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Reading and Writing Assignment
Dr. A. Frank Thompson Financial Planning
Finance 1040 - voluntary extra credit assignment worth 50 points
Finance 3040 - required assignment included in total class points worth 100 points.
All papers are due no later than Friday, April 15th, 2016.
Assignment Declarations
This will be the only major extra credit research assignment, this semester, in Finance 1040, so you will need to decide no later than Wednesday, January 26th, 2016 if you want to complete it for credit. You need to declare your intentions using the form below which identifies the one book you plan to use in your research, and then turning it in, on or before January 26th.
For those in Finance 3040, as a course requirement, you will need to decide on at least two outside readings or more from those listed at the bottom of this page. On January 26th, you will need to turn in a statement identifying those books you have selected, and your research thesis. If you are having trouble defining a research thesis I would be happy to help in your formulation of a relevant set of hypotheses for your research.
Motivation for this Assignment
AACSB accredition guidelines call for there to be writing across the curriculum in all business courses. Consequently, this reading and writing assignment is intended to fulfill that mandate. However, more importantly it is designed to help you further develop critical thinking skills, create cogent and logical arguments while researching a business topic, utilize techniques and ideas introduced in the core curriculum and obtain feedback on how to write clearly and effectively. All of these objectives represent areas where business leaders and prospective hiring firms have indicated business students need to improve, not just at UNI, but in the other schools of business across the country. These concerns were expressed when talking with business leaders at university functions during my years of teaching at Iowa State, the University of Cincinnati, not just UNI. If an institution is to have a total quality improvement process within its curriculum in something other than name only, it will need to address deficiencies on an ongoing basis and be able to demonstrate through meaningful action its commitment to change. I leave you with three questions ---(1) Did you have a writing assignment in each of your classes in the business school? (2) In those classes where there was a writing assignment, did you receive feedback on how to improve your writing and research skills? (2) If you didn't have a writing assignment or didn't receive helpful feedback, did you ever wonder what that supplemental tuition fee now being levied on business students in the junior and senior years was being used for?
Purpose of this Assignment
The purpose of this assignment is: (1) to allow you to extend your knowledge of the course text and lecture materials to solve practical financial problems (2) to include a writing and research component within the course that compliments the class learning objectives and (3) to encourage the integration and use of course materials with outside readings to create meaningful concepts related to constructing good financial plans.
Given these objectives, the following general conditions apply to this assignment (1) any research paper should include a bibliography, and footnotes to appropriately recognize the work of others being referenced (2) the paper should be a finished work in the sense that you have corrected spelling and grammatical errors from your submission [i.e., avoid sentence fragments, subject/verb incongruity – I would be more than happy to help you proof your paper, prior to your turning it in]. It might interest you to know, that in my previous work as a Ph.D. coordinator in Finance at University of Cincinnati, even graduate students had difficulties with writing. However, if you work at it, good writing can become a major strength for you in business and graduate school (if that is one of your long term goals)], and (3) figures and tables should be labeled and incorporated within the text. The body of the paper should include (1) a 4-5 page introduction and summary of the major findings of the reading, followed by (2) a 4-5 page synopsis of the ideas from the reading that reinforce concepts presented either in lecture or within our text, concluding with (3) a 4-5 page statement of how this information may be used to help you prepare financial plans now and in the future. If you are not comfortable with this last section, you can provide some ways in which this information could be used by you to help with your parent’s financial planning. Alternatively, you could use the information to show how the concepts could be used to address the way UNI's Athletic Department lavishly spends money , creates funding deficits that requires it to tap into the general education fund each Summer to cover losses during the academic year, pays coaches annual salaries in excess of that of the university, and provides long term contracts with hefty exit fees and fringe benefits [such as golf memberships, cars, airplane travel for family and friends] that would be considered outrageous for all other UNI employees. It is extremely important that you footnote and reference the work of others. You must provide citations for any material you present either from the book or external documents used to support (such as our text) your arguments in the paper. If you need help in terms of the way to cite the work of others please feel free to ask for my assistance. Failure to cite the work of others is considered to be an academic ethics violation in this course, as it would be in any other class.
