1. The Walden Form and Style Review
With the
Walden Writing Center Editors
Martha King and Heidi Marshall

2. Game Plan Quick review of form and style process and responsibilities
Preparation for the review
Titles, abstracts, IRB, and proposal chapter reviews
Example form and style review (F&S) feedback
Q & A
Group exercise

3. The Form and Style Process
Required for all doctoral studies and dissertations.
F&S review is part of a collaborative effort to produce publication-ready manuscripts.

4. Capstone Review Process
 URR approves for CAO review of abstract
 Chair approves for URR review; document sent to URR
 Orals conducted; changes made
 Returned to student; changes made
See checklist doc on CRS website.
Reorder the top two steps.
 URR approves for Form and Style review
 Chair approves for URR review; TII report, consensus rubric, & committee-approved document sent to URR

5. Process-Related Help
The Office of Student Research Support oversees and tracks the approval process.
Questions about PhD process:
Questions EdD process:
Questions about DBA process:
Degree-specific documents, rubrics, checklists, and forms are all available on the Research Center’s website:

6. Students’ Responsibilities
Help your students by setting these expectations.
Use the consensus rubric for guidance.
Use the dissertation or doctoral study template and meet page formatting guidelines (access templates here) .
Know basics of APA style documentation, spell and grammar check their work, align citations with references.
Write and conduct research with integrity.
Apply the feedback committee has given them.
Ask for help along the way.
Correspond respectfully with faculty and staff.
Chairs and URR are putting a lot of emphasis on the percentages in the TII report without reading the details, so address that when talking through this slide.

7. Chairs’ Responsibilities
Insist students spell check their work and eliminate most grammatical errors. Use MS Word grammar check or Grammarly.
Require students meet minimum page formatting guidelines.
Carefully review and interpret a Turnitin report. For help, view the tutorial video, particularly the section entitled Turnitin Reports.
Ensure students have cited all assertions from the peer- reviewed literature and from theory.
Watch for IRB and copyright violations.
Faculty and URRs are not expected to
Be line editors.
Know the minutiae of APA style.
Give the same feedback to students over and over.
Allow students to bully / whine / cajole / complain / their way past them.
Pass on work that the university is not proud to have published (per CAO David Clinefelter).

8. Chairs’ Responsibilities
Ensure that research problems, theory, questions and hypotheses, methods, findings, and conclusions are in basic alignment.
Ensure the university’s established minimal standards for Walden research.
Give ample feedback to guide motivated students.

9. Editors’ Responsibilities
Help students write more concisely, grammatically, and in accord with all aspects of APA style with constructive, positive, collegial feedback.
Ensure university formatting guidelines are met.
Watch for intentional or unintentional integrity and confidentiality violations.
Read critically to ensure basic alignment is articulated and minimum standards are met.

10. The Editorial Review Averages about 6 hours.
First chapter read thoroughly; the first 5-10 pages of other chapters are read, then skimmed for typical patterns. First few pages of RL are reviewed to point out patterns, and appendices are checked for copyright or IRB violations, although that is not strictly F&S.
Main concerns: APA style, overall format, integrity.
Track changes and comments are used.
Some line-by-line mark-up, but much pattern identification.
Detailed letter and checklist to guide revisions. N

11. Preparing Your Students: APA 6th* Ed. Basics
Common errors to look for before F&S *All students must use APA 6th ed.
Ensure use of serial comma throughout, per APA 4.03.
Use first person appropriately, per APA 3.09 and Walden academic leadership.
Study APA manual table and figure examples and do more than copy and paste tables from SPSS (APA Ch. 5).
Report the literature in the appropriate verb tense (3.18), and update the proposal language before final form and style review.
The purpose of the study is/was / I will interview/interviewed 12 school principals.

12. Preparing Your Students: Abstracts & Titles
Abstract guidelines at researchcenter.waldenu.edu.
Students tend to top-load their proposal abstracts so there’s insufficient room left to report the findings and articulate the social change implications.
One page, one paragraph, no indent.
CAO abstract reviewer requires the word “social change” in the implications piece near the end.
CAO abstract reviewer has the final word on abstracts and titles.
Short and sweet titles sell.
Phrase as statement, not as question.
Dissuade starting with “An Exploration of” “A Study of” and so on.
See APA 2.01 for excellent guidance.

