First, a grad student would probably refer to him/herself as a grad student, not “a college student enrolled in a masters level history program”. I suppose it’s possible this is an undergrad taking 1-2 grad level courses and being pretentious by calling this a “program”, though.
Second, in my experience it’s more common for grad level assignments to come with a maximum page/word count rather than a minimum. A grad student should be able to ramble on for 15+ pages pretty easily. I remember having more than one assignment where I wrote the paper the way I wanted to write it first, then had to brutally edit it down to fit within the maximum word count.
Beyond that, the other specifications for the papers sound like undergrad assignments to me. I’m a university librarian, so I deal with plenty of undergrads who need help finding their five non-Wikipedia sources. But I’d be a bit surprised if a professor in a grad level History course bothered to specify a minimum number of sources or explain that Wikipedia wasn’t going to cut it.
I considered that. But I figured if the instructor is scrutinizing these papers to the extent that he’d catch something like that, then this guys’ already in trouble. Three papers written in a week by somebody who isn’t in the course are going to have some major tip-offs. The guy’s only hope is that the papers are being graded by some bored assistant who’s doing a half-assed job.
I’m torn on this. It may be a really crappy program or a fake. I’m not in grad school but in my undergrad I work with professors one- on-one with assignments preparing me for grad school. I can’t imagine them having me do a review and then providing me with specific questions. At this stage any student should be able to knock out a review without any prompting.
I’m confused by the citation format. I’ve only ever seen Chicago used. Even books from an academic press are all in Chicago. APA? Why? Heck, I had one teacher assign MLA and that threw me off completely.
Can I ask, what kind of program, and what was your goal?
It’s just that in the sciences, a Master’s degree is usually a consolation prize for getting kicked out of a PhD program (or you get a Master’s along with your PhD); there really aren’t any programs designed to give a Masters of Physics or whatever.
A thesis program in Canadian history. I had ultimately intended to get my Ph.D and applied for several programs, but declined my acceptances. I realized I didn’t want to fight the academic battles and scrounge for scraps in the crumbling Arts programs.
The arts are not like that. Some Masters programs are designed to be a terminal degree–usually coursework-based or report-based ones. Thesis programs are generally intended to precede a PhD program in order to prepare you for writing a major dissertation. In some cases your Master’s thesis can actually become part of your PhD dissertation. It is certainly not a “consolation prize.”
And in general, grad school in Canada is not like that – it’s not common to go straight from a bachelor’s degree to a PhD program, even in the sciences.