Task
For your signature assignment, you have to write an op-ed piece that is relevant to business (broadly defined, including entrepreneurship) business law and/or policy. An op-ed is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper. Op-eds give an informed viewpoint on a topic that is of interest to the writer, and also of interest to the general public. The topic and the opinion in your article are entirely up to you. Please feel free to run your idea by me before you start writing, but don’t feel required to do so. In choosing a topic you may think about anything we have discussed in class, anything in the textbook that we have discussed or are scheduled to discuss, any topic outside of class that is of general interest to you, personally. The only requirement on the topic is that it be on an issue impacting business or business law and/or policy. Since business law covers such a vast area, you may have many ideas to consider, from which you will select one to develop. For more clarity on the wide range of topics you are free to consider, here’s a list of just a few possibilities:
the music business
the fashion industry
Sports industry
technology
the importance of educating minority youth/women about entrepreneurship
employment discrimination in hiring and the workplace
alternative dispute resolution
Why or why not corporations should think less about shareholder value and more about social engagement in their communities
How a course like Business Law II is relevant to your broader NJCU School of Business curriculum
How a course like Business Law II should be taught in order to make it more relevant to your broader NJCU School of Business curriculum
The benefits or the downsides of allowing a large company like Uber squeeze out local or independent taxi drivers
As you can see from the above short list, the purpose is to give you the freedom to write about something that you feel passionate about and want to share your viewpoints with others in an informed and reasoned way. Writing an op-ed is an example of civic engagement. In writing an op-ed, private citizens are given an opportunity to express their views, and maybe influence others to their way of thinking.
To stress (once again): While op-eds are written to express authors’ opinions, they also contain information. This information could be facts, statistics, summaries of academic research, or quotes attributed to knowledgeable people in the field. Your goal when writing an op-ed is to convince your audience, so it is in your best interest to only use persuasive information from reliable sources.