English 360: Technical & Professional Writing
Dr. Russel Hirst
Assignment #3: Proposal Proposal for Scientific, Technical, or Business Report

This assignment calls for 4 to 6 double-spaced pages seeking approval from me, your instructor, for the kind of final report you want to turn in. You must convince me that your proposed report will offer, in some plausible scientific, technical, or business context, information that is important to a particular scientific, technical, or business enterprise.

For example, you may want to write a report on robotics. Fine. But you must conceive of your report in a real or hypothetical scientific, technical, or business context--that is, you must write the report for a particular audience that needs specific things in order to function (to solve a problem, increase profits, enhance technical processes, pursue further lines of research, etc.).

In fulfilling this function, most reports (the better ones) offer one or more of the following:

• An advance in knowledge.
• A novel synthesis of information.
• A new solution to problems or response to opportunities.
• An adaptation of technical information for a non-technical audience.
• A critique/challenge of received knowledge. Invariably, they offer a content, structure, and style well suited to the scientific, technical, or business contexts/needs that called them forth.

In your proposal, therefore, you must convince me that:
• The material of the report will be conceived in an appropriate real-world context–that is, you must describe the real or hypothetical situation that calls for the report you propose to write.
• Your report will make a real contribution of some kind–it will be more than just a pasting together of other people's facts.
• You have at least a fundamental idea about how to structure the report (a basic outline).
• You have the background, credentials, resources, and motivation necessary to write the report you are proposing.
• You have a plausible research and writing strategy for completing each phase of the report (a good graphic is appropriate here–a time line, table, chart, etc.).

I am both your audience and your evaluator for this proposal, but for all the other papers, I am your evaluator alone; your audience is up to you.