David L. Jaffe, MS
Lathrop Library Classroom 282
Tuesdays & Thursdays from 4:30 to 5:50pm PT

Report Writing Tips

General:

• Refer to Mid-Term Team Project Report and End-of-Term Project Report for suggested section titles
• Organize the report to "tell the story"
• Strive for readability rather than bulk (large number of pages)
• Be concise
• Black text, no background
• Use 1.5 line spacing
• Choose 11 or 12 point sans-serif font
• Do not use any font colors other than black
• Use one column of text
• Employ reasonable margins
• Do not use "justified" paragraph formatting
• Refer to example mid-term and end-of term reports

Cover Page:

• Include team members' photos and names. Photos could be individual images or a composite photo with Project Suggestor.
• List team member's names in the order they appear in the photo
• List Project Name, Team Name, Course Name, Year, and "Mid-Term Report" or "End-of-Term Report". Center this text.
• Exclude a page number
• Use a larger font

Table of Contents:

• Exclude a page number

Figures and Tables:

• Scan, rather than take photos of sketches
• Use the Design Group copier to scan sketches
• Use the Design Group copier or Photoshop or Photoshop Elements to add contrast and remove background from sketches - here are instructions
• Use this information and software applications to process scanned drawings and images
  • A Linux Guide to Book Scanning
  • ScanTailor: includes a feature to "de-warp" "curved" images due to the book binding
  • Spreads: modular workflow assistant for book digitization
• Re-draw sketches that can't be made legible
• Include "call-outs" to point to and describe important features in figures and tables
• Figures (photos and sketches) and tables (charts and graphs) should be inserted in the body of the report, not in a separate section at the end
• Embedding figures and tables within the body of the report is ok
• Flow text around figures and tables
• Scale figures and tables as appropriate for the page
• Insert figures and tables near where they are referred to in report body

Captions:

• Refer to Caption Tips for instructions on how to insert figures and tables and create captions
• Each figure and table should have a descriptive caption beginning with: "Table 1", "Figure 3" to refer to them in the body of the report
• It is ok to "bundle" related figures with designations: "Figure 1a", "Figure 1b", etc
• Single-space caption text
• Captions should be no wider than the figure
• Captions should be brief and not include narrative text

Body:

• Insert a blank line between paragraphs
• Break up long paragraphs
• Break up concentrations of text with figures or photos
• Start a new section on a new page rather than on the very bottom of the current page
• Avoid having an isolated single line of text from a paragraph at the bottom of the page

Content:

• Begin with a description of the problem / challenge
• Name your device so you can easily refer to it
• Adopt a professional and scientific tone
• Avoid hype
• Define what is meant by "innovative" or "innovation" or other "marketing" words
• Avoid colloquialisms such as "doable", "awesome", "fantastic", "pain-point", "lock-down", "on the other hand", "a lot of", etc
• Include justifications for all your decisions
• Include reasons for your judgments
• Include references for all quotable material
• Strive to be concise by merging sentences
• Avoid repetition, duplication, and redundancy
• Avoid repetition, duplication, and redundancy
• Delete "in order to" if removing it does not change the the sentence's meaning
• Use past tense when referring to completed activities
• Avoid cliches like the plague 
• Compare your project prototype to existing products

Bibliography:

• Single space reference items
• Insert blank line between references
• Examples of adding references in the body of the report
  • ... end of sentence. [7]
  • ... end of sentence. [7, 8, 9]
• Example of listing url references in the Bibliography
  • [7]    Reference
  • References can use any format, but must remain consistent throughout Bibliography
• Employ this method for listing url references in the Bibliography
  • Include both the webpage title and url
  • Make the url "clickable"

  Example:

      [7]    Perspectives in Assistive Technology Homepage
              http://engr110.stanford.edu

Appendix:

• Insert calculations, analyses, and supporting figures, photos, tables, and Bill of Materials here

Other:

• Have someone outside your team proofread your report
• Include corrections to your mid-term report in your end-of-term report
• Email your report in Word and/or pdf format

Updated 12/29/2022