The first reflection paper should cover material learned up until that point in the course.
Minimum requirements: Citations are not needed, but if citations they are used, they must be in text and a separate reference page at the end of the paper must all be in APA style. An acceptable range is between 3-4 pages double-spaced. The paper should not exceed 5 pages. A paper with fewer than three (3) full pages (1 inch margins on all sides) is not acceptable and will receive half-credit (50). A full page consists of text only; headers/footers, titles, name/date, and the like are NOT calculated in the full page requirement. Papers that fail to be comprehensive in integrating all of the material and do not meet the minimum requirements will receive half-credit (50 points). As the semester progresses, the papers will be expected to be more analytical and insightful.
Basically, students should answer the question – what have you learned in this class so far? In answering this question, students will be expected to integrate the material in an analytical and critical manner. As such, students should not summarize (e.g., in week 1, I learned about local government, in week 2, I learned about state government), but rather be reflective about what you learned by integrating, dissecting, critiquing, and analyzing the knowledge received from a variety of sources. Each paper should cover all information sources and attempt to describe how these sources fit together. In other words, these papers should not simply cover the readings, but must be reflective of the knowledge obtained from all sources. Students may select to do outside research in attempt to integrate and understand the material. Your opinions about what you are learning, what you are finding interesting, what you didn’t know, what you are now understanding better are key to successfully completing this assignment.
Answer preview
Congress is the most powerful branch of the United States government. The powers of the Congress exceed by far those of the Supreme Court and the presidency. Having said this, I literate and affirm that the Congress, not the Supreme Court or the president is the problem in the governance of the United States. I agree with it that the Congress is the most critical link between the public and their government. However, over the last decade or so, the Congress has not acted to prove this. It has failed terribly to help reach a consensus out of many and diverse views of not only the public but also the general public. I also agree that the Congress has impacted the lives of Americans in some way. But I feel, there is more it can do in its capacity to ensure that the wellbeing of Americans is achieved in a mighty way (Cooper, 2018).
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