawatt
$500-1000 per kWp
Source: solarbuzz.com
The price comparison between solar energy and fossil fuel-based energy illustrates an important point of economics. The point is that people tend to respond to price mechanisms. When the price of a good or service goes up, people tend to find substitutes, or limit the amount of the good or service they consume. When the described scenario occurs for a good or service, it is said to have reached the choke point, or the maximum willingness to pay. The case of the energy market today is that the price of fossil fuel-based energy production has not reached a choke price in which people will find substitutes, such as solar energy. The choke price for fossil-fuel energy production has not been reached because the costs associated with extraction are still relatively cheap. In order for the price of solar energy to come down low enough to compete with fossil fuel-based energy, several market actions would have to take place.
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First, it is important to understand that fossil fuels are depletable resources, meaning that once the known reserves are used up, they are gone, or they dont replenish themselves for thousands of years, too long for humans to wait around for the next usable reserves. This means that gradually, the overall price for the fossil fuel resources will go up. As less of a resource is available over time (essentially becoming rarer to extract) the higher its price becomes. That is a simple example of supply and demand in economics. The supply and demand notion along with the mentioned extraction costs could eventually contribute to fossil fuel energy production becoming as expensive as alternative energy production, according to some economists such as Thomas Tietenberg. Extraction costs are simply the costs associated with physically removing and transporting a fossil fuel from the ground. They are the costs of running the various extracting equipment, paying the workers who run the equipment, and then fueling the vehicles to transport the fossil fuels to the power plant. Over time, these costs increase due to the fact that fossil fuels are relatively easy to extract at first because they are close to the surface of the ground, as is the case with oil and coal. Once the surface reserves are extracted, deeper drilling is continually required (Tietenberg, & Lewis, 2009). Now that an economic discussion of the current energy market has been made, it is time to turn attention to the future of the energy market, with solar power in mind. When considering solar energy for the future of the energy market, economist Thomas Tietenberg offers a model for how solar energy could enter the market on a large scale basis. It is important to recognize that there would be a transition phase if energy production were to move away from fossil fuels and towards solar power. In theory, the transition to solar power would be a perfect transition, meaning that there would be enough solar power installed to completely replace fossil fuel energy production. This would occur because the choke price for the
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depletable resource would exceed the price of using the infinite solar resource. In other words, every last bit of the depletable resource is used up in order to maximize the total net benefits from the resource. In economics, total net benefits are the monetary benefits gained from extracting and using up every last morsel of a resource up to the point of the maximum willingness to pay. It makes sense for firms to want to extract and sell every last bit of the depletable resource because society would no longer use these resource once a cheaper, perfect substitute was found, such as solar energy. This is why the transition to solar would be smooth. The described scenario is in fact a theory, however. The real world seldom operates perfectly, and it is likely that the amount of installed solar power would not be sufficient to replace all fossil fuel based energy systems at the time of transition, making it a disadvantage for the future of solar power. It is clear that solar energy is still an expensive technology to produce electricity, even when compared to other renewable energies. As mentioned before, the technology is being developed at a rapid rate, and as efficiencies improve the costs to produce electricity from the technology will fall. Along with having a current high cost of production, solar energy also has a disadvantage because it relies on sunlight, something that is not always available depending on the weather. It has been discussed that during the summer months, solar energy thrives due to the fact that sunlight is abundant. However, there are also times of the year when sunlight is not abundant and is blocked due to weather patterns. This decreases efficiency of solar systems greatly. In order to be able to store electricity when sunlight is not readily available, batteries must be used. Special batteries known as lead-acid deep cycle batteries must be used to store the
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electricity. These batteries are large and are designed to be able to handle large amounts of electricity as well as constant charging and discharging that would take place in a solar system (Batteries for solar energy systems). The cost of the batteries can be high because they are designed to handle such a great charge from the stored electricity. Along with having to rely on expensive batteries to store electricity during down times of sunlight, solar energy presents a disadvantage in requiring a large amount of space to operate. Solar energy systems often require a fairly large amount of space to be installed in order to be efficient. Silicon wafers in the systems tend to absorb light photons slowly, therefore many silicon wafers must be used. This can present a problem in places where space is at a premium, such as within a crowded city (Disadvantages of solar energy). Again, expense becomes an issue as many silicon wafers must be used to make an efficient solar system. The disadvantages of using solar energy have been looked at. Many of the disadvantages involve money. The technology is still relatively expensive to install and use, when compared to other technologies used for producing electricity. These cost disadvantages will gradually be overcome as the technology advances and new processes are developed to harvest the solar energy. Now that the advantages and disadvantages of solar energy have been discussed, it is time to look at where solar energy is used around the world. 2.3 Solar Energy Use throughout the World
Solar energy use is catching on around the world, with Europe, Japan, and the United States leading the way. Statistics from 2008 show that Germany, Spain, Japan, the United States, and India have the most installed solar power, based on megawatts measured (Buuma, 2009). It
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will become clear in the following paragraphs that often federal governments of countries play an important role in the development of renewable technologies such as solar. Currently, Germany is leading the world by far when it comes to solar power, having close to 6,000 megawatts of solar power capacity installed; this is five times as much capacity than the United States has. The reason Germany uses so much solar energy is the fact that their government has made it easy for its citizens to have the systems installed. Germanys government has provided monetary incentives for its citizens to install home solar systems. The website solarbuzz.com (2008) sums up the incentives present for German citizens: The Feed-in Law in Germany permits customers to receive preferential tariffs for solar generated electricity depending on the nature and size of the installation. Under the new tariff structure introduced in 2004, the base level of compensation for ground-mounted systems can be up to 45.7 euro cents/kWh. PV installations on buildings receive higher rates of up to 57.4 euro cents/kWh (p. 1) This law acts as a subsidy for the solar panel customers, making it easier for them to pay for the purchase and installation costs of the systems. Another way in which the German government eased the costs of purchasing a solar panel system was by experimenting with a loan system in the early 2000s. The German Government providedloans totaling 1.7 billion Euros for the procurement of PV systems under the 100,000 Roofs Program, which terminated at the end of 2003. Loans are still available, but under slightly less advantageous conditions (Fast facts germany, 2007, p.1). Given the fact that the German government has implemented solar-
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friendly laws and loans, it becomes clear as to why they are leading the world in solar energy. Other countries are racing to catch up, and legislators have begun to make solar friendly laws. In the United States, a growing interest for home based solar panel use has led some states legislators to revise laws on energy use in order to encourage home owners to buy solar panels. For example, in New York State, condo owners can receive a reduction on their state income taxes if their building uses PV panels. A community in Massachusetts has taken another approach to encourage solar panel use. Columnist Y. Chernova (2009) states, In Massachusettsthe new Green Communities Act, which went into effect in July, requires utilities to allow neighborhood net metering, which would permit residents of several housing units to band together to be co-owners of a solar power system and use the power to offset their individual bills (R:5). Whether the systems are individual or community based, state officials have begun to realize that solar power is beneficial to have in a city, as they provide energy and capital to the owners. While numerous small solar systems are being installed, large solar power plants are also being built and upgraded. Currently, there are plans to build several solar plants in the Western United States, as this region of the country receives high annual sunshine. Writer G. Hudson (2008) outlines the countys future plans for solar plants. The city of Deming, New Mexico has plans to build the worlds largest solar power plant by 2011. The plant will provide the state with 300 megawatts of annual electricity, enough to power 240,000 homes. A similar project is also underway near Gila Bend, Arizona. The plan is for a 280 megawatt solar power plant, and is meant to compliment the Deming plant by sharing electricity within the region. These plants will create jobs and boost the economy for the region, all while providing clean energy. Internationally,
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Spain has also begun to use solar energy on a large scale, with a 20 megawatt plant having been completed in the city of Murcia. The plant uses 120,000 PV panels spread out over 100 hectares to generate the electricity. Experts from Murcia claim that the region receives about 300 days of sunshine, making it a perfect location to build the plant, again creating money and jobs for the region. While the United States is making strides in installing solar power, it is still far behind the aforementioned Germany. This is partly due to government and policy differences. Government and policy creation will largely shape the future of solar power and is the next topic of discussion. In a recent article published in The Nation magazine, columnist Christian Parenti explores the dynamic between the U.S. government and the development of technologies. The underlying argument made by Parenti is if the government was to implement and use renewable technologies on a large scale, eventually the private sector would follow suit. Software billionaire mogul Bill Gates is mentioned in the article, providing his view of how the government helped spark the computer and microprocessor boom. Parenti (2010) summarizes: The Internet and the microprocessor, which were very fundamental to Microsoft being able to take the magic of software and having the PC explode, were among many of the elements that came through government research and developmentwhen it comes to developing new sources of energy, I believe the federal government needs to play a more active role than it does today. (p. 16) Gates view may be a bit one sided however; as he tends to only favor constant innovation for the clean tech industry. Parenti (2010) reveals that Gates, among others, is stuck on the notion that game changing technology is what is needed to convert the clean tech movement to large
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scale use. An overemphasis on breakthrough inventions can obscure the fact that most of the energy technologies we need already existthey are: wind farms, concentrated solar power plants, geothermal and tidal power, all feeding an efficient smart grid. Parenti goes on to mention that the price gap between clean technologies and fossil fuels is still too large, giving capitalist economies reason to not invest in clean tech. As mentioned in past sections, people and firms tend to respond to price mechanisms, and this holds true for private firms investing in clean energy as well. Whats the fastest way to close the price gap? According to Parenti, the fastest, simplest way to do it is to reorient government procurement away from fossil fuels and towards clean energy. In essence, the government must use its vast spending power to create a market for clean energy. Indeed, the U.S. government has massive monetary power. Taken together, government at the federal, state, and local levels account for over 38% of the nations GDP. That is a huge number to consider for one entity, over one third of the nations GDP. Contributing to this number is the fact that the federal government is the worlds largest consumer of energy and vehicles, which can be viewed as the inputs for generating over one third of the GDP. If a redirection of purchasing was made for these inputs, say to clean technologies such as electric vehicles and more energy efficient buildings, this would create a huge market for clean technologies. Using the government to expediate advancement of green technology would help the developers cross what is called the valley of death (Parenti, 2010). The valley of death is the period in a technologys life cycle when capital dries up because there is a lag from the technologys initial invention and its successful application to the market. A report published by accounting firm Ernst & Young found that an average technological invention, such as a flat screen TV costs about $20-100 million to invent but about
