iRubric: General Essay/Report rubric

The major claim of the essay is weak—vague or obvious. The essay does not respond to a true question, tension, or problem. The introduction usually has no motive.

The major claim is logical and would require some evidence for support, but the stakes are not as high as they should be. The essay’s major claims are somewhat unclear, unspecific or uninteresting (not novel given the state of knowledge in the relevant domain). The introduction lacks a clear motive or contains an unspecific or weak motive.

Either the major claim is clear and arguable but lacks novelty or else sets out to explore an intriguing idea that has not been developed into a specific claim. The introduction either unsuccessfully motivates an insightful and novel claim or weakly and artificially motivates a claim that does not constitute a significant revision of the status quo.

Either the major claim is clear, arguable, and complex but misses opportunities for nuance or subtlety, or else it sets out to explore an ambitious idea whose complexity leads to minor errors in articulation. The introduction suggests some context or stakes for the argument but does not offer strong motivation, or a convincing motive is gestured at but remains implicit.

The major claim of the essay is insightful and novel (does not merely repeats what others have written and found in research). The thesis is not trivial, going beyond what we know already from research in the relevant domain. The thesis responds to a true question. It is stated clearly at the outset and evolves throughout the paper. The introduction has a clear motive that outlines the stakes of the argument and demonstrates a meaningful context for the author’s claims.

The argument may be too simple and so does not develop over the course of the essay. Or the argument may be incoherent or too broad, without any clear organization or transitions.

The argument mostly makes logical sense, but the structure of the essay is confusing—jumping around, missing transitions, or taking on too many ideas at once. Or, the argument itself may be presented simplistically, leading to a predictable structure and unnecessary transitional language.

The argument is interesting and logical, but the structure of the essay is, at times, confusing. The essay’s claims are sometimes executed in a confusing sequence, or they seem related to the thesis but have a confusing relation to one another. Transitional language may be present but is unsuccessful or inconsistent.

The argument follows a clear logical arc, but small gaps, digressions, or a lack of transitional language interrupt the flow of ideas in a few places.

Ideas develop over the course of the essay so that the foundations established early on push the argument toward a more complex conclusion. The structure is both logical and engaging.