Draft a Term Paper titled “A Plan for the Restructuring of the Department of Homeland Security: The
Need to Improve DHS’s Effectiveness.”
In order to prepare you for the Term Paper, you are asked in Unit 3 to submit a one sentence “thesis statement” (one and only one sentence!) for your Term
Paper.
As a reminder, the Thesis Statement (TS) is the most important sentence of any paper you write, and should be written before any other part of your paper.
Your TS is the “beacon” for the rest of the paper and the body of your paper must follow and reinforce your TS.
Because your TS is the most critical part of your paper, you should write and edit it before you write any other part of your paper.
Below is a good 6-part test to determine if you have a good TS:
Does it answer the question clearly and directly?
Does it tell you what you are going to cover in your paper; is it a good road map for your paper?
Does it have a point of view and includes your opinion?
Does it have some “pizzazz” that engages the reader? Is it interesting, and thus memorable to the reader?
Does it answer the “so what” question? Why should the reader care about your point of view? Why is this important to the reader?
Is the writing sharp, crisp and to the point?
A TS is NOT the following:
a restatement of the assignment question
vague, combative, or confrontational
simply a standard sentence
rambling or unfocused
For the purpose of the term paper your question is:
“If you were advising the President of the United States (POTUS), what recommendations would you make to POTUS in order to better integrate the different
intelligence and homeland security agencies with the goal of creating more useful “actionable” information?”