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$1 billion to deploy into the market at competitive prices. Using the federal governments massive capital could help clean tech companies cross the gap of invention to market deployment (Parenti, 2010). It has been seen how developed nations with established governments could shape the future of their countries renewable energy use. It can be achieved through incentives for individual citizens, or through government funded purchasing and development. However, for developing nations, such as those in Africa, renewable solar technologies also have a future. As is the case with many African nations, most developing nations tend to have rural areas where villages are built. Because of the remote location of these villages, it is often difficult to provide them with electricity, as electric lines dont usually run to rural areas (if the lines are even there to begin with). Often in these remote locations, water and food are at a shortage. One of the few resources in abundance in these locations is sunlight. Photovoltaic panels could be installed on the roofs of the villages schools, clinics, and community centers to provide the buildings with electricity. Another way in which PV systems could help rural villages is by powering water pumps (Uses of solar energy, 2010). This makes life easier for the villagers, as they would no longer have to draw water from a river or well. One project in particular is working to power rural buildings in the African countries of Burundi, South Africa, Lesotho, and Benin. The Solar Electric Light Fund (SELF) is a program set up to work in partnership with developing nations to provide them with the necessary energy needed to power homes, schools, and health clinics. The mission statement of SELF claims, We believe that energy is a human right. To meet global challenges such as food and water scarcity, climate change and poverty,
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SELF is working to assign greater priority to the importance of sustainable energy (Solar electric light, 2009). Several of SELFs solar projects will be highlighted. One of the first projects completed by SELF provided a village in Burundi the opportunity to have a health clinic. The village of Kigutu is approximately ninety miles from the nations capital, and the closest hospital is fourteen miles away. In May of 2009, SELF was able to electrify the villages first health clinic, providing basic preventive and pediatric care for approximately 60,000 inhabitants of the village. The clinic was electrified due to a grant obtained by SELF to install and operate solar panels on the clinic. Another project afforded a village in Benin the change to improve its agriculture yield by installing a solar irrigation system. In 2007, SELF installed three solar irrigation systems in the crop fields outside of a village in Benin. This allowed for the crops to be watered automatically, meaning that the women farmers who work the fields spent, on average, 50% less time in the fields. The controlled irrigation system also allowed for the field sizes to be expanded due to the large range of the system. The increase in field size allowed for a greater yield in crops, meaning less malnourished families in the village. Lastly, a project completed in the Eastern Cape of South Africa provided villagers a chance to send their children to a school with a computer lab. In August of 2008, SELF installed solar panels on a schools classroom, providing it with the electricity necessary to convert the room to a computer lab. The lab served as an advanced learning facility for the region, as they had previously never had access to computers and the learning potential that the technology brings (Solar electric light, 2009). Versatility is what makes solar energy so useful and interesting, both in the developed and developing world. In the developing world, it is clear that solar energy can improve the social needs of rural communities. In the developed world, solar energy can be used as a clean,
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alternative source of energy for a variety of applications. The locations and uses of solar energy have been looked at. Now, an important question must be answered: what does the future hold for solar energy? 3. Solar Energy and the Future 3.1 Let the Light and Money Pour In
It is clear that when considering the future of energy, renewable technologies such as wind, tidal, biomass, and solar power are in the discussion. Renewable technologies are a part of sustainability. Sustainability is thinking about resource use today, so that future generations may enjoy the same quality of life enjoyed on the planet today. Solar energy has massive sustainable potential due to the fact that the sun is going to shine as long as humans live. As technology and efficiencies increase, solar energy use will only grow. The applications and use of solar technology will grow as new research is conducted and new ideas come to light. Some of the new areas for solar technology are thin-film PV panels, solar powered cars, and smart-grid connected solar systems. Photovoltaic panels are being developed today which can be produced cheaply and in mass quantities. As previously discussed, solar panels operate using silicon wafers, dyesensitized solar cells, or thin-film wafers. The silicon wafers are 10 to 20% efficient, meaning that they convert 10 to 20% of the incoming light photons into electricity. Thin-film wafers are being developed which operate at 10 to 19% efficiency, and will be the wave of the future in terms of solar panel development. Where the thin-film panels have an advantage over silicon is the fact that the panels are more easily installed because they are lighter and thinner. Mass quantities can be used in order to make up for the lost efficiency. The costs of the panels will
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also help in the long run, according to the president of Borrego Solar Systems Inc., Mike Hall: Theres a lot of interest in thin-film because theres an expectation that itll transform the market into being cost competitive (Sweet, 2009, R:6). The thin film panels will become cost effective because of the way they are constructed. When compared to silicon wafers, these thinfilm wafers do not use as much material. As well as being cheaper to manufacture than silicon panels, thin-film wafers offer output even when they are in the shade. Silicon wafers can often lose as much as 25% efficiency in the same situation (Sweet, 2009). The thin-film wafers can operate in the shade because the semiconductor materials are able to harvest a wider range of light wavelengths from the sun (Krupp, & Horn 2008). When it comes to solar energy, the future is about improving efficiency. This can be done on both silicon and thin-film wafers. As efficiencies improve, solar panel systems will grow in popularity and solar companies will reap the monetary benefits. Solar powered cars are also a future solar technology which is being looked into. Currently, solar powered cars are not on the market for commercial use. They are produced mostly by students to compete in racing competitions. The cars operate using the same technology present with photovoltaic panels. Arrays of the panels are arranged on top of the car to provide it with electricity. The electricity can be used directly or stored in batteries for later use. While solar cars may be a long way off from achieving efficiencies suitable for commercial use, they are a good way to educate the public about solar technology. The University of Missouri-Rolla recently hosted a solar car race in the summer of 2010. The route of the race was from Tulsa, OK to Chicago, IL; which is about a 700 mile race. Along the way, the racing teams made several stops in Missouri, allowing the local communities to speak with the team members
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about what they were doing (Mikkel, 2010). If nothing else, the competition was a way to showcase what each university could do while at the same time showing the world what the future of solar technology holds. The final topic of future solar technologies is the smart electricity grid. Smart grid technology is a concept that is not solely tied to solar energy, if developed however, it could widely integrate solar technology. In essence, it would serve as an upgraded version of the current electrical grid which powers the United States. The current U.S. electrical grid relies on centrally located power plants to provide electricity to cities and counties across the country, and is quite reliable in doing so. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that the system is about 99.97% reliable. However, blackouts do occur occasionally, costing American citizens around $150 billion a year. While the grid is very reliable, it can be overburdened, and with constant development of cities and towns, the grid has to grow along with the urban development. There is also a national security dimension tied in with the centralized grid system. Because of the arrangement of central power plants, they can become targets for anyone looking to cripple the nation, such as a terrorist (Scharf, 2010). With smart grid technology, the aforementioned drawbacks of the old electrical grid could be improved. One new technology that would be present on a smart grid is whats known as advanced metering infrastructure or AMI for short. AMI technology would allow individual homeowners to use wattage readers to see where electricity was being used the most and then fine tuning where they wanted to cut back on usage. A second technology would also be used on the power generation end of a smart grid. An automated computer system would be put in place at power plants (possibly solar) that could track and see where electricity was being used and when, in order to more accurately predict peak usage times. With the aforementioned AMI technology
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integrated together with the computer system on the power generation end, this would allow the electrical grid to talk to each end more, increasing efficiencies across the board (Lamb). Solar energy ties in with the smart grid due to the fact that individual users can feed their un-needed energy back into the grid. As discussed, solar energy can be distributed by centrally located power plants across the grid or it can serve individual homeowners who have solar panels installed. For those who have solar panels installed, if smart grid technology is developed, this could lead to monetary benefits for the user. In essence, the solar panel owner would be able to sell energy back to the smart grid, allowing others to use it. The U.S. Department of Energy recognizes this as an opportunity to update and improve the existing electric grid and has thus initiated the Solar Energy Grid Integration System (SEGIS) project to try and solve the various problems associated with smart grid technology. The SEGIS project brings together utilities, leaders in the field of photovoltaics, energy management, and communications to decide what needs to be done for solar to be fully integrated into a smart grid. So far, the team has identified that the grid must allow for two-way power flow and more advanced inverters must be installed on home PV systems. Inverters are electrical devices which switch high-voltage direct current from PV panels into low-voltage alternating current, which is needed for use in home electrical systems. In a smart grid, the inverters would have to disconnect from the system when necessary and also be able to stay online when drops and spikes in utility voltage would occur. Current inverters cannot differentiate between a true utility blackout (when disconnect would be needed) and a grid disturbance or fluctuation (peaks and spikes). Another problem identified by the SEGIS team is the fact that environmental conditions can suppress the efficiency of PV systems. Typically power plants operate within a climate controlled space, whereas PV systems are exposed to the
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elements outdoors. This could lead to the reliability of the PV system to vary, which would be detrimental to the overall efficiency of the smart grid. In response, SEGIS is developing forecasting techniques which would allow for precise data on how cloud cover and variable weather patterns affect how efficient the system is (Scharf, 2010). It has been seen that smart grid technology would offer solar energy a chance to be fully integrated into a highly data-based and well-organized system. The system would face technological challenges of course. Spending the time and money to overcome these challenges will be the ultimate determinate of whether the smart grid technology sees future development. 3.2 Closing Remarks
Various aspects of solar energy have been discussed: how it works, where it is used throughout the world, and what it is used for. Solar energy has the potential to have social, economic, and technological impacts on the future. Ultimately, solar energy will take change. It will take changing the way the world thinks about electricity and resource use. Change never comes easy, but it is something that humans are very able to adapt to. It would be hard to imagine not being able to use the internet hundreds of years ago. Since its inception, the internet has changed the way the world communicates and gathers information. Solar energy has the potential to have just as great of an impact on the world. Famous architect and inventor Buckminster Fuller once summed up the unique relationship humans share with the Earth: We are on a spaceship; a beautiful one. It took billions of years to develop. We're not going to get another. Now, how do we make this spaceship work? Making the spaceship work is something that the human race has been trying to figure out for a long time.
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Technology will always be a part of human ingenuity and spirit. When it comes to solar technology, the breadth of human ingenuity is yet to be fully realized.
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References Solar electric light fund: annual report 2009. http://www.self.org/index.asp Batteries for solar energy systems. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.thesolarguide.com/solarenergy-systems/solar-batteries.aspx Best quotes on our precious earth. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.squidoo.com/Best-Quoteson-Our-Precious-Earth Buuma, C. (2009, February 9). Energy consumption by the numbers. The Wall Street Journal, pp. R2: 2. Carmichael, B. (2007, December 26). Tech could reduce coal facilities' emissions. USA Today, Retrieved from http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/environment/200712-26-coal-main_N.htm Chernova, Y. (2009, February 9). Catching some rays. The Wall Street Journal, pp. R: 5. Crude oil faq. (2010, September 23). Retrieved from http://www.eia.doe.gov/ask/crudeoil_faqs.asp#foreign_oil Disadvantages of solar energy. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.clean-energyideas.com/articles/disadvantages_of_solar_energy.html Ecosystem damage to show true cost of gulf spill: expert. (2010, July 15). The Independent Energy savers: passive solar home design. (2010, October 20). Retrieved from http://www.energysavers.gov/your_home/designing_remodeling/index.cfm/mytopic=102 50 Energy savers: five elements of passive solar home design. (2010, October 20). Retrieved from http://www.energysavers.gov/your_home/designing_remodeling/index.cfm/mytopic=102 70 Fast facts germany. (2007, August). Retrieved from http://www.solarbuzz.com/FastFactsGermany.htm Hudson, G. (2008, March 5). World's 13 biggest solar energy plants, photovoltaic [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/03/05/worlds-7-biggest-solarenergy-plants/ Janis, R., & Tao, W. (2009). Mechanical and electrical systems in buildings, 4th ed.. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc. Krupp, F., & Horn, M. (2008). Earth, the sequel: the race to reinvent energy and stop global warming. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company Ltd. Lamb, R. (n.d.). How the smart grid will work. Retrieved from http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/smart-grid.htm
