Preparing a proposal that will get approved without many objections is a challenge for most research candidates. Get complete information on the guidelines that your college follows regarding length and writing style for a proposal. While some candidates write the proposal before they actually start working on the project, it is wise to do some groundwork prior to penning down the proposal. This will help you face the committee’s questions satisfactorily.
Keeping in mind the following tips will enable you to get the proposal approved without hassles:
Follow the Format
Every college has a definite format for the proposal, which is similar to that prescribed for PhD dissertation. The most usual format is:
Title page
Abstract
Introduction/ Problem statement
Literature review
Research methodology and design
Conclusion
The chapters have to be in the specific sequence and within the required word limit. The presentation aspects like font size and style, headers and pagination also need to be perfect.
Select Relevant Resources
Be very careful while choosing the resources that you will use for research. The literature review chapter is crucial in a proposal as it builds the base of research. The committee must be sure that your references are reliable, relevant, recent and free from plagiarism. You may need to get a minimum number of references, as required by the college. Apart from online resources and library, you can access unpublished as well as published articles of prior researchers.
Provide Citations
Apart from choosing references, citing them as per the proper style is also important. Most colleges use APA style; however, you may be asked to follow any other style like MLA, AMA, AP, ACS, Harvard, etc. Make sure that you follow the same for literature review as well as bibliography.
Prepare Strong Research Design
The research design and methodology that you present in the proposal will reveal to the committee the strength of the study that you are about to undertake. It must be detailed and rationale for choosing a methodology over others must be stated.
The data collection and analysis methods, as well as dependent and independent variables, must also be identified here. The assumptions used for study must be free from validity issues.
Write with precision, using scholarly language and highlight the reasons for your study in the abstract. Lastly, edit and revise the proposal before presenting it.