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Section 0101
Heavilon 227
T/Th 10:30-11:45

Dr. David Blakesley
Office Hrs: T/Th 1-3
Office: Heavilon 302c
Ph: 765.494.3772
Fax: 765.494.3780
blakesle@purdue.edu

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Project 2: Techniques of Copyediting

Scenario
You are a member of large editorial team responsible for copyediting all the material to be published in Spring 2001 issue of WPA: Writing Program Administration. You need to help the production editor create a style sheet, ensure that individual copyeditors agree on a common set of proofreaders' symbols, and actually copyedit one article.

Prompt
Working individually, you should 1) master the conventions of punctuation, style, and citation published by the MLA (Modern Language Association); 2) copyedit one article targeted for the Spring 2001 issue of WPA: Writing Program Administration.

Steps in the Process

1. Mastering MLA style and proofreaders' marks: Begin by reading and studying the handout/excerpt from the MLA Style Manual, which you can download in Word or PDF format:

   Copyediting and Proofreading Word format
   Copyediting and Proofreading PDF Format

   On Thursday, February 15 you will be given an in-class test that will measure how well you can identify and define selected proofreaders' marks and copyedit a paragraph of text and several entries from a Works Cited page. You will have 40 minutes to complete your work and will not be allowed to use any notes. (4 points possible, of a possible 10 on this project.)

2. Class Preparation of WPA Style Sheet: In-class on Tuesday, February 13, we will develop a style sheet for copyeditors of WPA: Writing Program Administration. Style sheets are collections of in-house rules to be used to ensure that published works and frontmatter follow the same guidelines from issue-to-issue. They also help copyeditors identify the mistakes commonly made by authors for the target publication.

   To prepare for this in-class work you will need to review the Fall/Winter 2000 issue of the journal, which you will be provided in class for use throughout this project. Because this is an in-class activity, you won't need to hand anything in. I will give the finished style sheet to everyone on Thursday, February 15 so that you can proceed to Step 3.

3. Copyediting a WPA Article: In this step, you will copyedit one of two articles targeted for publication in the Spring 2001 issue of the journal. You may find these articles here:

   Author A (PDF format) (Last names Albin-Johnson)
   Author B (PDF format) (Last names Lischer-Woolf)

   Get the free Acrobat Reader here.

   Your goal will be to identify using standard proofreader marks and the WPA style sheet all changes that need to be made to the manuscript in order to prepare it for final publication, to mark a printed copy of the text, then turn it in on Tuesday, February 27. You can earn up to 6 points for this step (of a possible 10). To determine your grade on this step, I will compare your copyedited version with a master copy of the article containing all problem items. Here's how you can earn points:

   Identify	Earn (Points)
   90%	6
   80%	5
   70%	4
   60%	3
   50%	2
   40%	1

   False Alarms (items marked as errors or problems that are not errors or problems) will hurt your overall score. For every 5 false alarms, you will lose 1 point.

Grading
This project counts as 10% of the course grade and breaks down as follows:

In-Class Exam: 40%
Copyedited article: 60%
Total: 100%

Important Dates

• February 13: In-Class Development of style sheet
• February 15: In-class exam on proofreading marks.
• February 27: Copyedited article due.

Print-Friendly Version
PDF Format
Word

External Links & Miscellany

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