Gradatorium: This is an A

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Here's the introduction and body paragraphs from the A paper.:

The United States has, as one of its core values, the noble goal of providing higher education to its citizens. With its emphasis on a liberal education, a college degree in the United States not only prepares an individual for their career, but also instructs the student in critical thinking, and thereby, prepares them to become active participants in the governing of our country. The United States is a democracy. Merriam-Webster's College Dictionary's definition of a democracy is "government by the people; esp: rule of the majority (Merriam-Webster 307)." Universities need to be distinctly public institutions because they prepare students to participate in our democracy. As does our institutions of government, this public university belongs to all citizens, not based on their income or ability to pay, but by virtue of their citizenship. In his book, "The States and Public Higher Education Policy," Donald Heller sites affordability and access as two of the key issues facing public higher education in the new millennium. Heller refers to President Truman's 1947Commission on Higher Education:

It is the responsibility of the community, at the local, State, and National levels, to guarantee that financial barriers do not prevent any able and otherwise qualified young person from receiving the opportunity for higher education. There must be developed in this country the widespread realization that money expended for education is the wisest and soundest of investments in the national interest. The democratic community cannot tolerate a society based upon education for the well-to-do alone. If college opportunities are restricted to those in the higher income brackets, the way is open to the creation and perpetuation of a class society which has no place in the American Way of life (Heller 1).

The Commission recommended

that in publicly controlled institutions there be no tuition or other required fees for the thirteenth and fourteenth school years, irrespective of whether they are offered by a two-year or a four-year college; and that fees above the fourteenth school year be reduced at the earliest possible moment to the level prevailing in 1939 (Heller 1-2).

The Commission's recommendations resonate with my own values. No charge for tuition or other fees for the first and second year of college at public universities is a great beginning. Further, I propose that there be no charge for tuition or other fees, and living expenses be subsidized for the entire duration of a student's education.
     

In the 1960's, in an effort to legitimize Religious Studies, there came a need to create a more scientific view of things. Some believe, as Donald Wiebe stated in his book, The Politics of Religious Studies, that "It was because of the adoption of such a scientific framework…that the study of religion succeeded in achieving the academic legitimation it sought from the university" (123). This scientific framework allowed for religion to be addressed in a cooperative way and from a global perspective (Prues qtd. in Hart 3). Certainly, this change in the study of religion created a level playing field, so to speak. It allowed for academia to attack a topic previously untouchable by its own standards. Handled at the time by divinity schools, which most often were Protestant, "religious scholarship, with its dogmatic and sectarian reputation, had to adjust to the claims made by science, with its truth-discovering capabilities" (Hart 17). The intangibility of a faith-based education, which constituted Religious Studies at the time, would not have melded with the research university's structure. Another reason for its acceptance at this time is the Supreme Court case of Abingdon School District v. Schempp (1963), which reinforced the doctrine of the separation of Church and State, also enabled the forging of a path for the teaching of religion in schools and universities. "Prior to this decision, the constitutional separation of church and state had limited the study of religion to private institutions which often had religious affiliations" (Taylor 11). Justice Goldberg is often referenced on this case because of the comments he had made which went beyond the majority decision of the Court, insisting that "religion ought to be a part of one's education, but such education, in order to be neutral, must be a 'teaching about' religion rather than a 'teaching of' religion" (Wiebe 107). This marked a turning point in that no longer was it an issue of whether or not to include religion into study, but rather how to do it. Perhaps these changes to Religious Studies, having created so much a debate, have in turn created a discipline lacking any definable center.

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Here are comments from different teachers on how they would grade this paper:

1. The central accomplishment of this paragraph is the scope of the research represented, and the writer's ability to fit that research into a larger context. She begins with a primary claim, that Religious Studies had to make itself more scientific to be accepted as a discipline in the secular research university. She then goes on to show that this issue is not only academic, but also legal: the Supreme Court's work on the separation of Church and State created an atmosphere where it was possible to talk about religion without endorsing any one religion. This issue links back to the writer's own position, articulated earlier in the essay, that the study of religion should be central to a liberal arts education. This goal was hampered by the "dogmatic and sectarian reputation" of Religious Studies earlier in the twentieth century. But now, due to the legal work of the Court, the writer's plan for Religious Studies becomes possible for the first time in the history of American academe. The writer's ability to show how her own plan is linked both to the "scientific" study of religion and the legal issue of the separation of Church and State is one of the strengths of the paper as a whole.
   

2. Instructor 1 is correct that the great strength of the passage is the density of the research. However, the writer could have done a number of things to improve the way the research was used. The fact that this is true is not a contradiction of its status as part of an A paper-essays do not have to be perfect to receive an A. However, even A papers can be improved. In this case, it may have helped the writer to question the premise of the research she used: the idea that the "scientific" study of religion is somehow superior to the religious study of religion. Because the writer herself wants the study of religion to be central to a liberal arts education, she seems to approve of the move towards a scientific methodology. Unfortunately, she never questions whether or not this strategy was the only way to integrate religion into a secular curriculum. And she never considers if certain biases from the dominant religious culture of the United States-Protestantism-may still shape and inform the scientific study of religion despite the scientific standard of objectivity. Is scientific understanding of non-theistic religions possible in a Religious Studies curriculum shaped almost entirely by a tacitly monotheistic culture? Trying to go beyond the premises of her admittedly strong research would have made her paper even better.