As the Guidlines for the Inquiry Project make clear, you have a variety of options and a great deal of flexibility in selecting a topic and format for your Inquiry Project. However, one option that you may wish to consider has a somewhat more specific focus and format. That option is to create the newsletter for the Writing Sequence.

Last year, students in the Writing Sequence worked on a voluntary basis outside their Writing Sequence courses to write, edit, design, and publish the newsletter for the Sequence, which they called Writing Community Newsletter. (Copies are available from me or in the Writing Center.) This year, we are hoping that English 303Z will be the "site" for publishing the newsletter. Thus, you have the option for your Inquiry Project of becoming part of the "staff" of the newsletter. What follows are some guidelines for this option.

In some important ways, this option is no different from any other kind of Inquiry Project you might choose to do. As the guidelines for the Inquiry Project indicate, your project is the result of sustained inquiry into an issue or problem in education; it must involve research and a significant amount of writing; and it is worth 25% of your grade for this course. However, this option differs from other kinds of Inquiry Projects in these significant ways:

• This is a collaborative project that requires you to work closely with several other class members to produce a newsletter.

• This project is inherently public in a way that other projects may not be. All the Inquiry Projects are intended to be read by members of this class and will be published on our web site, making them available to anyone who would like to read them. But this project is intended from the outset to be distributed as a conventionally published newsletter to the SUNY-Albany community.

• This project will require you to consider design and publishing issues that other projects may not. For this project, you will not only have to research, write, and edit articles, but you will also have to design the newsletter and consider issues involving layout, graphics, and so on. It's important to note that desktop publishing and related computer technology will be available in the Writing Center to any students who choose this option.

In effect, this option enables you to fulfill the requirements for this assignment at the same time that you can gain significant experience in writing and publishing for a wider audience.

Although you will have a great deal of flexibility regarding the specific topics that you will write about for the newsletter and the design of the document, you will need to keep in mind the following guidelines in order to fulfill the requirements for this assignment:

1. Your contribution to the newsletter must represent a significant amount of original writing. The guidelines for the Inquiry Project indicate that this project should be the equivalent of 2000 words. (See Guidelines for the Inquiry Project.) That requirement applies to this option as well. As part of that requirement, you must write at least one of the articles that are eventually published in the newsletter.

2. The writing you do for the newsletter must, like all the Inquiry Projects, represent careful, thoughtful inquiry into an issue or problem, in this case focused on writing and/or the Writing Sequence at SUNY-Albany. This inquiry miust involve research, as described in the Guidelines for the Inquiry Project.

3. You must submit a proposal for this project indicating your intention to pursue this option and describing some ideas you have for the newsletter. (See Proposal Guidelines.)

4. You must still schedule a conference with me to discuss a draft of your work for this project.

5. As part of this project, you must also write a critique/self-assessment of your work on the newsletter, which will be submitted by the due date for the project. This critique/self-assessment should be approximately 500 words in length and can be submitted via email.

6. Grades for this option will be based in part on the writing you do for the newsletter, in part on your other contributions to the project (such as design, editing, photography), in part on the final version of the newsletter itself; and in part on your critique/self-assessment.

Keep in mind, too, that you will have a great deal of flexibility in deciding not only what to write about but also how to participate in this project. Some students, for instance, may be experienced users of desktop publishing software and thus may focus their work on design and layout; others may focus their efforts on editorial decisions. You will need to negotiate your role with your classmates who participate in this option.

This option represents an exciting opportunity to engage in research, writing, and publishing in a way that will also have an impact on the larger University community and on the Writing Sequence in particular. You will have a great deal of input into what to write about and how to present it in a published document. And you'll have a chance to hone your writing skills as well. I will consult with and guide this project in whatever ways you and the other students you work with deem appropriate, but the work will be yours.

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