(1) Your third writing assignment in WRTG 391 will be a synthesis of sources essay, often called a literature review.

Please watch video on WA #3 — approaching the synthesis of sources essay.  Then complete the following task.

Imagine that you are working for department within a large company.  The manager of your department is considering allowing workers in your department to telework, in other words, to work from home. 

However, your manager is not sure what to expect from this possible change.

She is not sure what the advantages, pitfalls, unexpected issues, etc. are of allowing teleworking. For example, she is not sure whether workers become less productive because they will be working from home and not supervised.  She also considers the possibility that workers will become more productive because they won’t have to worry about traffic and parking.  They won’t have to take large amounts of time off to get children to a doctor’s appointment, to see a doctor themselves, to take care of errands, etc.  It is possible that working from home will improve productivity. 

Other questions abound in her mind.  For example, how many days a week should the workers be allowed to telework?  Should they be limited to one day?  Two days?  Or should they be unlimited to telework as many days as they would like per week?

In addition, she is not sure if everyone should be allowed to telework or if perhaps only people in certain positions should be allowed to telework.  For example, she knows that the janitor cannot telework.  His job could not be done at a distance.  But some individuals could telework, as their jobs involve meetings and other functions that could be accomplished at a distance.

Overall, your manager is somewhat at a loss on this issue. 

Your manager has asked you to review the literature on teleworking.  She has asked that you submit a literature review to her next month on the topic of teleworking.

From what you have gleaned in this class about what a literature review is, what is your manager asking you to do?

• Does she want a proposal that supports a new teleworking arrangement?
• Does she want a persuasive paper that takes a stand against teleworking?
• Or does she want something entirely different from those two options?

Please give your answer in a paragraph of 5-10 sentences.

(2) This discussion task is designed to help you analyze some research studies on the topic on which you will be writing WA #3.

To complete this task, you will read over the following two articles:

Dante E. Mancini, “The “CSI Effect’ in an Actual Juror Sample: Why Crime Show Genre May Matter.”

Janne A. Holmgren and Judith Fordham, “The CSI Effect and the Canadian and the Australian Jury.”

To access the articles, please take the following steps:

• click Content
• select Class Resources
• select eReserves
• select the icon for eReserves in the middle of your page.
• in the list of items that appears, locate the articles and download them.

.

After you find these two articles, please read them over and complete the following for each one:

• list the source in APA format
• list key terms in the article
• describe the focus of the study
• describe the methodology the author(s) used
• summarize the study’s findings
• write your reflections on the article itself.  Comment on whether you found the study difficult to interpret, whether you understood the methodology, or other items that might be of interest to your fellow classmates.

This task will help you become more familiar with finding research studies on your topic, reading them over, gleaning the main points of them, and summarizing their findings.  These skills will be helpful as you continue to research for WA#3.