Minimum Standards for English Majors
(rev. 8/03)

In 200-level courses and higher,* the faculty in the English Department will return papers written by English majors, if they

• Do not follow correct MLA documentation (including failure to integrate quotations correctly, misplaced punctuation, incorrect work cited entries, etc.);
• Include more than one major grammatical error (run-on sentences [including fused sentences and comma splices], subject-verb agreement errors, and fragments);
• Contain excessive minor errors (i.e., misuses of commas, semicolons, misspellings, etc. which display a failure to proofread).

Instructors will return papers, final papers will be reduced by one letter, and students will have forty-eight hours to revise and re-submit papers.  In many cases, instructors will not have read the entire paper once they have determined that an essay fails to meet the minimum requirements; consequently, students will need to review and revise essays from beginning to end to make corrections. If essays fail to meet these minimum standards after re-submission, students will earn Fs for those assignments.  If papers are submitted at the end of term and cannot be revised, instructors will deduct an appropriate number of points from the essay's final grade. 

*In creative writing classes, the policy will be applied at the discretion of the instructor.  In some cases, students may flout grammar and spelling rules for particular artistic purposes.