Peer reviewed research project

Due dates:

Document due by email November 14

[Papers posted on-line November 19 at 3 pm.]

Reviews of your peers due by email November 22 at 5 pm

[I will be away weekend of Nov 23-24, but will try to have reviews back to you by email by early in week of Nov 25^th.]

Your revised document due by email December 5 at 8 am

Step I: Writing and designing the report (due Nov 14)

The purpose of this report is three-fold:

1. It will give you a chance to research something of personal interest, maybe something related to your field.

2. It introduces you to peer review, the system by which scientific papers are revised (or rejected).

3. It introduces you ever so slightly to “web publishing,” if you haven’t done that before.

Directions

1. Choose a topic on anything to do with the history of life. If could be not just science, but history, art, education, or any other field. It could be straight science – what really killed the dinosaurs? Or it could be: How have dinosaurs affected the history of moviemaking? What is the influence of paleontology on child development? How many misconceptions in dinosaur science are spread through advertisements? I ask only that you do not choose exactly the same topic you chose for the media projects.

2. Write a short report in which the text is 500-1000 words(about 1-2 single spaced pages) long. The audience for your project will be the lay public, more specifically your class peers (and me). Write at the level of the educated layperson, but you should assume the viewer knows little about the History ofLife (though of course your class peers know lots by now!).

3. Sending it to me at rmr16@cornell.edu:

Option 1: Send it to me as a text file, just as you have been sending your public policy opinions. Please do not use graphics.

Option 2: If you know how to make websites, have a place to post your paper, and don't mind being less anonymous, you might post it to the site. In this case, feel free to use graphics and formatting. Simply send me the URL (that is, the website address).

In either case, use the following subject line to correspond with me:

Subject: THOL02 research project lastname, first name

Step 2: Reviewing your peers (you have between Nov 19 and Nov 22 to accomplish this)

4. You will find your own project number on the list of research projects.

List of peer-reviewed projects.

You can find your paper in the list of papers from your class, by looking through the titles. I removed the names of authors from the papers, so the process would be anonymous.  If after searching through the papers you can’t find a paper that you sent, please let me know.

5. In the list, the projects will be numbered, and you will be responsible for judging (anonymously) as best you can the 3 projects with the numbers I have assigned you.  Here is the plan for assignment: review the 3 projects directly after your own project in the list (if you name is at the bottom of the list, simply begin again at the top) on the day you look at the list.

6. Anonymously review the papers on 3 characteristics and write a short review for each paper.  In addition to a verbal description, please give a numerical rating from 1=poor, 2=needs fair amount of improvement, 3=reasonable, 4=very good, 5=excellent.

Please do not consider graphics and formatting in your ratings [if you go to a website], but feel free to comment verbally if you felt something about these characteristics were very positive.

Keep in mind that you are writing to the authors and also to me (the editor).

It is imperative that you give these reviews as neutrally as possibly, or the system doesn’t work; this very same issue is obviously critical in real life.

Now please go to a form that you can “cut and paste” into an email and use for your answers:

7. Send your responses to me at rmr16@cornell.edu, using a separate email for each paper. The subject line should read:

Subject: THOL02 Review of project # Lastname, Firstname,

in which # is the number of the paper. The deadline is Nov 22.

8. I will check the responses, and make sure they seem reasonable. Reviews will be returned to the authors, unless I find them unreasonable (they may be too critical, unjustifyably good, or just lacking any insight). I will be the “editor;” I will help get reviews, but will not do the reviews myself.

In a real life situation, reviewers and the editor must decide if a paper is worth publishing, but I don’t think we need that kind of system now.

Step 3: Edit your paper; I will disseminate reviews after I receive them; probably you will have them shortly after Nov 24, by email, after which you will have until Dec 5 to send a revised version.

9. Authors then have time to respond the suggestions of reviewers. Authors may disagree with reviewers and not make certain requested changes, but if so must respond to the editor with an explanation for not following the indications of reviewers.

I will look at the edits you made.

10.Follow step 3 for sending me the revised version.

In the subject line write

Subject: THOL02 Research project # revision lastname, firstname

The # should be the number assigned to your project.

Authors should describe their major changes in the body of their emails.  The deadline is Tuesday December 5.

Your grade will be based on 50% the quality of your initial report, 25% on the quality of your reviews, and 25% on the quality of your revisions.