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Mikkel, D. (2010, March 25). Rolla brings solar car racing back. Retrieved from http://www.greenpacks.org/2010/03/25/rolla-missouri-brings-solar-car-racing-back National security and alternative energy. (2010). [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12kXsu35PWA Parenti, C. (2010, August). The big green buy. The Nation, 291(5/6), Retrieved from Academic Search Premier Database Pidd, H. (2010, June 11). Bp oil spill estimates double. Retrieved from http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/11/bp-oil-spill-estimates-double Questions about electricity. (2009). Retrieved from http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/ask/electricity_faqs.asp Scharf, M. (2010). Bringing solar power to the smart grid. Power Engineering, 114(5), 58-59. Retrieved from GreenFILE database. Solar electric light fund: annual report 2009. http://www.self.org/index.asp Sweet, 2009, C. (2009, February 9). Silicon substitute. The Wall Street Journal, pp. R: 6. Tietenberg, T., & Lewis, L. (2009). Environmental economics & natural resources, 8th ed.. Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc. Uses of Solar Energy. (2010). Retrieved from http://www.solarbuzz.com/Applications.htm Wilson, J., & Burgh, G. (2008). Energizing our future: rational choices for the 21st century. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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5.10: Academic Paper Example 2
Rainforests: Preserving a Natural Wonder John Krygiel Dr. Mario Bros GRY 351
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Table of Contents
Section 1-Introduction 1.1-Opening Statements 1.2-What is a Tropical Rainforest? 1.3-Where are the Tropical Rainforests? 1.4-How Rainforests Help the Earth Section 2-Examining the Present State of Rainforests 2.1-Degradation of the Rainforests 2.2-Further Reasons for Deforestation in Various Tropical Regions Section 3-What is Lost With Forest Degradation? 3.1-The Natural Dimension-Environment and Species 3.2-The Human Dimension-Medicine and Disease Section 4-What Does the Future Hold for the Rainforests? 4.1-Reasons for Hope 4.2-Closing Remarks References p. 129 p. 131 p. 132 p. 126 p. 127 p. 122 p. 123 p. 118 p. 118 p. 119 p. 120
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1.
Introduction 1.1 Opening Statements
The worlds tropical rainforests represent the oldest vegetation type still present on Earth. If respecting ones elders holds any truth, the human race needs some improvement in terms of respecting Mother Earth, but more on that later. The immensity of the rainforests is what gives them such beauty. Supporting eco-systems with thousands of plant and animal species, one can begin to see why preservation of such places is of utmost importance. In his book Tropical Rainforest, Arnold Newman notes that the rainforests have often been called the Womb of the Earth, by biologists and scholars, considering that they hold the largest biomass of any terrestrial habitat (11). Unfortunately, the people who live in these regions are forced to destroy them in order to live and support their families. Through the findings in this discussion, the following will be examined: what is currently happening to the rainforests, for what reasons, and the consequences of these actions. 1.2 What is a Tropical Rainforest?
The definition of a rainforest is as follows: a luxuriant forest, generally composed of tall, broad-leaved trees, found in wet tropical uplands and lowlands around the equator. The tropical part refers to the climate of the forests, meaning that the forests lie in regions with annual rainfall exceeding 70 inches and experience hot, humid air. The rainforests experience high average temperatures overall, usually within a daily range of 80 to 86 Fahrenheit, and a nightly range of 68 to 72 Fahrenheit (Rainforest). The temperatures vary depending on which tropical region one is in. Because of the continually high temperatures, the rainforests seasons are defined in terms of their rainy and dry spells. The winter season is typically the rainier season, while the summers experience dry spells of two to three weeks. In essence, the
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terms rainforest, tropical rainforest, and tropical forest are interchangeable, because they all mean the same thing. It is assumed that when one speaks of a tropical forest, he or she means a rainforest. 1.3 Where are the Tropical Rainforests? Today, approximately four million acres of rainforest remain, covering about 6% of the Earths land surface. Rainforests lie in three main regions of the world. The first and largest region is that of Central and South America (the Amazon Basin in Brazil being one of the largest rainforests in the world). The second largest region lies in Central and West Africa, in the countries of Madagascar and Democratic Republic of the Congo. Lastly, the smallest region is the Indo-Malayan region and spans the countries of Myanmar, Thailand, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines (Newman 10).
Figure 1.1 Locations of World Rainforests, Source: Mongabay.com
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1.4
How the Rainforests Help the Earth Even if someone is not an admirer of the worlds natural beauty, they should appreciate
the rainforests. This is true for several practical reasons. First and foremost, the rainforests help to combat global warming. In recent news, the issue of global warming has become a hot topic which often leads to controversy. Without delving too far into the issue, it will be briefly examined in the following paragraphs as to what it is, and how rainforests help to minimize its impact on the planet. It has been argued that humans have not contributed significantly to global warming. It is true that the earth has and always will experience fluctuations and changes in its overall global temperatures. However, as humans continue to live and put massive amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, there is evidence that this is altering average temperatures globally. The science of global warming and the atmosphere can be explained as follows: Carbon dioxide is the primary driver of global warmingCarbon dioxide's importance in greenhouse effect is based on its ability to absorb much of the electromagnetic radiation below the visible light wavelength, trapping heat radiation that attempts to escape from the Earth, thereby causing an increase in the Earth's temperature (Global Warming). In summary, Earths atmosphere allows for the suns incoming short wave radiation to pass through to the earths surface, this is what contributes to the annual temperatures we have grown accustomed to. It is the long wave radiation which creates problems. The long wave radiation is reflected back from the earths surface out to the atmosphere. When the atmosphere is continually being filled with greenhouse gases, mainly CO2, these gases absorb the long wave radiation. The long wave radiation then becomes energy that contributes to global warming (Newman 125).
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One would be hard-pressed to argue that putting massive amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere could be helping the global warming situation. So where do the rainforests fit in to the global warming equation? The answer lies in what is called carbon sequestration. Sequestration means to hide or conceal the source of something. In terms of carbon, the rainforests act to sequester it, so that it is not released into the atmosphere, combining with oxygen to create CO2. This occurs because trees and plant life take in carbon to live and grow. Carbon aids in the photosynthetic process of plant life. Carbon makes up approximately 50% of an entire trees biomass. For all the forests (temporal, tropical, boreal) worldwide, the total amount of carbon contained in their biomass is twice the volume of carbon held in the atmosphere. In terms of tropical forests alone, these hold 65% of all the carbon in forests worldwide. In essence, forests of all types act as carbon sinks which hold the carbon within tree and plant material (Newman 125-127). So, the greater the amount of forests on Earth, the easier it becomes for us, its inhabitants, to reduce the amount of carbon that goes into the atmosphere. Along with acting as carbon sinks, rainforests also help to provide oxygen to the planet. Oxygen is essential to all plant and animal life. Without it, life could not flourish. The rainforests have been called the lungs of the planet, as they provide it with so much oxygen. For each 2.47 acres of rainforest, twenty-eight tons of oxygen is produced per year (Newman 126). With less than four million acres of rainforests remaining, this translates into approximately forty-five million tons of oxygen being produced each year by rainforests alone. Obviously, this contributes a significant amount to the overall average amount of oxygen available to breathe. Tropical deforestation, which will be explored in the following sections, significantly decreases the amount of oxygen that is produced by these awesome forests.
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2.
Examining the Present State of Rainforests 2.1 Degradation of the Rainforests
There are less than four million acres of rainforest remaining globally, and this number continues to dwindle. The main reason for this is deforestation. Deforestation refers to the clearing or thinning of forests, due to human actions. This takes place due to several factors. In most cases, in order to survive and support families, the inhabitants of rainforest regions must cut down the forests to acquire money and/or food. One such practice which provides the inhabitants with food is slash and burn agriculture (Newman 78).
Figure 1.2 Slash and Burn Agriculture on a Plot, Source: scienceclarified.com
Slash and burn agriculture is a largely futile practice. This practice involves clearing an entire plot of land (slashing), and then burning the cleared biomass of trees in order to dispose of them. What is lost in this process is the natural habitat of the rainforest creatures. It has also been found that with such a massive amount of trees being lost, this leads to the plot of soil becoming largely unusable for farming. This is due to the fact that when it rains, the rain will pelt the ground, causing erosion; the erosion causes much of the soils nutrients to be removed in the
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mass flow of water. With fewer nutrients in the soil, it becomes harder to effectively grow crops on the cleared plot. Another problem is that large populations of people are forced to live on a single plot of land, placing a more intense burden on the soil. The estimates for sustainable farming practices are in the range of thirty to forty eight people per square kilometer. In some regions of tropical forests, this number is around ninety people per square kilometer. (Newman 78). While it is true that cleared forests can be reforested (replanted), this process does not restore the original amount of nutrients or biomass that was present originally. The primary forest is cut down for agriculture and is used for farming for a year or two, and then it is abandoned. The farmers will then move on to another plot. If they chose to replant the plot, they create what is called a secondary forest. This secondary forest can take up to thirty years for it to recover the same amount of biomass and nutrients which were present in the primary forest. There is also the fact that the secondary forest bears little resemblance to the original because the diversity of the trees and plants is lost, and the rainforest creatures must adapt to this change (Newman 79-80). At the basis of tropical deforestation lies money and food. 2.2 Further Reasons for Deforestation in Various Tropical Regions Basic socio-economic factors have been discussed as to why rainforests are destroyed. But how else do its inhabitants contribute to deforestation? They do it largely through logging, agriculture, illegal drug production, cattle ranching, and production of paper products. The practice of logging is one that is largely unsustainable, but highly profitable for those partaking in it. The premise is simple: there is a high demand for exotic timber, such as teak and mahogany; therefore the loggers are happy to sell it in order to turn a profit. An example of this is in the Philippines, in which the Agta tribes-people were studied by Gerhard van den Top.
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In his book The Social Dynamics of Deforestation in the Philippines, Gerhard van den Top performs a case study in the Philippines looking at the consequences of deforestation due to logging and agriculture activities. He describes that at first, corporate logging operations had brought in their own skilled laborers from other regions. However, many of the companies soon began to hire the local people of the Cagayan Valley in the Philippines- the Agta tribes people (117). It makes sense that these people would want to work for the logging industry, as many of them do not have alternative options for employment. Van den top describes a typical immigrant familys situation: Newcomers from the lowlands: The Ramon family, Cagayan Valley. We are invited to visit the sitio where these people and two more families live. There is a house and all around the house there are products drying; the family looks happy, healthy, and productive, and they say it was a very good decision to move here. [Father of family]: We were so hard up in the lowland province of Danguilan, Penablanca, where we were also immigrants. We did not own a carabao (water buffalo) and we did not have a rich relativehere we produce our own food and the soil is good (van den Top 118-119). It is clear that these people are taking agricultural and logging jobs in order to support their families. It is true that in any region of the world, a family trying to make ends meet will take the first steady job that comes their way. When it comes to people living in tropical forest regions, it is unfortunate that making a living has to come down to deforestation. Besides logging and agriculture, deforestation also takes place due to illegal drug production and cattle ranching. Cleared land and the chemicals involved in illegal drug production both contribute to degradation of the rainforests. It is estimated that upwards of 2.5 million acres of forest has been cleared in Peru alone for the production of cocaine. The land is cleared so coca leaves can be cultivated and then transformed into the common powder form of cocaine. The chemicals involved in this process also create a problem devastating the land. The National Agrarian University in Lima reports that 158 million gallons of caustic chemicalsare dumped into the
