Mr. Sapp's English Classes

General Paper Guidelines

During this year, you will be writing a number of papers for English class. Every paper should reflect your best effort, of course, both intellectually and creatively. However, I am going to ask that you conform to some format standards in writing your papers. These requirements will help me in my assessment of your writing, will assure a level of conformity among all the papers, and will generally encourage a professional appearance in your work.

Please assume that all of these standards always apply; I will let you know if any are waived for a particular assignment. I will return papers that do not conform to these standards, which will cause them to be late.

Your papers should …

• have a cover page that has (centered) the title of the paper 1/3 down from the top margin and (again centered) your name, the class, and the date on separate single-spaced lines 1/3 up from the bottom margin
• be typed (word-processed)–hand-written is acceptable if you speak to me first
• use a standard font (Times, Times New Roman, New York, Chicago–any of the city names are usually acceptable)
• use 10 or 12-point fonts (exception: the title on the cover page)
• use standard (1") margins
• have your last name in the upper-right-hand corner of every page, beginning on page 2
• have the page number centered at the bottom of every page, beginning on page 2
• have a Works Cited page ("Bibliography") for any works cited in the paper
• be stapled one time in the upper-left-hand corner (or use a paper clip)
• use bold, underline, and italics styles only when necessary (such as for a title)
• use bold, underline, and italics styles only when necessary (such as for a title)
• not be in a binder, folder, document protector, etc.

Please see me if you have any questions about paper format.

Mr. Sapp