Rubric for Evaluating Written Assignments
10% - Presentation: Grammar, spelling, bibliographic references
10% - Appropriate footnoting of sources, clearly identifying page numbers, publications
25% - Clear outline of major themes, topical sentence structure, working hypotheses,
conclusions
25% - Original thought, critical thinking about the topic, extension of ideas that
were researched
15% - Ability to present ideas and arguments in a way that draws the reader to
an understanding of the topic, and an interest in the analysis
15% - Demonstration of how to appropriately use financial analysis to reach logical
conclusions within the paper
Note: If you use any material from an outside source without giving attribution to it – using a footnote and bibliographic reference, that is considered plagiarism and will result in your receiving an F in the course if you don’t correct and resubmit the paper. I will grade the resubmitted paper, but the most points you will be eligible to receive is 50% of the assignment.
Sample outline of a research paper
Title page
Introductory paragraph - main topical sentence, outline of the paper, summary of the themes within the body of the paper, conclusions based on your research
Set of Paragraphs – establishing the importance of the research, background, review of prior studies with rationales as to why these are more important than other research you may have consulted
Analysis – a set of paragraphs where you synthesize the research, and then develop you own original ideas on how to evaluate your topic, the analysis should directly support you main research conclusions as presented in the first paragraph
Results – a set of paragraphs indicating the significant results of your research, which coincides with your analysis
Conclusions – one or two paragraphs that highlight you conclusions with a rationale as to why you have come to these findings
Anotated Bibliography -- consisting of a complete set of references used in research your topic [both those cited directly in the paper, as well as, those used to better understand the topic] along with one or two sentences identifying the major themes in the reference that relates to your topic.
List of Books to be Used with this Assignment
Buffettology, by Mary Buffett in collaboration with David Clark
The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas Stanley and William Danko
The Millionaire Mind by Thomas Stanley and Willaim Danko
FIASCO: The Inside Story of a Wall Street Trader by Frank Partnoy
Days of Grace, by Arthur Ashe
Robert I. Sutton, The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving
one That Isn't, (Warner Business Books, New York, 2007).
Dave Barry's Money Secrets - Like: why is there a giant eyeball on the dollar? by Dave Barry (Random House Publishng, New York, 2006). For this latter book, a word of explanation is in order. Dave Barry is a satirist in much the same fashion as Mark Twain, Will Rogers, or Jon Stewart of the Daily Show, or those articles that appear in The Onion. Satire is a literary device in which vices, follies, abuses, etc. are held up to ridicule, sarcasm, irony [e.g. reducto ad absurdum], in order to make a point. Sometimes the elaborate nature of the satire may hide the intent of the author altogether which is unfortunate. For example, two illustrations of satire from English literature would be Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, and Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, now considered to be children's books. Many will read these two books and completely miss the political irony and satire within them. The purpose of satire is to use a comedic device to cause one to think critically about issues and/or policies, that if left unaddressed, might negatively impact individuals or society in general. Barry is also somewhat of an inconoclast in the sense that he often attacks venerated or traditional institutions regarded by him as erroneous or based on superstition, but underneath he appears to support fundamental principles [liberty, freedom, human rights] that can only be established through fundamental institutions such as government agencies or regulation. His purpose is to get the reader to think about what are their beliefs and why do they hold them. So at one level Barry's book is humorous and at times outrageous, but the ideas are presented to make much deeper points about the state of our current economic system and its impact on financial planning. If you use this book, you will need to critically and carefully read the book, to relate how Barry's satirical points reinforce the financial planning principles presented in our text and lectures. My reason for mentioning these perspectives is that in a prior year, I assigned this book and was taken aback when a few students were offended by Mr. Barry's ideas, because they didn't understand it to be satiricle in nature.
Finance 1040 Extra Credit Assignment Declaration Form
All extra credit papers must be completed and turned in no later than the end of class on Friday, April 15th, 2016.
To initiate this voluntary extra credit assignment, you must fill out and sign the following contract, turning it in no later than, Wednesday, January 26th, 2016.
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CONTRACT AGREEMENT FORM
Extra Credit Addendum to Finance 1040, Spring 2016
I ______________________wish to participate in the extra credit reading and writing assignment outlined in Dr. Thompson's website. I agree to abide by the conditions stated in his description of such assignments acknowledging that a failure to fully cite another’s work or adhere to the UNI Academic Ethics policy. The book I have selected for my extra credit assignment is:_____________________
Signed________________________ Student ID:_______________ DATE:_________