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habitat and find their way into the water drainage, as does the herbicide used to clear the land for coca production (Newman 85). These herbicides and chemicals in turn travel through ground water, making their way into a regions tributaries and rivers. These chemicals destroy the aquatic life present in the rivers, while also contaminating drinking water for humans. Cattle production impacts rainforest lands via the process of feeding and raising the cattle. In order to feed cattle, the cattle-farmers have to convert land to pastures in order to grow grass which the cattle can graze on. In Brazil, cattle ranching is responsible for approximately 30% of deforestation. The reason cattle ranching is so prevalent is because there is a large demand for inexpensive beef products around the world, most notably by fast food companies. By breaking down the land area it takes to raise cattle and the amount of meat yielded from each cow, it takes around sixty-seven square feet of land to produce a quarter-pounder hamburger (Newman 86). With so many fast food enterprises in the U.S., it becomes easy to see why rainforest nations devote so much land and time into cattle ranching. Much like cattle production, land is also cleared for the production of paper products. The production of paper products begins with the felling of trees. The wood within the trees is what is used to make paper. Trees are either made up of hardwood or softwood, and depending on what kind of paper is desired, this will determine which kind of wood is used. Most writing and printing type paper is a mix of both hardwood and softwood product. Paper production begins with the conversion of wood into a soupy mix called pulp. The fibers of cellulose within a trees wood are used to make the pulp, and the pulp is then combined with water, dried and formed to make paper products (All About Paper). The consumption of paper is increasing faster than any other forest product. The equivalent of one billion forest trees are wasted yearly due to people throwing away paper instead of recycling it (Newman 103).
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So far, it has been discussed as to why tropical forests are being destroyed. Various socio-economic factors provide incentives for the lands inhabitants to live off of the tropical forests. These factors include agriculture, logging, cattle ranching, illegal drug production, and the production of paper products. So, what exactly is lost when these activities take place? This question will be looked at in the following sections. 3. What is Lost with Forest Degradation? 3.1 The Natural Dimension-Environment and Species
H.G. Wells once said, Human history more and more becomes a race between education and catastrophe (Newman 110). This statement holds some truth once thought about. The human race continues to make advances in science and technology, making it easier to live and accomplish goals, while at the same time learning about the natural world. In contrast, there is a vast amount of information the human race does not know about the Earth-this information includes knowledge of the myriad plant and animal species or just an understanding of world cultures in general. There tends to be an under appreciation for where humans call home. There is evidence of this beyond destruction of the rainforests; take a walk down any number of streets in a given city, and it is most likely littered with trash and recyclables. It is everyones duty to take care of the earth, including trying to preserve the rainforests. So what is lost when the rainforests disappear? For starters, the natural water cycle is affected. When this happens, it can alter natural habitats, affecting the plants and animals which occupy them. The water cycle begins with water evaporating from the oceans, rivers, and seas. This water vapor gets pulled into the atmosphere via air currents. Clouds eventually form, and rainfall may then proceed to the ground, providing life a chance to thrive. Along with evaporation from water, plants (mostly trees) have a direct impact on this cycle because of
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transpiration. Transpiration is the direct transfer of water into the atmosphere via plant tissues and/or animal skins (Transpiration). A single acre of forest releases close to two hundred gallons of water into the atmosphere daily. This is more than the seas contribute through evaporation on a daily basis. The water cycle can be directly affected by deforestation. Extinction of animal and plant species can also be directly attributed to deforestation. The tropical forests hold a great amount of biological diversity when it comes to both plant and animal species. Many of these species have been growing and adapting for millions of years. Yet, many of them are in danger of extinction, and the United Nations Environmental Program estimates that by 2020, 10% of total animal species in the world will disappear due to deforestation (Newman 115). Because the tropical forests are so vast in terms of the species they support, they should be protected in order to keep habitats from collapsing. While it is clear that plants and animals are dependent on the tropical forests for a habitat to live, humans also have reasons to keep the tropical forests thriving. 3.2 The Human Dimension-Medicine and Disease
Modern medicine has its roots within the rainforests. This is true because up to 50 percent of the medicinal products used today are derived from plants. Of these 50 percent, about 25 percent of them come from tropical forests. It has also been shown that the simplest types of bacterium can synthesize and form more compounds in its life than the worlds chemists put together. This is a pretty impressive fact when thought about; bacteria are amongst the simplest organisms on earth, yet they have relied on biology to survive for millions of years (Newman 117). A major plant-derived compound that is used for medicinal purposes is what is known as an alkaloid. An alkaloid is defined as, any of a class of naturally occurring organic nitrogen127 | P a g e
containing bases (Alkaloid). It has been shown that alkaloids have important physiological effects on humans. So far, the uses of alkaloids have been for cardiac and respiratory stimulants, blood pressure boosters, muscle relaxants, and painkillers. A common drug derived from alkaloids is morphine, used as a painkiller after a major medical procedure. Another alkaloid, taken from the tropical cinchona tree (commonly found in eastern Andean forests), is quinine. This compound was crucial in fighting the spread of malaria in developing nations. In fact, it has been the most effective compound in fighting the spread of any infectious disease in human history (Quinine). While many of the discovered compounds from rainforests are still being examined and tested, they still hold much promise for helping sure infectious diseases among humans. The following table shows a few drugs along with their uses today.
Drug Quinine Origin cinchona tree (S. America) Calabar bean (Africa?) coca plant (South America) curare liana (America) Use Malaria treatment
Neostigmine
Used to treat glaucoma and provides a blueprint for synthetic insecticides Local anesthetic; cocaine served as a blue print for less toxic, less addictive anesthetics Muscle relaxant for surgery; to treat muscle disorders like Parkinson's disease and multiple sclerosis. Cannot be synthesized in the lab. Pediatric leukemia, Hogkin's disease
Novacaine, cocaine Turbocuarine
vincristine, vinblastine
rosy periwinkle (Madagascar)
Table 1.1 Various modern drugs, used to help cure infectious diseases. Source: mongabay.com
It can be seen that the tropical forests provide many organic compounds which can be used to produce drugs useful in fighting the spread of infectious diseases. With deforestation, these compounds are at risk of being lost. Along with organic compounds being lost, deforestation can also lead to the spread of infectious diseases.
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As aforementioned, quinine has been used to curb the spread of malaria. This evasive disease is spread due to insects and mosquitoes found in abundance in tropical forests. The insects are parasites which can pass on the disease to humans via a bite to the skin. When left undisturbed, these insects prefer to dwell high within tropical forests canopies. However, with deforestation, these insects are brought into contact with the people felling the trees. When the trees are disrupted, the insects tend to fly out of the trees. As a result, the loggers can get bit, contracting malaria. The more the loggers work and fell trees, the greater the chance they have of contracting malaria. Another problem resides in depressions and ruts left in the earth because of the large tire tracks from machinery. Bulldozers and other large earth-moving equipment are used by the loggers when felling trees. When ruts and depressions are left in the worksites, this allows for rain water to build up within them. Stagnant pools of moisture become prime breeding grounds for mosquitoes, further adding to the spread of malaria (Newman 140). In a sense, the spread of malaria is a two front battle for the workers, as they are coming into contact with the insects high up in the canopy of trees, as well as on the ground due to surface water. It is evident that the destruction of the rainforests has an effect on both human as well as plant and animal life. The consequences are far reaching and include destruction of natural habitats, loss of medicinal plants, and the spread of disease. What does the future hold for the rainforests? Ultimately, this is what needs to be discussed and considered, as a natural life-giver of Earth is at stake. 4 What Does the Future Hold for the Rainforests? 4.1 Reasons for Hope
While tropical deforestation may not come to an end any time soon due to socioeconomic forces, there is still reason to believe that the forests can be preserved in a sustainable
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manner. Today, organizations have been formed to help protect the rainforests. Some of these include: The Tropical Rainforest Coalition (rainforest.org), the Rainforest Action Network (ran.org), and the Rainforest Alliance (rainforest-alliance.org). All of these organizations work to educate the public on the rainforests and what is happening to them today. Donations can be made in order to buy acreage of rainforest which will be set aside and protected from deforestation. It is not unrealistic to assume that these rules are not strictly followed by the forests workers. It is my hope that at least a few foreign governments are enforcing the boundaries as to which lands are protected and those that are not. In my opinion, the rainforest situation is not improving per se, but I do think that there is an overall growing public awareness of issues such as conservation and climate change, and within these issues the rainforests will tend to become a major topic for discussion. A major organization which has helped to develop sustainable agriculture practice within tropical forest regions is the Sustainable Agriculture Network. This organization has worked with countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, and Peru. The projects objectives include bringing together the major players in agriculture production in tropical rainforest regions. The idea is to get everyone on the same page in terms of creating sustainable programs of agriculture. This is done through creating standards regarding what and where crops can be planted, encouraging certification systems and protocols for farmers, and by creating monetary incentives via government programs for farmers who practice sustainable farming (Sustainable Agriculture Program). The aforementioned programs all have good intentions for the rainforests. However, it will take a worldwide effort in order to preserve the rainforests. It takes action, not only from
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those people living within the rainforests, but by people who live in other regions as well. The future of the rainforests is in everyones hands. 4.2 Closing Remarks
The world is an amazing and mind-boggling place. The natural world provides such splendor and beauty that at times it is hard to take in all at once. The rainforests provide some of this astounding beauty. It has been talked about in the previous sections as to what and where the rainforests are, what is happening to them, and the consequences of these actions. The rainforests provide the earth with the ever vital element of oxygen, as well as sequestering the atmosphere impairing element of carbon. They are also a large supplier of food and medicine for the human race. For these reasons, the rainforests should be cherished and thought about in the coming years. In taking some words of wisdom from famous astronomer Carl Sagan, it is put into perspective as to where humans call home. Like it or not, the earth is where we make our standIt is our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home weve ever known (Pale Blue Dot). This simple yet hopeful message is one that needs to be taken to heart, as the future of the planet rests on it.
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References Alkaloid. Encyclopedia Britannica. 2009. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 7 Oct. 2009. Web. Carl Sagan-Pale Blue Dot. YTMND, n.d. Web. 11 Oct. 2009. Eco Index: Project Profile-Sustainable Agriculture Program. Rainforest Alliance. 2001-2009. Web. 9 Oct. 2009. Global Warming. Encyclopedia of Global Warming and Climate Change. 2008. SAGE Publications. 2 Oct. 2009. Web. Mongabay. Medicines Derived From Rainforest Plants. Web. 11 Oct 2009. Mongabay. Tropical Rainforests of the World. Web. 2 Oct 2009. Newman, Arnold. Tropical Rainforest: Our Most Valuable and Endangered Habitat with a Blueprint for Its Survival Into the Third Millennium. New York: Checkmark Books, 2002. Print. Paper University-All About Paper. Tappi, n.d. Web. 2 Oct. 2009. Quinine. Encyclopedia Britannica. 2009. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 7 Oct. 2009. Web. Rainforest. Encyclopedia Britannica.2009. Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 2 Oct. 2009. Web. Science Clarified. Slash and Burn Agriculture. Web. 5 Oct 2009. Van den Top, Gerhard. The Social Dynamics of Deforestation in the Philippines: Actions, Options, and Motivations. Copenhagen S. Denmark: NIAS Press, 2003. Print.
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Chapter Six: Proposals