13. Form and Style Review: Titles*
Examples (Exaggerated. A little, anyway)
An Investigation Into Whether or Not Victims of Crohn’s Disease Tends to Feel Discriminated Against, and The Effectiveness of Staff and Faculty Awareness Programs on Reducing Discrimination: An Exploratory Study
Effectiveness of Awareness Programs on Treatment of Students With Crohn’s Disease
Moving Up the Pyramid: A Phenomenological Look at Unmet Needs.
* The title should be a concise statement of the main topic and should identify the variables or theoretical issues under investigation and the relationship between them (APA 2.01).  
Add
Moving Up the Pyramid: A Phenomenological Look at Unmet Needs.
Here’s what the 6th ed. manual has to say about titles (p. 23):
The title should be a concise statement of the main topic and should identify the variables or theoretical issues under investigation and the relationship between them.  
A title should be fully explanatory when standing alone.
Keep in mind that the title is used as a statement of article content for abstracting and referencing purposes, so include terms that would help a fellow researcher locate your study in electronic databases.
Titles are no more than 12 words.
Titles do not include words like method, results, study of, investigation of, or the like.
Avoid words that could mislead the reader (I think pyramid in the example title qualifies as misleading)
Other considerations for editing titles:
Avoid interrogative phrasing.
Do not use final punctuation (as in the example above).
Capitalize any word of four or more letters, and capitalize all parts of a verb (to if it’s part of the infinitive, has, or the like).
Gary’s not fond of colons in titles (I know this because he said the title had one of “those dumb colons” in it).

14. Form and Style Review: Publishing
The IRB number is required in text or an appendix.
Keep schools, job sites, interviewees anonymous.
In acknowledgments
In appendices
In the vita
Permission to use a test instrument for a study is separate from permission to include it in the dissertation or doctoral study. Visit
Tables and figures not in public domain require copyright clearance beforehand. Ensure tables and figures are APA compliant and are legible.

16. Form and Style Review: Examples
The form and style review is sent to the students and committee members.
Three kinds of feedback
Changes that are required.
Changes that are strongly urged.
Changes that would improve quality of ProQuest published manuscript and any publication beyond dissertation.

17. After the Form and Style Review: Example 1—Required Changes

18. Form and Style Review: Example 1—Required Changes
Trends and research related must have some currency [1998 estimate?].
The headings MUST conform to APA 6th if proposal approved after Left margin must be 1.5”. Basic APA errors must be corrected
Check on how red marks and comments line up.

19. Form and Style Review: Example 2—Expected Changes
Straightforward punctuation, usage, and APA errors must be fixed
Edited for economy of expression (wordiness)

20. Form and Style Review: Example 2—Expected Changes
This editor marked a lot of wordiness. We expect the chair to make sure students abide by our edits.
Comparing documents is a good tool for checking.

21. Form and Style Review: Example 3—Sure Would Help
“This paragraph sounds like the Purpose section.”
“You’re arguing the need for your study, so ‘seems to’ detracts from your authority. See APA 3.09”

22. Typical Marked Page

23. Form and Style Checklist
Full checklist available on the Writing Center website:

24. Introduces the checklist and provides details of the review.
Form and Style Letter
Introduces the checklist and provides details of the review.

25. Preparing Your Students
The editorial review
Explain to students it’s not a rubber stamp.
Tell students you will expect them to abide by the editor’s required and recommended changes.
Make sure your student works from the editor’s edited document.
Six hours of review generally results in X hours of work for students so tell them to plan ahead.
Editors have 14 days to return the document, so tell students to plan ahead.

26. Reasons a Review Would Be Halted
Academic integrity violations
Low writing assessment rubric score*
Formatting wreck**
* Scores of 1 or 2 in two out of the three rubric categories.
** Wrong version of APA edition; incorrect margins, pagination, line spacing, heading styles.

27. F&S Writing Assessment Rubric
Rating Scale
1 - Needs Substantial Revision
2 - Needs Revision in most areas
3 - Needs moderate revision in some areas
4 - Needs minor revision
5 - No revision
Cohesion and Flow
Difficult to understand; no topic sentences or transitions
Connection of ideas is difficult to follow; shifting focus; scarce transitions
Minor problems with cohesion; overall, paragraph structure and sentences are clear
Logical sequence of ideas; topic sentences are supported with evidence; frequent use of transitions
Clear and easy to understand; "sense of wholeness;" information presented in logical order with connection between ideas
APA
APA style is rarely followed; numerous APA errors
APA style is present, but inconsistently used
APA style used throughout; common errors exhibited
APA style is used consistently and with few errors
APA style is exemplary and used appropriately
Voice and Grammar
Informal/personal voice; uses other scholars' voices through direct quotes; numerous spelling/grammar errros
Voice occasionally appropriate for scholarly writing; grammar errors found on almost every page
Attention and effort evident in voice; good understanding of audience; occasional grammar errors
Scholarly voice is present; attention and effort given to grammar; tense is consistent
Voice is appropriate for topic, purpose and audience; exemplary spelling and grammar; consistent tense; appropriate complex sentence structure

28. Summary We direct all queries to the student and cc: the chair.
We ask that you ensure all the straightforward patterns are attended to in all chapters or sections and that you discuss the recommended ones with the student.
We ask that you and the student use the checklist we send back as a guide to the required changes throughout.

29. What you can do to help early on
Encourage students to contact the editors for help on proposal drafts. Appointments with the editors are made through the Walden scheduling system, accessible from their MyWalden portal.
For answers to questions about APA style, we’re an message away. Responses are sent within 24 hours.

30. We All Want To Help Our Students
Questions? Concerns?
Martha King Manager of the Editing Services Questions for the Editors Review of a Proposal Chapter Draft MyWalden portal, Academics tab