Editing papers

One of the many things I have to do at the end of each term here is to read and edit my thesis advisees' papers. As we often accept students to be our advisees based on what they will be working on for their thesis, I get students who vary in terms of writing skills as well as their capability to do quality work.

The most disappointing are those who simply have poor English writing skills. Their English grammar is atrocious while sentence structure is poor and at best awkward. I immediately recognize these types when after reading the first few opening paragraphs, I notice that I've made a dozen corrections on subject-verb agreement and verb tense. Often, they write sentences that mean something entirely different from what they mean to say. Or worse, there are sentences in which I can't figure out at all what they're trying to say. These are the students whose papers we teaching staff often call "hopeless", the ones whose papers I feel like rewriting entirely but know that I shouldn't or else it will no longer be the student's own work. In these cases, I make corrections on the first few paragraphs and simply tell the student to check the grammar for the rest of the paper. Or if I'm in a patient enough mood, I make corrections on the entire paper, by which time the paper is filled with slashes, arrows, carets and admonitions to "Rewrite!" written in red gel ink.

The more frustrating types are those who are pretty much capable of writing well in English but who are just lazy or don't care much about turning out quality work. These are the ones who write the shortest of explanations and descriptions, don't pay attention to indention or spacing between paragraphs and make careless mistakes like typographical errors. (Actually, I already notice this poor regard for quality when they present their thesis work to me and I can see that everything has apparently been done and put together haphazardly.) Obviously they simply slapped together ideas into a paper and didn't proofread before submitting the paper to me for my review and comments. Sometimes I end up giving the student a short sermon on how poor work will not likely be tolerated once they get a job and that even so, they should make it a habit to pay attention to quality this early.

Of course, the most satisfactory are the students who can both write acceptably well and do quality work. It is especially pleasing if the student has not received exceptional grades for his/her coursework but has still shown through thesis work that he/she carries out tasks with care and dedication. Every detail in their thesis work and thesis paper indicate that everything was thought out carefully. And although they still make mistakes in writing their thesis papers, these are the types with whom you can discuss making improvements at a higher level and not worry about not seeing the final draft before they make a final copy of their thesis paper.

Naturally, one would always like to work with students of the third type above. They cause the least headache at stressful times like these. But it is nevertheless rewarding to work with the other types and do your best to guide them in the hopes of helping them be better prepared for a career after graduation.