We are all ambassadors for a cause. Whether your cause is supporting funding for koala bear preservation or research for cancer, knowing how to write documents that further your cause is an awesome skill to have. A written document that furthers your beloved cause is known as a proposal. Technically speaking, you are trying to persuade someone to believe in making an investment for change, either in business or otherwise. In this chapter, well examine what a proposal is, what to know prior to composing one, and the various sections of a proposal and the function each serves. Sound good? Lets get to work!
6.1: What Is a Proposal?

A proposal is a document that is written with the purpose of acquiring resources from a third party in order to procure goods and services OR to advance research in a given field. They are used in the business world, academia, politics, non-profit organizations, you name it. In proposals, we use persuasive language to convince a third party that our endeavors are worthwhile. The long-term benefits must outweigh the shortterm costs and the audience you are entertaining has to be convinced of this. Lets begin with what we need to do prior to writing a proposal.
6.2: Pre-Proposal Checklist

Writing a proposal parallels writing an academic paper in many ways. You must:

Identify and understand your audience Use appropriate language Analyze your proposals purpose
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Research the topic Clearly present deliverables
Lets inspect each of these points on the checklist. Just some slight background info of my knowledge: in college I wrote a proposal that granted every student resident one aluminum water bottle in order to cut down on plastic waste. What can I say; Im a bit of a tree hugger! Anyway, this will be an example topic for us to work with in the proceeding sections. To the checklist! 1. Identify and understand your audience Establishing a connection with your audience is crucial when composing a proposal. Some questions to ask about your audience: What type of issues do they care about? What values do they hold closest? What is their age range? What knowledge do they possess about the subject matter in my proposal? Will my proposal fill a need that is mutual for myself and the audience? These are all great starting questions to consider before anything gets written in your proposal. In fact, you need to answer all of these questions if you expect to be successful in your proposal. For my water bottle proposal, I knew I would be addressing what was known on campus as the Sustainability Commission. These folks already knew about sustainable issues such as plastic waste. They (for the most part) cared about preserving the environment and going green. The previous year, they had given every student a water bottle to (re)use. I considered all of these factors prior to composing my proposal and wrote accordingly. 2. Use appropriate language Just as in our academic writing, the language used in proposals needs to be appropriate for the audience you are addressing. This should go without saying but avoid any slang, cursing, or humorous language. Otherwise, you will come off as an unprofessional asshat! And we wouldnt want that right!? Dont call anyone an asshat, by the way.
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3. Analyze your proposals purpose Clarity in any writing, ESPECIALLY PROPOSALS is paramount. You need to understand what your proposal is well, proposing. The first question to ponder: is your proposal asking for resources (typically money) to acquire goods and services or is it asking for funding to advance research in a particular field? Those are the two possibilities a proposal is seeking. After you have answered that question, you need to be able to state what the long term benefits will be if you receive said resources. The audience must be very clear on what your proposal will bring to the table and how it will be beneficial to the audiences organization/business/party. For my proposal, I knew that funding was readily available and could be used for various green projects on campus. My purpose was very clear: use a small fraction of this funding in order to provide each student-resident with an aluminum water bottle. The benefits were: reduced plastic waste and growing student awareness of sustainability-related issues. 4. Research the topic Again, just like in writing papers/essays, you need to conduct sufficient research on the topic you are proposing. Being over-prepared is ALWAYS better than being under-prepared or worse, not prepared at all! You need to be able to answer any question your audience may have about your proposal. Details matter a great deal here because when you have answers to any possible question, it builds trust with your audience. They will know that you didnt simply throw together some words and hope they would hand over several thousand dollars worth of funds. In other words, it shows you care about your topic and have worked to ensure that every detail is taken care of. The amount of research required will be a function of how much you already know about the topic, how complicated your topic is: ie. artificial organ research or a grant for water bottles, and how much your audience already knows about the topic.
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My topic did require a small amount of research. For example, I needed to know about different options in terms of water bottles. Would they be made of plastic, aluminum, bamboo? Does the harmful compound BPA have an effect on what type of water bottle to choose? What about pricing for the various types of each? All of these questions I had answers for. 5. Clearly present deliverables From your research, you need to explain what the deliverables of your proposal will be. For example, does your proposal have measurable metrics or outcomes? If passed, will what youre proposing save the company X amount of dollars? Will Y amount of lives be saved if your measure is implemented? What steps need to be taken in order for this measure to be accomplished? By who? Is your proposal an ongoing project? How will it be carried out in the future? You need to have an idea of how to answer these types of questions before writing your proposal. The deliverables make up the heart of your proposal and are what both you and the party you are presenting to are here for. Your deliverables need to be enticing and a good idea (duh!). My deliverables were pretty straightforward: buy X amount of aluminum water bottles at Y price for Z number of students. While it couldnt really be measured how much plastic waste would be avoided on campus, I still knew that my audience (the Sustainability Commission) would like the idea because of the good publicity it would bring the campus and more students as a result. That wraps it up for our pre-proposal work. Keep in mind that when completing this checklist, all of these steps are taken to demonstrate your professionalism and competence. People can recognize when something is bullshit or not. Now that we have an understanding of our pre-proposal work, we will look at the nuts and bolts of writing a proposal.
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6.4: The Components of a Proposal

