Formatting a University Term Paper Project

Every university term paper is to be formatted correctly and there are various types of formats that students use to prepare their papers. The Modern Language Association format is primarily used for humanities term papers while the American Psychological Association style is used for most scientific papers. Most professors require students to include a title page where in the middle of the paper they would type their name, title of the term paper, name of course, course number and date. Students should also type the paper in a 12 font size and they usually double space when typing the paper.

How To Use APA Format

In an APA-style paper, you would have the title page, an abstract about the purpose of the term paper, introduction that includes appendices and methodology and a page to place references on. When you type citations of research sources, you would include the authors' last names along with the year of publication in the paper. For example, you would type (Jones 1980) in the term paper when using APA style. When typing the works cited page, you want to type the author's last and first name, the year the work was published, the title and page number.

MLA Formatting Guidelines

The font should always be Times New Roman and the font size is 12. You want the term paper to have one-inch margins on all sides and you should double space the paper. Near the top corner of each page you would include your last name and page number. Each paragraph should be indented by four spaces and you would refer to an instruction book on MLA style to type the works cited page in this format.

Chicago Style Rules

This formatting style comes from the University of Chicago and it is used in humanities papers by some students and scholars. You want to include the citation at the end of the paragraph in parentheses and the citation must have the author's last name and year the work was published. If you're referencing a newspaper or magazine article, you would write the title of the article along with the year it was published.

Conclusion

Proper formatting is essential for term papers because it makes them look organized and credible to the professors. You want to proofread the term paper to ensure that you followed all formatting guidelines and that you used the most credible research sources.