DESCRIPTIVE ESSAY
With In-text Citations to Web Sources
You will be borrowing facts and figures about your specialties from a minimum of four sources on the Internet. Accordingly you will need to cite those sources in-text and in your References. Read the following APA rules about citations and References for Internet sources. Look at the examples of two in-text citations on the sample essay-page shown with a boldly outlined rectangle. . Use your Bryant & Stratton APA Style Guide for more help and illustrations.
Every fact, statistic, idea, or word borrowed from a source for the essay must be cited. The failure to credit a source is characteristic of plagiarism. You must cite your source even if you paraphrase it.
Paraphrase rather than quote most of your sources.
Do not quote more than a sentence from a Web site. Do not copy-and-paste lists from a Web site.
You must use quotes, if you are taking the exact phrase or sentence from a source. It is not adequate simply to cite a source from which you take text. The failure to quote the words of another is a characteristic of plagiarism.
Match the colored areas to the sample page below:
Include a paragraph #, when you quote a sentence or phrase from a Web page. You do not need to identify a paragraph number, if you paraphrase content from a Web page.
In the Descriptive Essay we will be citing Web pages in a larger Web site: Place the author (or organization), date, and paragraph # in parentheses at the end of a sentence that borrows from a site. Alternatively you can start your sentence with a signal phrase, such as: “According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (2007) working conditions can be stressful (para. 5).”
For other papers you may refer generally to a Web site without borrowing anything from a particular page. In that case it is sufficient to mention the site’s name and provide its URL in parentheses without a corresponding entry in your Reference list. For the Descriptive Essay you will need a more complete in-text citation to a particular Web page and paragraph, and a corresponding entry in your list of References.
Provide the year in the parentheses following the name of the author (or organization), if you start your sentence with a signal phrase that identifies the author.
If you use the title of the Web site or page in the text, it should be quoted and the words capitalized. In References you capitalize only the first word and proper nouns in the title of a Web page or article, and drop the quotation marks.
If the Web site has no date, use n.d. in the parenthetical citation.
Descriptive Essay 3
...............................................................................................
...............................................................................................
..........................................................[continued from page 2].
Duties and Tasks
The L.A. Community Policing Association (2004)
describes “neighborhood patrol” as the first recommended
assignment for new law enforcement officers (para. 1). The
Web page, “Richmond’s Police Management,” explains that the
next level of duty is more general.
The duties of a patrol officer are ........................................
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
...........................................................................................
.
A major promotion would be as a supervisor of rookie officers
(Greenspan, n.d.). ......................................................................
....................................................................................................
....................................................................................................
..............................................................................................
....................................................................................................
.............................................................................................. .
Job Outlook and Earnings
“Employment of officers in large urban areas is expected to
increase twofold in the next five years” (Bureau of Labor of
Statistics [BLS], 2007, para. 3). .................................................
..............................................................[continued on next page]
Do not write the bracketed notes, which appear on this illustration of a sample page. Continue providing details for a total of 4 - 5 categories of job characteristics.