Proposals are made up of several sections, each serving a specific purpose. Lets scrutinize each. Header Be sure to include a header similar to the one below! And just like writing a cover letter, do everything in your power to find out who you are writing to. Specific names are always better than To Whom It May Concern. The header has a simple purpose: to state who the proposal is from and whom it is addressed to, the date written, and to describe the subject matter. Date: To: From: Subject: May 6, 2010 Joe Smith John Krygiel Water Bottle Proposal
Thats about as straightforward as it gets. Next: the purpose. Purpose Heres where we determine if we are seeking funds for a good or service or for research. Because we already did this in the preliminary proposal work, now we simply plug it in using language that is to the point. In some regards, your purpose can be read and right away your audience can determine if you need to go back to the drawing board or not. But you probably wont have to because youve already researched your topic and know who your audience is, right!? Again, my example: Purpose The purpose of this proposal is to request the use of a portion of the SustainaFund in order to implement a program which would give each on-campus resident of Missouri State University one aluminum water bottle.
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After you have clearly described your purpose, a summary section is required. Summary The summary section is concise and hits on all the main points of your proposal. It serves as an outline of sorts in order to convey the general idea of what you are trying to convince your readers of. You can include thought-provoking points or some slight background information as I did: Summary For the past academic year (2008-2009) at Missouri State University, the Public Affairs mission was sustainability. One of the aspects of this mission was to provide each on-campus resident with a plastic closed cup to be used in the dining halls. The idea behind this was the closed cups would be reused by the residents and taken out of the dining halls. This reduced the amount of regular cups used in the dining halls, in turn lessening the amount of water needed to clean these cups. In order to continue the mission of sustainability, a similar program should be continued in the residence halls. Having reusable closed cups in the residence halls was a simple way to draw peoples attention to the subject of sustainability, and this proposed program would continue this mission. Because the very premise of sustainability is the fact that actions and ideas are carried out for the future, the proposed program would be ongoing in the residence halls. Having a reusable cup program was a great idea to promote sustainability; however a similar program needs to continue for years to come. The proposed program would allow each oncampus resident an aluminum water bottle to be used in and outside the dining halls. The program would take effect immediately during the next academic year (2010-2011). The water bottles would be provided for each oncampus resident, specifically those living in Freudenberger, Wells, Woods, Blair-Shannon, Scholars, Sunvilla, Kentwood, Hammons, and Hutchens Houses. For these halls, potentially 3,961 water bottles would be needed.
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Remember: keep this section short! 250-500 words is all that is called for. After you summarize, its time to provide an introduction. Introduction The purpose of your introduction is to give your readers a glimpse of what your proposal is about: its scope, mission, and context. Youll want to use persuasive language here if possible. In essence, you want to coax some emotion out of your readers and get them thinking, Ya! This would be a really incredible idea! Be careful not to be over-the-top with your language, but do try to emphasize your points. Heres how I did it: Introduction It is my belief that if the proposed program were to be passed, it would be an easy way to get students on campus thinking about sustainable actions. Ideally, the program would give the water bottles to residents the day they moved into the residence halls. The water bottles would be given to the residents by their resident assistant along with their room keys, information packets, etc. The resident assistants of each hall would encourage residents to use the water bottles while taking a jog, riding a bike, or working out, as well as in the dining halls. By encouraging the use of the water bottles, a healthy lifestyle as well as a healthy environment would be brought to the attention of on campus residents. The program would be recognized by Dine123, the on campus dining service, just as the reusable plastic cups were a year ago. By allowing students to fill up their bottles with a beverage in the dining halls, this would cut down on the number of cups that would have to be cleaned by the Dine123 staff. With the use of the previous plastic cup program, it may have been difficult to get students to actually use the cups in the dining halls. To encourage the use of the aluminum water bottles in the dining halls, a prize drawing would accompany the program. By using their water bottles, students could potentially win a prize, giving them incentive to use the water bottles. The funding for the prizes would be from Dine123,
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while the specifics of the prize drawings would also have to be decided on by the Dine123 staff. As you can see, I brought up the fact that if passed, this initiative would allow for improved health of students as well as improved health of the environment in reduced plastic waste. Since the students are the lifeblood of any university, this was a pretty persuasive route to take. I also proposed including a prize drawing with the program in which the students could enter their name to win if using their water bottle in the dining hall on a given day. By adding incentives to your proposal, you add feasibility that your program will actually work given the people you are affecting. In my case, the proposal was affecting on-campus students, so I played up that point to the commission I was presenting the proposal to. Here are some examples of ideas and language to give your introduction some persuasive juice: Is the program to be implemented easy to use? Does it have a seamless integration with current operations? Is it relatively cheap to accomplish? Can it bring the organization good publicity? Has it ever been attempted? Your organization could be a trendsetter.
After you have framed your introduction, its time to present your deliverables. The Deliverables I really wanted to name this section The Goods because thats what they are! Here is where we tackle all the metrics of your project: how much it will cost, how it will be implemented, how it will improve X amount of lives. As we see, I have this section broken down into budget and proposed task sub-sections: Budget To pay for the program, funds would be appropriated from the SustainaFund that was put in place the previous year. The program would be ongoing, so the funds would have to be used each academic
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year. The water bottles would be purchased prior to each academic year, in order to have them ready to give to residents during the fall semesters. The water bottles would be purchased from discountmugs.com or a comparable company which offers large quantities of aluminum water bottles at a discount rate. A quantity of 4,000 water bottles would be ordered. The left over quantity of water bottles would be saved for transfer student residents and the Dine123 staff. The specific order type would be for 20 oz. aluminum water bottles. Based on graphic and color options, this would cost approximately $8,700. For the proposed program, the silver aluminum color would be used, with a green bear paw graphic and slogan imprinted on one side of the water bottles. A personal suggestion for the bottles would be: Bears Think Green.
Cost and Product Summary Product ID# Qty. Product Color Imprint Color Position Production Price (4,000 @ $2.16 each) 1 Screen Charges Shipping AB101 4000 Silver (1) Green 350 Front Side Only Normal Production $8,640.00 $49.00 Free at time proposal written
__________________________________________ Total Cost $8,689.00
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Water Bottle Design and Slogan
Bears Think Green
Proposed Tasks Upon approval, the following tasks would be taken to implement the program. 1. Inform the Dine123 dining staff and resident assistants of the program. The resident assistants of each hall would be informed of the program while in training to become a resident assistant. They would be told to give the water bottles to each resident upon arrival at their respective residence hall. I would be personally willing to help sort and count the number of water bottles needed for each resident hall. Because being a resident assistant can be a busy job, I would be willing to give assistance in sorting the water bottles in order to have them ready to hand out. The Dine123 dining staff would simply be informed of what the program is prior to the start of the next academic year. 2. Allow Dine123 dining staff to decide on prize drawings.
The specifics of the prize drawings would need to be decided upon. Perhaps a numbering system for the water bottles would have to be
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employed, in order to specify who the winners would be. The frequency of the prize drawings would also have to be determined; this could be weekly, monthly, etc. Lastly, the prizes to give away would also have to be chosen. 3. Place order for the water bottles.
The order would be placed on discountmugs.com, using the aforementioned specifics and order ID number. The Missouri State University green fee fund would be used to pay for the order. 4. Present the water bottles to the residents of each residence hall.
The water bottles would be bestowed to each on-campus resident upon arrival in the fall at their respective residence hall. This section presents a very clear set of deliverables. Do the same with your proposal and youll be having projects being completed on the regs! To close out your proposal, include references or contact information with the appropriate sponsors: Sponsors and Contacts Tony T Director of Operations, Dine123 MO Awesome University 9000 Smith Ave. Springfield, MO 65987 John Krygiel Proposal Project Manager MO Awesome University 9000 Smith Ave. Springfield, MO 65987 Tel: 417.222.2222 Cell: 417.222.2222 Email: TonyT@university.edu
Cell: 636.555.5555 Email:krygiel@university.edu
Does it feel weird not closing with some sort of closing paragraph? Do not fret; proposals are unique in that they dont need this section. Its more of a down-to-business document that is meant to inform, remember? Just for reference, next we have my proposal in its entirety.
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6.5: Proposal Example

