Essay Question ECO506/506A

Students must write a 3000-5000 word document (including references) to meet the
requirements for this course using the heuristic discussed in the class. You are required to
analyze any important socio-economic issue using these four questions. Please do not use the
examples already discussed in the book and the lecture. This is an individual assignment and
no group work will be recognized.
The suggested outline of an essay is as follows:
Title page.
1-2 page introduction of the socio-economic issue analysed, which can include tables and
figures. This introduction should include a clear statement of the question you are going to
analyse.
1-2 page background information, which can include historical analogies to the question
studied, further literature and information.
Step one of the heuristic. One page at least.
Step two of the heuristic. One page at least.
Step three of the heuristic. One page at least.
Step four of the heuristic. One page at least.
Synthesis of the four steps. One page at least.
Conclusion. One page at least.
References.
Part of the assignment is to choose a topic that lends itself to being analysed in 3000 to 5000
words. The `best' topics are usually recent events in politics and economics from a country you
are well acquainted with. Re-analysing a topic the student knows very well already using the
heuristic is much more likely to lead to a good essay than to take a topic completely new.
Possible topics could be something like this (but are not limited to): The analysis of abuse or
violence, a discussion on discrimination, legalization of drugs, the act of terrorism, IndiaPakistan conflict, the socio-economic analysis of corruption, shooting spree in schools,
idolizing stars in most countries, etc. Plagiarism will be severely penalised. Make sure you
avoid plagiarism in all possible forms, otherwise if you are caught you will get zero. Your
assignment will be passed through the Turnitin software to detect plagiarism.

Particulars of the Essay

This assessment is worth 20% of the overall grade for the entire ECO 506/506A course and
will be due by 4 pm on 31st March, 2016. You are also required to provide a brief list of the
references (follow Chicago author-date referencing) used in the essay.
Students will be rated on the following criteria:
Identifying an original topic (5 marks).
Clarity of arguments (5 marks).
Presentation (grammar, use of words, spelling, etc) (5 marks).
Difficulty of topic (5 marks).
Students will be penalised for an extremely small essay (less than 3000 words).
Recommended document formatting includes:
Line spacing of 1.5
Time New Roman 12 pt font.
All pages must be numbered
All four margins 20mm
Should have a proper title and a separate title page.
Submission:
Assignments must be emailed to the Course Coordinator at the following email address:
eco506a@gmail.com by the due date and time. Please do not send it to the official email
address.
Assignments will also need to be submitted in hard copy form at the HSS office. There will
be a box for you to drop your assignments on the 31st March, 2016 till 4 pm.
Requests for extension will be decided individually only after the student has submitted an
application to the course coordinator citing genuine reasons for an extension. In case of medical
issues, a doctors prescription must be attached along with the application. The next deadline
in case the request is approved will be within the next two weeks.