Rules for the essay

• Essay formatting Essays should be word-processed, in a 12pt font, double spaced and fully referenced.

• The Word Count You must state your actual word count at the end of your essay. Failure to do so will incur a penalty of -2 points. Word counts may vary by + or – 10% from the prescribed word limit. Word limits do not include bibliographies but do include footnotes and endnotes.

• Submissions All essays must be submitted to TurnItin via Canvas by the deadline stated. Submit your essay as a Word (.DOC, .DOCX), PDF or Open Document (.ODT) file. Please note Apple Pages .pages files are not supported by Canvas and TurnItIn. If you use Pages, export your document to a supported format before uploading.

• Late Submission of Essays There will be a penalty of 10 points per day for up to 5 days (including weekends) for any assessed work submitted after the specified submission date, unless the student’s Home School grants an extension. After 5 days a mark of 0 will be assigned. Please note a "day" is 24 hours, i.e. the clock starts ticking as soon as the submission deadline has passed. There are no discretionary periods or periods of grace. A student who submits work at 1 second past a deadline or later will therefore be subject to a penalty for late submission.

• Referencing Guidelines All essays must be properly referenced. This means indicating the source of any quotation, any data, and/or for any view or interpretation which you summarise from another source or author. Failure to attribute ideas to the source from which they have been taken constitutes plagiarism and is a serious academic offence. Failure to provide proper references and a bibliography will result in a penalty of -10 maximum. This could make a difference between a 2.1 or First grade, or, in dire circumstances, the difference between a pass and a fail. So please don’t lose points needlessly because of your lack of attention to these important details. SEE THE POLITICS PROGRAMME HANDBOOK FOR DETAILS OF REQUIREMENTS AND DEDUCTIONS for errors in presentation and scholarly apparatus. Also note that page numbers must always be given. Direct quotes should always include the page(s) from which the quotation has been taken. Even when paraphrasing/summarising a specific part of the author’s text, pages you are drawing on should also be provided. Failure to do so will result in a deduction of marks. As well as acknowledging the source of particular ideas or information contained in your essay, the purpose of referencing is to enable a reader to find the source that you have used. It is this principle that guides what is to be included when you reference. There are two alternative systems of referencing widely used in the social sciences, the ‘Harvard system’ (sometimes called the ‘author-date system’) and the ‘Chicago 9 system’ (which uses footnotes).