Department of English
356 Bachelor Hall
Oxford OH 45056 | portfolio@muohio.edu
downloads
(Form must be completed in Adobe Reader to be submitted electronically.)
online resources
Helpful Suggestions, Hints, and Tips for Composing your Portfolio
Scoring criteria
The readers of your portfolio are all experienced teachers of college writing. When we score the portfolios submitted to us, we use the learning outcomes of English 111 and English 112 as the guide. Before completing your portfolio, you should spend time reading your portfolio with an eye toward whether your writing demonstrates these outcomes. While we make changes from year to year, the major criteria remain the same, and you should be familiar with them.
The learning outcomes of English 111 and English 112 are that students will:
- Demonstrate an ability to write effectively for different contexts, audiences, purposes, and genres (particularly academic contexts, audiences, purposes, and genres) and demonstrate their awareness of audiences’ multiple perspectives.
- Engage the composing process using effective strategies for developing ideas; researching topics; producing drafts; revising, peer responding, editing, and proofreading their writing; and delivering their writing via print and electronic media.
- Conduct research-based inquiries to explore their own ideas, to engage different perspectives, and to develop findings into sustained arguments.
- Perform critical, close reading, making arguments using textual citation as evidence and demonstrating their understanding of the historical and cultural complexity of texts — how texts can be read differently in different rhetorical, historical, and cultural contexts.
- Locate, evaluate, integrate, and cite secondary sources of information effectively and ethically, using appropriate academic citation methods.
- Produce effectively organized writing that is stylistically appropriate and that meets conventional expectations for particular audiences in specific contexts. Student writing shows evidence of careful proofreading and attention to mechanics, appropriate to audience and context.
- Reflect critically on their own composing practices and rhetorical decisions.
Tone and Style
Portfolio readers suggest that students while students need to show mature and insightful thinking and writing, they should also present themselves naturally, not artificially. Evaluators suggest that students should not be afraid to use “I,” and that “their own voice(s) should not be drowned by research.”
We have recommended in the past, and we continue to encourage you to “write as yourself,” not as the student you think college professors want you to be. We look for evidence that you think about how you fit into the world, about how issues you write about relate to your personal situations (social, racial, gendered, economic, regional, religious, etc.). Instructors suggest repeatedly:
“Consider your audience of portfolio readers. We’re real people who can see through stereotypic, immature arguments. We appreciate critical thinking and self-awareness in each piece, not just description.”
Raters are interested in what you think and see and how you see those things in relation to broader issues and concerns. Evaluators tell students to “think about how the pieces you write connect, and talk about them as a whole, not just as random pieces.” Also, “think seriously about ambiguities, feelings, and problems. Revise, rewrite and show that you are thinking about your audience.”
While you should keep audience and aim in mind as you develop your portfolio, you will benefit as well from more specific advice and suggestions our portfolio scorers offer below.
- The importance of the reflective letter: The most common pieces of advice our raters suggest concern the reflective letter. This initial piece is obviously an important part of the portfolio, much more that just a cover letter. Part of what we mean when we say “reflective” is that we want you to situate yourself for your readers—in terms of your “social location,” or, in other words, how your race, class, and gender influence your values and opinions. One rater insists, “Give much more attention to the reflective letter. It should be REFLECTIVE (many were not) and interesting,” and “go beyond simple summary of what is in the collection. Reflect on how the pieces reveal something about you as a writer and how they are connected.” The reflective letter sets the tone for the whole portfolio and creates a first and lasting impression. Think about what reflection involves—not just including details about who you are and how you write but also about how and why your background and environment have affected what you write. Many successful letters strike a balance between confidence and humility; many show awareness of strengths and limitations, as well as awareness that writing has consequences (beyond getting credit for English at Miami).
- Use the full 6-12 page single-spaced allotment: We strongly urge you to take full advantage of the page limit and develop your pieces fully. All raters notice whether or not a student’s portfolio has enough “substance.” With this in mind, we ask that students use the page limit and make it work. Longer portfolios (that stay within the page limit) offer analysis and discuss the complexity of issues. Brief portfolios rarely get a high score because they can’t fully develop, support, and sustain a writer’s position.
- Develop with specific detail: Use many details, examples, and illustrations to develop and explain your points. Instructors prefer concreteness to vagueness and showing to telling. When appropriate, use dialogue and narrative examples and scenes to help develop your work. As one rater suggests, “Look at a lot of examples in Best of Miami Portfolios and try to figure out why they are good pieces. Usually, it’s not because of the topic but because of how the writer develops the topic.”
- Content and style should suit audience and aim: Be aware of “big issue” topics and make sure you can take them on in a way that is focused and thoughtful. Also, when using outside sources, work from your own viewpoint instead of simply retelling other peoples’ ideas. If you use outside sources, be sure to include a Works Cited page, so readers know that you know how to give appropriate credit to other writers when you use their ideas.
- Be creative: Don’t be afraid to experiment. Include pieces in a variety of styles if possible. Raters say, “forget formulas” emphasizing that “a good five-paragraph theme has no greater chance than a good paper with any other structure… Life is too short to cram into five paragraphs!” Several raters have mentioned that they want a writer to “take chances, use humor—show different sides of yourself! Take time to ask yourself: ‘How can I make this more interesting? More engaging?’ and then take time to revise. No one wants to be bored.”
- Revise your portfolio carefully: Most professional writers see revision as going well beyond changing words and correcting grammar. Give yourself plenty of time to spend reading and re-reading your work, thinking of ways to offer fresher examples and more compelling arguments. Revising also means considering your audience: “Go over your pieces and ‘re-see’ them for this audience and situation.”
- Appearance and correctness count: Of course content is most important, but after taking the time to do the writing, you need to spend time polishing and correcting the work. Both spell check and get a trusted person to proofread. Give pieces titles, number pages, and use a legible, plain typeface or font. Full portfolios in italics or long narrow fonts are difficult to read, and anything smaller than 10 pt. is also extremely hard to read. Remember: a readable point size: 12 pt. is best. Please single-space your documents and use one-inch margins.