Step By Step Guide On How To Write A Concept Paper For Research Writing a concept paper serves as an efficient way to present the introduction and basic concept of any thesis/project, etc. that a doctoral student or student group wishes to pursue. However, often the students/student groups may have no knowledge on how to write a concept paper, how it is helpful, what is its purpose, etc. This article serves to tell how to write a concept paper for research and provides essential tips to keep in mind while writing a concept paper. But first, you should know what a concept paper is. A concept paper has the purpose of being a prologue to a full research paper. The paper is expected to be relatively short, and most are 2 to 5 pages long. An academic concept paper has one objective: to attract potential sponsors and possibly get them to fund your project or adopt your idea. A phd concept paper essentially saves time as the review/thesis panel may decide against sponsoring your project.
Steps to Write a Concept Paper Officially, there are no steps or set of rules that one needs to keep in mind when writing a concept paper. However, writing a paper that is concise and passionately explains your thesis/project is important. To ensure this, certain steps should be adhered to. The steps to be followed when writing a concept paper are given below: ● Create a rough structure of the paper and decide where to start and how to finish your paper. ● Decide on a sponsor or the sponsors you would approach with your paper. Choose a sponsor whose mission coincides with the ideas discussed in your project.
● Now, you need to start writing your paper. As a start, it is advisable to outline the problem or idea that your project focuses on. Place it into appropriate context and elaborate on why it is important. This allows your sponsors to recognize the basic concept of your project. ● Once you have stated your problem/idea, you need to explain your reason or reasons for venturing into the project. This is called presenting your rationale to the panel.
● Upon establishing the purpose of your project, you need to define how your project would work and explain your hypothesis or the basics involved with your method. Include a timeline for your project as well. This helps the sponsor understand your project better. ● After this, provide a general but well-structured analysis on the initial budget required for your project. This analysis helps justify the need to fund your project and allows the sponsor to decide whether your project has scope or not. ● Include contact info at the end of the paper so that the sponsors can reach out to you. Include your email, phone number, home address, etc. ● Proofreading your concept paper multiple times is necessary. This helps identify and consequently rectify your errors if any. ● If you are a group of students, establish the role of each student before writing the paper. Decide on which student writes the paper, who does the research involved, who contacts the sponsors, etc. Defining the role of each person will reduce confusion and increase overall efficiency.
Tips for Efficient Writing Clear and ardent concept paper writing is imperative if you want your sponsors to fund your project. An idea, no matter how innovative, is rendered useless if it isn’t properly explained. Given below are some tips to ensure that you write a paper that convinces the sponsor to fund your project: ● Start your paper with an attention-grabbing fact or statement that is related to the problem or idea your project focuses on. This helps ignite interest in the sponsors in the beginning. ● Emphasizing the uniqueness of your project helps you stand out among competitors in front of your sponsors and gives you a distinct advantage. ● Giving detailed examples on how you would review your project at different stages would show your sponsors that you are serious about your project. This would lend credibility to your paper as well. ● Ending with a project summary helps the sponsor retrospect and put each component of your project into perspective. ● The concept paper should be neat and tidy. ● The language of the paper is very important. It should indicate that you are confident in your project. Another vital factor is the vocabulary you
use. For general organizations, usage of scientific terminology should be reduced and key concepts must be properly explained. However, for sponsors such as a scientific institution, using technical jargon is better. Strict devotion to these tips would drastically increase the chances of the sponsors approving your project.
You can look on more informations about concept papers here: http://www.conceptpaper.org/