Examples
The examples available from the links below include documents written by students and professionals. While they may help give you ideas about the ways specific writers responded to communication tasks, they are not meant as models.
Make sure to read the accompanying analyses that discuss the purposes, contexts, strengths, and weaknesses of the examples.
Framing the Problem
Example 1: Obesity and the Role of Fast
Food.
This problem description is an essay of informed
opinion that advocates a chosen policy instrument.
Example
1 Analysis
Example
2: Educational Funding in New York State.
This problem description
is a memo describing a problematic condition, identifying its causes,
and enumerating proposed solutions.
Example
2 Analysis
Example
3: Issues surrounding air pollution regulation.
This is a policy
analysis without recommendation. Students were asked to prepare
a policy memo that a senator can use to develop his/her opinion
on a problem chosen by the student.
Example
3 Analysis
Example
4: Military Pay
This description of problematic conditions
with recommendations is a report written by professional policy/
program analysts in the United States General Accounting Office
(GAO), an investigative and auditing staff of the Congress.
Example
4 Analysis
Knowing the Record
Example 1: The Legislative History of Nutritional Labeling
Here is a student’s legislative history written for a course
assignment.
Example 1 Analysis
Example 2: Charter Schools in America
Here is another student’s legislative history of an educational
reform. This history was also written for a coursework assignment.
Example 2 Analysis
Knowing the Arguments
Example: Higher Education Act (HEA) Amendments
of 1998 (memo)
This position paper was written in memo form by a student. She
produced the position paper in a public policy writing course based
on analysis
she had performed in a policy studies course.
Example Analysis
Requesting Action
Example 1: Maryland Network Against Domestic Violence
Here is a policy proposal by a nonprofit organization advocating
an amendment to proposed legislation. The student author, wrote
the proposal for a course assignment in public policy writing.
She
used her experience as a volunteer ‘ghost’ writer for
the organization’s spokesperson to recreate an actual proposal
for the assignment.
Example 2: National Charter School Evaluation (memo)
A student wrote and presented this proposal
as the spokesperson for a nonprofit organization in a (simulated)
roundtable held annually by a coalition of nonprofit organizations
to set the coalition’s lobbying agenda for the year.
Example 3: petition for the National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration
Here is a petition to a government agency by auto safety experts.
Example 3: Letter of Transmittal
In a letter of transmittal, they address
the petition to the head of the agency responsible.
Informing Policy Makers
Example 1: Clarity emerges as court closes its doors
Here is a London newspaper’s summary of investigations into
the decision in 2003 by Tony Blair (United Kingdom prime minister)
to join George W. Bush (United States president) in a war against
Iraq. Investigation was prompted by the apparent suicide of a UK
government staff member involved in the decision-making.
Example 1 Analysis
Example 2: CAFO E-mail and Attached Memo
Here is a memo written by a community resident to a local official
about a local zoning issue. The memo
was sent as an attachment to an e-mail message, also included in
the example.
Example 2 Analysis
Examples of ‘Good’ and ‘Bad’ Tone
Here are several examples that illustrate ‘good’ tone
and ‘bad’ tone in statements of opinion. These examples
were e-mailed to an elected official in county government regarding
a proposed merger of city and county schools.
(Analyses included)
Providing Testimony
Example 1: Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions
(simulation)
This example is written and spoken by a student in a classroom-simulated
Congressional hearing. The student is
here enacting the role of spokesperson for a policy analysis think
tank. In that role, he presents his own message on the importance
of labeling. Shown here is the one-page oral summary that he also
submitted (with appendices) as the written statement for the record.
(Not shown here are accompanying charts detailing the impact of nutritional
labeling on consumer choice and the compliance with labeling requirements
by fast food industries.)
Example 2: Living with Exceptional Value
This example is by written by a citizen testifying in state environmental
protection agency field hearings. Shown here is the written statement
for the record (edited to reduce length). An oral summary was
delivered.
Influencing Administrations
Example 1: Comment to the Docket Concerning Amendments to FMVSS
208, Occupant Crash Protection
This written comment is a technical analysis of a proposed change
in motor vehicle safety standards. The comment was written by professionals
in the field of automotive safety and submitted during the rule-making
process.
Example 2: Penns Valley Conservation Association (letter)
This is a technical analysis of a mining permit application. Prepared
by a local environmental conservation group, the comment is written
by the group’s attorney in response to a call for public
input on the permitting process.
Example 3: Aaronsburg Civic Club (letter)
This is a letter by a citizen’s group requesting a public
meeting.