Date: To: From: Subject:
Purpose
May 6, 2010 Joe Smith John Krygiel Water Bottle Proposal
The purpose of this proposal is to request the use of a portion of the SustainaFund in order to implement a program which would give each oncampus resident of Missouri State University one aluminum water bottle. Summary For the past academic year (2008-2009) at Missouri State University, the Public Affairs mission was sustainability. One of the aspects of this mission was to provide each on-campus resident with a plastic closed cup to be used in the dining halls. The idea behind this was the closed cups would be reused by the residents and taken out of the dining halls. This reduced the amount of regular cups used in the dining halls, in turn lessening the amount of water needed to clean these cups. In order to continue the mission of sustainability, a similar program should be continued in the residence halls. Having reusable closed cups in the residence halls was a simple way to draw peoples attention to the subject of sustainability, and this proposed program would continue this mission. Because the very premise of sustainability is the fact that actions and ideas are carried out for the future, the proposed program would be ongoing in the residence halls. Having a reusable cup program was a great idea to promote sustainability; however a similar program needs to continue for years to come. The proposed program would allow each on-campus resident an aluminum water bottle to be used in and outside the dining halls. The program would take effect immediately during the next academic year (2010-2011). The water bottles would be provided for each on-campus resident, specifically those living in Freudenberger, Wells, Woods, Blair-Shannon, Scholars, Sunvilla, Kentwood, Hammons, and Hutchens Houses. For these halls, potentially 3,961 water bottles would be needed. Introduction
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It is my belief that if the proposed program were to be passed, it would be an easy way to get students on campus thinking about sustainable actions. Ideally, the program would give the water bottles to residents the day they moved into the residence halls. The water bottles would be given to the residents by their resident assistant along with their room keys, information packets, etc. The resident assistants of each hall would encourage residents to use the water bottles while taking a jog, riding a bike, or working out, as well as in the dining halls. By encouraging the use of the water bottles, a healthy lifestyle as well as a healthy environment would be brought to the attention of on campus residents. The program would be recognized by Dine123, the on campus dining service, just as the reusable plastic cups were a year ago. By allowing students to fill up their bottles with a beverage in the dining halls, this would cut down on the number of cups that would have to be cleaned by the Dine123 staff. With the use of the previous plastic cup program, it may have been difficult to get students to actually use the cups in the dining halls. To encourage the use of the aluminum water bottles in the dining halls, a prize drawing would accompany the program. By using their water bottles, students could potentially win a prize, giving them incentive to use the water bottles. The funding for the prizes would be from Dine123, while the specifics of the prize drawings would also have to be decided on by the Dine123 staff. Budget To pay for the program, funds would be appropriated from the SustainaFund which was put in place the previous year. The program would be ongoing, so the funds would have to be used each academic year. The water bottles would be purchased prior to each academic year, in order to have them ready to give to residents during the fall semesters. The water bottles would be purchased from discountmugs.com or a comparable company which offers large quantities of aluminum water bottles at a discount rate. A quantity of 4,000 water bottles would be ordered. The left over quantity of water bottles would be saved for transfer student residents and the Dine123 staff. The specific order type would be for 20 oz. aluminum water bottles. Based on graphic and color options, this would cost approximately $8,700. For the proposed program, the silver aluminum color would be used, with a green bear paw graphic and slogan imprinted on one side of the water bottles. A personal suggestion for the bottles would be: Bears Think Green.
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Cost and Product Summary Product ID# Qty. Product Color Imprint Color Position Production AB101 4000 Silver (1) Green 350 Front Side Only Normal Production
Price (4,000 @ $2.16 each) $8,640.00 1 Screen Charges $49.00 Shipping Free at time proposal written __________________________________________ Total Cost $8,689.00
Water Bottle Design and Slogan
Bears Think Green

Proposed Tasks
Upon approval, the following tasks would be taken to implement the program. 1. Inform the Dine123 dining staff and resident assistants of the program. The resident assistants of each hall would be informed of the program while in training to become a resident assistant. They would be told to give the water bottles to each resident upon arrival at their respective
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residence hall. I would be personally willing to help sort and count the number of water bottles needed for each resident hall. Because being a resident assistant can be a busy job, I would be willing to give assistance in sorting the water bottles in order to have them ready to hand out. The Dine123 dining staff would simply be informed of what the program is prior to the start of the next academic year. 2. Allow Dine123 dining staff to decide on prize drawings. The specifics of the prize drawings would need to be decided upon. Perhaps a numbering system for the water bottles would have to be employed, in order to specify who the winners would be. The frequency of the prize drawings would also have to be determined; this could be weekly, monthly, etc. Lastly, the prizes to give away would also have to be chosen. 3. Place order for the water bottles. The order would be placed on discountmugs.com, using the aforementioned specifics and order ID number. The Missouri State University green fee fund would be used to pay for the order. 4. Present the water bottles to the residents of each residence hall. The water bottles would be bestowed to each on-campus resident upon arrival in the fall at their respective residence hall. Sponsors and Contacts Tony T Director of Operations, Dine123 MO Awesome University 9000 Smith Ave. Springfield, MO 65987 John Krygiel Proposal Project Manager MO Awesome University 9000 Smith Ave. Springfield, MO 65987 Tel: 417.222.2222 Cell: 417.222.2222 Email: TonyT@university.edu
Cell: 636.555.5555 Email: krygiel08@university.edu
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6.6: The Final Word

We all have the capacity to create profound change. Take your good ideas and turn them into actions. Fight for your cause. Write proposals to make it happen. Whether its something as simple as a proposal for water bottles or an initiative to end the use of baby minks to craft ridiculous fur coats, it all makes a difference! Dont let the gatekeepers and rule-makers dictate what is possible or not. With a well-crafted document such as a proposal, you never know, it could open their eyes to new concepts and make them think, Ah ha! Look at what this young professional has brought to our attention! Of course he/she is brilliant anyway, why would we expect anything less? Inspirational talk aside, I want you to believe in your ideas and be able to articulate them on paper. Because if you dont, who is going to believe in them? That brings us to a close for the informational content of this eBook. Gasp! Youre going to miss my smart-ass remarks Im sure. Ive learned a ton by writing this book and I sincerely hope it has been of help to you! Lets jump to the final-final word.
Jumping to the Final-Final Word!
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Chapter Seven: The Final-Final Word

