Writing Homework Help

Using John Rawls’s Veil of Ignorance as your framework, write a mini-paper (no less than 4 pages, no more than 6 pages) explaining your decision to the case below.

** You must have a title page with your name (this does not count as one of the 4 to 6 pages)

** You must use at least 5 external sources in your paper (three of which MUST be scholarly—academic journals or academic books), in addition to the sources you find in the notes on John Rawls. A biography of Rawls or the dictionary do not count as other sources. When citing other sources, you must do so in APA (American Psychological Association) style. APA is not to be confused with AP (Associated Press) style. APA style is the preferred writing style for academic research. When citing other sources, you must also have a bibliography page (this does not count as one of the 4 to 6 pages). The entries in your bibliography page must be in alphabetical order.

** 4 pages do not mean 3 pages and a few paragraphs on a fourth page. You must write at least 4 full pages (top to bottom), 12-point font in Times New Roman, with one-inch margins side to side, top to bottom. Your paper’s lines must be double-spaced.

** 3 points will be counted against you for each misspelled word, grammatical mistake, and/or awkward sentence. You are in graduate school and should be able to write well. Please refer to the proper usage of subject/verb agreements, proper usage of antecedent/pronoun agreements, and proper usage of the apostrophe located in the Week One module.

** Do not give a bio of John Rawls or a summary of the case. However, you must reference Rawls and his perspective in your paper and discuss how his perspective plays a role in your decision of the case.

The Case of the Overtime Sports Editor

You are the editor of a suburban daily newspaper with 25,000 subscribers. You have an editorial staff of 10, including a sports editor who covers all junior high and senior high school sports in town with the help of a part-time sports reporter and a few reporter stringers. There are two high schools and three junior high schools in town, which are the focus of the sports coverage.

The sports editor, who has been with the newspaper for five years, is in his mid-20s and is well liked by the staff and the community. The coaches and schools especially like him because of his tireless energy in covering their sports activities. He is a hard-working sports editor who manages to communicate well with those on his beat.

As editor, you have been with the newspaper for a year, and you work for a publisher who respects the newsroom’s autonomy yet also wants it to stay within its budget. Your editorial costs have been exceeding the budget since you arrived and the main reason is staff overtime. Unfortunately, the person for the lion’s share of that overtime is the sports editor.

The reason is clear and legitimate, at least to the sports editor. He routinely works 12-14 hour days trying to cover all he is responsible for. He is literally a workaholic and doesn’t seem to know when to stop. Oftentimes, you have come in to work at 8am only to find asleep at his desk from working late into the night. He knows he is good, He often shoots his own photographs because he likes his shots better than the other photographers on staff. He lays out his own pages and writes all headlines and photograph captions. The result is an award-winning sports section. But, he is also sending overtime rocketing off the charts.

You have talked with him about the situation a number ot times, but he doesn’t see a problem. He answers you with, “I bring a lot of readers to the sports section,” and “You can trust the fact that I get the job done right.”

At one time, you even hired a full-time sports reporter to help him. But, the sports editor did not trust the other guy because he was from out of town and did not know the local sports scene yet. It resulted in the sports editor not using the reporter at all. So, you moved the new reporter into a news slot when he was needed.

But now you have a new hire to justify to the company and you still have the sports editor’s customary 30 hours of weekly overtime to deal with. You have already limited everyone else to a maximum of 5 overtime hours each week, and they are not happy with that the sports editor is still grinding out his 30 hours. What are you going to do about it and what are the possible implications of your actions?