Thesis - Introduction as writing sample?

[HermoineG]

Hi people,

Is it okay to submit the introduction section of my thesis proposal as writing sample? Thank you!

 

 

[fuzzylogician]

In all likelihood that will not be a good idea. I assume your introduction sets up the problem, discusses why it is important, and sketches roughly what it is that you're going to do in the thesis. If so, it's going to be missing a very important ingredient of a successful writing sample -- actual research. You don't usually provide any details or support for your claims in the introduction, you just say what you're going to do. That's perfectly fine for an intro, but a writing sample should show that you are able to develop a sustained argument for a certain point, not just say that you will. So, I would suggest picking a contentful chapter and, if you would like, appending to that a portion of the intro or writing a short summary of what happened in previous chapters. 

[HermoineG]

Thanks fuzzylogician. That makes complete sense. Based on this, I have another question about picking content-ful chapter. I have written a paper that is currently under review for publication. I've written that entire paper and revised it but I'm the second author on it (for political reasons).  The first author, in all likelihood, has never even read the entire paper. Would it be okay to submit it as my writing sample - just the discussion section of it after giving some background about the question and research methods? Appreciate any thoughts you might have on this. Thanks!

[fuzzylogician]

It's always dangerous to submit a co-authored paper as a writing sample, because there will be obvious questions of who actually did the work and the writing. If you have the support of your advisor and, as you say, you did the bulk of the work yourself, it could be a good option. You will want to submit a short summary along with the paper stating exactly what your contributions are. It could be a supplement, or sometimes it can be done as a simple footnote at the beginning of the paper: "X conceived of the idea, did all the work, and wrote up the paper; Y got a free ride" (or, you know, something more subtle to that effect), and you should have your advisor also address that in his/her LOR, so there is no doubt. If this mysterious first author is your advisor or if you otherwise think you might not have your advisor's support in submitting this paper, then I would advise against it. If the adcom suspects that it's really your advisor or the other author who did the work or the writing, then your writing sample could be discounted or wholly disregarded. 

If this paper is based on a chapter of your thesis, I would say another perhaps safer option is to submit the chapter and add a note that it's been revised for publication and has been submitted to Journal X. Either way, I'd probably say submit the whole paper/chapter, even if it's longer than the page limit, along with instructions to concentrate on pages X-Y (and perhaps a short summary of the background and methods). The choice would partly depend on how much the paper has been revised/improved compared to the chapter, along with the authorship concern. 

[HermoineG]

Thank you fuzzylogician! I was busy with my the beast - GRE!

I think I'll talk to my advisor about it. My advisor is not the first author and knows that I've written the paper. But then, 4 others reviewed it and suggested modifications. So I guess you are right. I don't think I can send this paper as my sole work.

I think I'll have to modify my other work that I submitted for a class and send that one in. Thanks for your insights! Its been really helpful.