Its getting very near the end! Weve come a long way in our technical writing voyage. Feel more empowered to compose cover letters, rsums, academic papers, and proposals? Know how to better make your mark in the academic or business world? I thought so! I want to leave you with a few important closing thoughts that apply to writing and life in general.
Know Thyself
These words are inscribed on the Greek Temple of Apollo at Delphi. I dont know all the details of Greek history and wisdom, but I do know they had a few philosophers. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. These guys knew a thing or two about thinking. My point is, whether you are writing a paper on the Civil War or completing that research project at work on the metabolic rates of digestion in panda bears, its wise to know thyself and your writing habits. Be honest with yourself and be aware of how well you work in different environments. For instance, do you tend to procrastinate if given a due date that is four months away? Plan your time accordingly. Are you a night owl who likes to stay up and work in the quiet of the wee hours? Or would you prefer to work amidst lots of noise and chaos? There are no right or wrong answers to these questions, but you do need to have an awareness of what works best for you. Knowing thyself also means that we can admit
We Dont Know Everything

On an individual basis, that is. Its okay to not have the answer to every detail of your work. Thats why we invented the internet, books, periodicals, and any other form of distributed information. In todays me-centric world of Twitter feeds, Instagram, and Facebook, I think we have become a bit too focused on the individual. In writing or work in general, this can translate into having an attitude that we know it all. Being a hard-headed Polish and German descendant myself, there were plenty of times when writing this book that I had to admit
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the need to look stuff up. Funny enough, we have this vast treasury of knowledge known as the public domain. Its okay to realize that we dont know everything and its perfectly fine to ask for help. I partially did this with the rsum section of the book. Rather than pretend I knew what a well written rsum would look like in every specific industry, I called upon the help of friends to do the heavy lifting for me (big shout out, thank you all!). Collectively, humans know a shit ton. Why not tap into this resource and put aside any ego you might have? After all, there are some pretty inspiring people out there willing to share their stories and insights as to how they reached their level of amazingness.
See Inspiration, Be Inspired

If youre ever stuck in a rut with writing or just life in general, summon the will to watch or read something inspirational! As humans, the enormity of what we have accomplished is astonishing. There are literally billions of sources from which we can draw inspiration. Inspiration motivates us to work, create, and share in the overall awesomeness that is life. I stumbled upon a profound saying somewhere in my internet travels that reads, Everything was impossible until someone did it. Let that sink in for a moment. Everything was impossible until someone did it. When it comes to writing, it can be easy to fall into the trap of, I cant write this paper, its too hard! Or Im uninspired and hate the subject matter; Ill simply put it off until a few days before the due date! But, if we subscribe to this line of thinking, we are embracing the idea that writing academic papers or proposals is impossible. Whenever I begin to feel this way about any of my writing whether it is my blog or even many times throughout this eBook, I make myself watch something inspiring. It doesnt even have to be related. Simply by reading, watching, or hearing an awesome story has the power to make us realize ANY challenge can be overcome. Some good places to start? TED Talks on YouTube, the library, online blogs and articles, real-life heroes or mentors, family, and friends.
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All of these sources can be an inspiration for writing. They can spark curiosity and give you a new source from which to draw from. And if we are inspiring each other through our work, we are doing our jobs. Thank you for reading! If not already a member of my blog at praccticalcivilization.com, I invite you to become one. I cover many topics related to the upcoming generations way of doing business and living life. I hope to see you around! If you ever have any questions about writing or just want to introduce yourself, drop me a line in the contact form on the website, I would love to hear from you! Best of luck and happy writing.
About the author: John Krygiel is a Missouri native thinking and writing about how society has gotten to this point. He lives, writes, works, and plays in Springfield, MO. He leads an unconventional lifestyle that does not include the office-cubicle job that pays him to chase the preferred "mainstream life. He is a musician, minimalist, writer, camper, adventurer, tree hugger, and traveler who enjoys discussing the world with folks and having a beer while doing so.
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Sources
Chapter 1:
Typewriter image: http://vintageprintable.com/wordpress/wpcontent/uploads/2010/09/Art-Poster-Advertisement-Adler-typewriters.jpg Alphabet image: http://vintageprintable.com/wordpress/wpcontent/uploads/2012/09/Juvenile%20-%20Alphabet%20%20ABCs%20of%20Objects%20A-B.jpg
Chapter 3:
1. Plagiarism definition: http://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/plagiarism
Chapter 4:
Hand-written letter image: http://vintageprintable.com/wordpress/vintageprintable-printed-material-ephemera-typography/vintage-printable-printedmaterial-ephemera-typography-2/typography-handwriting-last-letter-of-maryqueen-of-scotts-1/ 1. JP Morgan cover letter: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/10/cover-letter-to-jp-morganlaughing-stock-of-wall-street-goes-_n_1268695.html
Chapter 6:
Boys jumping image: http://vintageprintable.com/wordpress/vintageprintable-entertainment-recreation-2/#jp-carousel-19932
Chapter 7:
Author image: Clear Creative Photography
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Acknowledgements
Where to start? So many awesome people to thank for the creation of this first full-length eBook. Ill start with my Mom and Dad. They have showed me so much love and respect and set an awesome example. I love you both! Thanks to all my friends who sent me your rsums! That section would have been a huge pain in the ass without your well-crafted, awesome rsums. Thanks to Steve, Sam, Ben, Becca, and Tom! I want to give a shout out to all of the awesome bloggers who have inspired me to write this book when I doubted it would ever become a reality. All of the guys over at Fizzle.co, Daniel at rich20something.com, David at Raptitude.com, Francine at Missminimalist.com, and John Morrow. While I know none of you personally, you have been an inspiration to me on how to write for a blog and eventually this book. Thanks to all my subscribers and readers! Its an incredible feeling to know I have a wider audience to speak to and interact with. I look forward to getting to know all of you! Last, but certainly not least, I want to thank The Big Guy Upstairs. I think weve all been given natural talents and abilities, and God put us here with a purpose. If we are constantly working to improve our natural talents, I think we are doing our job. Thanks for reading! I love you all.
John
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Further Reading and Resources

Bibliography Machine: http://www.easybib.com/ Business Insider: http://www.businessinsider.com/why-this-is-an-excellentresume-2013-11 Citation Machine: http://citationmachine.net/index2.php Financial Samurai: http://www.financialsamurai.com/examples-of-goodresumes/ Forbes: http://www.forbes.com/sites/augustturak/2013/02/18/how-to-writea-plan-or-proposal-that-rocks/ http://www.dailywritingtips.com/ http://www.englishgrammar.org/ Purdue Writing Lab: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/
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Technically Speaking: A Humorous Yet Useful Guide To Technical Writing For Young Professionals

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Technically Speaking: A Humorous Yet Useful Guide To Technical Writing For Young Professionals

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Technically Speaking

A Humorous yet Useful Guide to Technical Writing for Young Professionals

Who This Book Is For

What You Will Find in This Book

Chapter One: (Not Your Typical) Grammar School

1.1: Parts of Speech

Luckily, we no longer have to practice writing on typewriters anymore!

1.2: Singular & Plural Nouns

1.3: Possessive Nouns

1.7: Action Verbs

A is for Apple. But you knew that already!

Chapter Two: More Grammar (And its Applications)

2.1: Noun Phrases

2.2: Verb Phrases

2.3: Prepositional Phrases

2.5: Relative Clauses

2.6: Sentence Types

Take immediately. Behave so we can both return to what we were doing.

2.7: Active Voice

2.8: Passive Voice

2.10: Common Usage Errors

2.12: Misplaced Modifiers

2.13: Sentence Fragments

2.14: Spelling and Punctuation

Chapter Three: General Tips for Writing Well

Rule #1: Know Your Audience

Rule #2: Read a Lot, Repeat

Rule#3: Always, Always Have Multiple Drafts

Rule #4: Be Open to Changes

Rule #5: Use Transitional Sentences

Rule #6: Find Something Besides Clichs to Convey Ideas

Rule #7: Avoid Redundancy

Rule #8: Know the Correct Format!

Rule #9: NEVER, EVER Plagiarize Your Work! Ever.

Rule #10: Proofread and Edit!

Chapter Four: Cover Letters & Rsums

4.1: Having a Purpose

4.2: Purpose of Cover Letter

4.3: The Dos and Donts of Cover Letters

4.4: Cover Letter Examples

Well Written Specific Job Opening Letter:

Well Written General Inquiry Letter:

Susan Smith Enclosures (1)

No hand-written letters on parchment paper!

Poorly Written Specific Job Opening Letter:

Poorly Written General Inquiry Letter:

Thank you for your consideration.

4.5: Purpose of Rsum

4.6: The Dos and Donts of Rsums

4.7: Rsum Examples

Green Tech Rsum:

Power Source Solar

Theater & Arts Rsum:

Assistant Stage Manager

Stage Management Resident

Assistant Stage Manager

Assistant Stage Manager

Assistant Stage Manager

Production Stage Manager

Theater & Arts Rsum Contd.: Skills

Public Broadcasting Rsum:

Biological Sciences Rsum:

Biological Sciences Rsum Contd.:

Honors and Awards

Skills & Certifications

General Laborer Rsum: