Show that you understand the current state of research on your topic.
The length of a research proposal can vary quite a bit. A bachelor’s or master’s thesis proposal can be just a few pages, while proposals for PhD dissertations or research funding are usually much longer and more detailed. Your supervisor can help you determine the best length for your work.
One trick to get started is to think of your proposal’s structure as a shorter version of your thesis or dissertation , only without the results , conclusion and discussion sections.
Download our research proposal template
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Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We’ve included a few for you below.
Like your dissertation or thesis, the proposal will usually have a title page that includes:
The first part of your proposal is the initial pitch for your project. Make sure it succinctly explains what you want to do and why.
Your introduction should:
To guide your introduction , include information about:
As you get started, it’s important to demonstrate that you’re familiar with the most important research on your topic. A strong literature review shows your reader that your project has a solid foundation in existing knowledge or theory. It also shows that you’re not simply repeating what other people have already done or said, but rather using existing research as a jumping-off point for your own.
In this section, share exactly how your project will contribute to ongoing conversations in the field by:
Following the literature review, restate your main objectives . This brings the focus back to your own project. Next, your research design or methodology section will describe your overall approach, and the practical steps you will take to answer your research questions.
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To finish your proposal on a strong note, explore the potential implications of your research for your field. Emphasize again what you aim to contribute and why it matters.
For example, your results might have implications for:
Last but not least, your research proposal must include correct citations for every source you have used, compiled in a reference list . To create citations quickly and easily, you can use our free APA citation generator .
Some institutions or funders require a detailed timeline of the project, asking you to forecast what you will do at each stage and how long it may take. While not always required, be sure to check the requirements of your project.
Here’s an example schedule to help you get started. You can also download a template at the button below.
Download our research schedule template
Research phase | Objectives | Deadline |
---|---|---|
1. Background research and literature review | 20th January | |
2. Research design planning | and data analysis methods | 13th February |
3. Data collection and preparation | with selected participants and code interviews | 24th March |
4. Data analysis | of interview transcripts | 22nd April |
5. Writing | 17th June | |
6. Revision | final work | 28th July |
If you are applying for research funding, chances are you will have to include a detailed budget. This shows your estimates of how much each part of your project will cost.
Make sure to check what type of costs the funding body will agree to cover. For each item, include:
To determine your budget, think about:
If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.
Methodology
Statistics
Research bias
Once you’ve decided on your research objectives , you need to explain them in your paper, at the end of your problem statement .
Keep your research objectives clear and concise, and use appropriate verbs to accurately convey the work that you will carry out for each one.
I will compare …
A research aim is a broad statement indicating the general purpose of your research project. It should appear in your introduction at the end of your problem statement , before your research objectives.
Research objectives are more specific than your research aim. They indicate the specific ways you’ll address the overarching aim.
A PhD, which is short for philosophiae doctor (doctor of philosophy in Latin), is the highest university degree that can be obtained. In a PhD, students spend 3–5 years writing a dissertation , which aims to make a significant, original contribution to current knowledge.
A PhD is intended to prepare students for a career as a researcher, whether that be in academia, the public sector, or the private sector.
A master’s is a 1- or 2-year graduate degree that can prepare you for a variety of careers.
All master’s involve graduate-level coursework. Some are research-intensive and intend to prepare students for further study in a PhD; these usually require their students to write a master’s thesis . Others focus on professional training for a specific career.
Critical thinking refers to the ability to evaluate information and to be aware of biases or assumptions, including your own.
Like information literacy , it involves evaluating arguments, identifying and solving problems in an objective and systematic way, and clearly communicating your ideas.
The best way to remember the difference between a research plan and a research proposal is that they have fundamentally different audiences. A research plan helps you, the researcher, organize your thoughts. On the other hand, a dissertation proposal or research proposal aims to convince others (e.g., a supervisor, a funding body, or a dissertation committee) that your research topic is relevant and worthy of being conducted.
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Learning objectives.
Writing a good research paper takes time, thought, and effort. Although this assignment is challenging, it is manageable. Focusing on one step at a time will help you develop a thoughtful, informative, well-supported research paper.
Your first step is to choose a topic and then to develop research questions, a working thesis, and a written research proposal. Set aside adequate time for this part of the process. Fully exploring ideas will help you build a solid foundation for your paper.
When you choose a topic for a research paper, you are making a major commitment. Your choice will help determine whether you enjoy the lengthy process of research and writing—and whether your final paper fulfills the assignment requirements. If you choose your topic hastily, you may later find it difficult to work with your topic. By taking your time and choosing carefully, you can ensure that this assignment is not only challenging but also rewarding.
Writers understand the importance of choosing a topic that fulfills the assignment requirements and fits the assignment’s purpose and audience. (For more information about purpose and audience, see Chapter 6 “Writing Paragraphs: Separating Ideas and Shaping Content” .) Choosing a topic that interests you is also crucial. You instructor may provide a list of suggested topics or ask that you develop a topic on your own. In either case, try to identify topics that genuinely interest you.
After identifying potential topic ideas, you will need to evaluate your ideas and choose one topic to pursue. Will you be able to find enough information about the topic? Can you develop a paper about this topic that presents and supports your original ideas? Is the topic too broad or too narrow for the scope of the assignment? If so, can you modify it so it is more manageable? You will ask these questions during this preliminary phase of the research process.
Sometimes, your instructor may provide a list of suggested topics. If so, you may benefit from identifying several possibilities before committing to one idea. It is important to know how to narrow down your ideas into a concise, manageable thesis. You may also use the list as a starting point to help you identify additional, related topics. Discussing your ideas with your instructor will help ensure that you choose a manageable topic that fits the requirements of the assignment.
In this chapter, you will follow a writer named Jorge, who is studying health care administration, as he prepares a research paper. You will also plan, research, and draft your own research paper.
Jorge was assigned to write a research paper on health and the media for an introductory course in health care. Although a general topic was selected for the students, Jorge had to decide which specific issues interested him. He brainstormed a list of possibilities.
If you are writing a research paper for a specialized course, look back through your notes and course activities. Identify reading assignments and class discussions that especially engaged you. Doing so can help you identify topics to pursue.
Set a timer for five minutes. Use brainstorming or idea mapping to create a list of topics you would be interested in researching for a paper about the influence of the Internet on social networking. Do you closely follow the media coverage of a particular website, such as Twitter? Would you like to learn more about a certain industry, such as online dating? Which social networking sites do you and your friends use? List as many ideas related to this topic as you can.
Once you have a list of potential topics, you will need to choose one as the focus of your essay. You will also need to narrow your topic. Most writers find that the topics they listed during brainstorming or idea mapping are broad—too broad for the scope of the assignment. Working with an overly broad topic, such as sexual education programs or popularized diets, can be frustrating and overwhelming. Each topic has so many facets that it would be impossible to cover them all in a college research paper. However, more specific choices, such as the pros and cons of sexual education in kids’ television programs or the physical effects of the South Beach diet, are specific enough to write about without being too narrow to sustain an entire research paper.
A good research paper provides focused, in-depth information and analysis. If your topic is too broad, you will find it difficult to do more than skim the surface when you research it and write about it. Narrowing your focus is essential to making your topic manageable. To narrow your focus, explore your topic in writing, conduct preliminary research, and discuss both the topic and the research with others.
“How am I supposed to narrow my topic when I haven’t even begun researching yet?” In fact, you may already know more than you realize. Review your list and identify your top two or three topics. Set aside some time to explore each one through freewriting. (For more information about freewriting, see Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” .) Simply taking the time to focus on your topic may yield fresh angles.
Jorge knew that he was especially interested in the topic of diet fads, but he also knew that it was much too broad for his assignment. He used freewriting to explore his thoughts so he could narrow his topic. Read Jorge’s ideas.
Another way writers may focus a topic is to conduct preliminary research . Like freewriting, exploratory reading can help you identify interesting angles. Surfing the web and browsing through newspaper and magazine articles are good ways to start. Find out what people are saying about your topic on blogs and online discussion groups. Discussing your topic with others can also inspire you. Talk about your ideas with your classmates, your friends, or your instructor.
Jorge’s freewriting exercise helped him realize that the assigned topic of health and the media intersected with a few of his interests—diet, nutrition, and obesity. Preliminary online research and discussions with his classmates strengthened his impression that many people are confused or misled by media coverage of these subjects.
Jorge decided to focus his paper on a topic that had garnered a great deal of media attention—low-carbohydrate diets. He wanted to find out whether low-carbohydrate diets were as effective as their proponents claimed.
At work, you may need to research a topic quickly to find general information. This information can be useful in understanding trends in a given industry or generating competition. For example, a company may research a competitor’s prices and use the information when pricing their own product. You may find it useful to skim a variety of reliable sources and take notes on your findings.
The reliability of online sources varies greatly. In this exploratory phase of your research, you do not need to evaluate sources as closely as you will later. However, use common sense as you refine your paper topic. If you read a fascinating blog comment that gives you a new idea for your paper, be sure to check out other, more reliable sources as well to make sure the idea is worth pursuing.
Review the list of topics you created in Note 11.18 “Exercise 1” and identify two or three topics you would like to explore further. For each of these topics, spend five to ten minutes writing about the topic without stopping. Then review your writing to identify possible areas of focus.
Set aside time to conduct preliminary research about your potential topics. Then choose a topic to pursue for your research paper.
Collaboration
Please share your topic list with a classmate. Select one or two topics on his or her list that you would like to learn more about and return it to him or her. Discuss why you found the topics interesting, and learn which of your topics your classmate selected and why.
Your freewriting and preliminary research have helped you choose a focused, manageable topic for your research paper. To work with your topic successfully, you will need to determine what exactly you want to learn about it—and later, what you want to say about it. Before you begin conducting in-depth research, you will further define your focus by developing a research question , a working thesis, and a research proposal.
In forming a research question, you are setting a goal for your research. Your main research question should be substantial enough to form the guiding principle of your paper—but focused enough to guide your research. A strong research question requires you not only to find information but also to put together different pieces of information, interpret and analyze them, and figure out what you think. As you consider potential research questions, ask yourself whether they would be too hard or too easy to answer.
To determine your research question, review the freewriting you completed earlier. Skim through books, articles, and websites and list the questions you have. (You may wish to use the 5WH strategy to help you formulate questions. See Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” for more information about 5WH questions.) Include simple, factual questions and more complex questions that would require analysis and interpretation. Determine your main question—the primary focus of your paper—and several subquestions that you will need to research to answer your main question.
Here are the research questions Jorge will use to focus his research. Notice that his main research question has no obvious, straightforward answer. Jorge will need to research his subquestions, which address narrower topics, to answer his main question.
Using the topic you selected in Note 11.24 “Exercise 2” , write your main research question and at least four to five subquestions. Check that your main research question is appropriately complex for your assignment.
A working thesis concisely states a writer’s initial answer to the main research question. It does not merely state a fact or present a subjective opinion. Instead, it expresses a debatable idea or claim that you hope to prove through additional research. Your working thesis is called a working thesis for a reason—it is subject to change. As you learn more about your topic, you may change your thinking in light of your research findings. Let your working thesis serve as a guide to your research, but do not be afraid to modify it based on what you learn.
Jorge began his research with a strong point of view based on his preliminary writing and research. Read his working thesis statement, which presents the point he will argue. Notice how it states Jorge’s tentative answer to his research question.
One way to determine your working thesis is to consider how you would complete sentences such as I believe or My opinion is . However, keep in mind that academic writing generally does not use first-person pronouns. These statements are useful starting points, but formal research papers use an objective voice.
Write a working thesis statement that presents your preliminary answer to the research question you wrote in Note 11.27 “Exercise 3” . Check that your working thesis statement presents an idea or claim that could be supported or refuted by evidence from research.
A research proposal is a brief document—no more than one typed page—that summarizes the preliminary work you have completed. Your purpose in writing it is to formalize your plan for research and present it to your instructor for feedback. In your research proposal, you will present your main research question, related subquestions, and working thesis. You will also briefly discuss the value of researching this topic and indicate how you plan to gather information.
When Jorge began drafting his research proposal, he realized that he had already created most of the pieces he needed. However, he knew he also had to explain how his research would be relevant to other future health care professionals. In addition, he wanted to form a general plan for doing the research and identifying potentially useful sources. Read Jorge’s research proposal.
Before you begin a new project at work, you may have to develop a project summary document that states the purpose of the project, explains why it would be a wise use of company resources, and briefly outlines the steps involved in completing the project. This type of document is similar to a research proposal. Both documents define and limit a project, explain its value, discuss how to proceed, and identify what resources you will use.
Now you may write your own research proposal, if you have not done so already. Follow the guidelines provided in this lesson.
Writing for Success Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.
Components of a research proposal.
Research proposals differ in terms of their presentation depending on what each University department requires. In other words, there is no set template for a research proposal. Please contact your lecturer regarding the format you are expected to use for your research proposal.Thus, the components of a research proposal include, but are not limited to those mentioned in this guide.
Try to come up with a title that is unique and at the same time easy to remember. It should also make a lasting impression to the reader and make them want to come back and read your proposal. The title must also capture the main concepts of the study . As the research process is lengthy, it is important that you choose a topic that you are so curious about that you remain motivated for the duration of the research process. Select a topic that you will be able to complete within the time frame that you have for your research.
The background to the topic of your intended research must be clear and precise. It must not only include an in-depth explanation of the key points of your subject but also all the developments in the field as well as their timelines . The researcher must also explain the compelling interest in the research issue as well as the personal interest (if any) in the topic. This section must also indicate the specific area within which the topic falls in your particular field of study or subject . Aslo, how will the proposed study contribute to a particular field? In other words, the impact and the significance in a subject area must be clearly outlined. The target audience must also be clearly described.
It is important that the objectives are in alignment with the research questions. The objectives must indicate what the aim of the research study is. In fact, objectives give you a clear indication of the steps that you will take to achieve the aim of the research. The objectives must be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.
Collect and present relevant literature on your topic of choice. It is important to include all the main authors or experts in a particular field. Depending on your field of study or topic, ensure that you include recent literature as well as literature that presents counterarguments to the topic. The justification for the study needs to based on existing literature. Click here for more information on how to write a literature review.
The researcher must indicate the limitations of the study which are what the researcher cannot do or factors that are beyond the researcher's control, as well as delimitations that the researcher chooses not to address for the purposes of the study. Delimitations are boundaries that the researcher has set for the study. The r easons both for limitations and delimitations must be discussed in this section.
Your schedule for the research must be stated clearly including the projected timelines for the various stages of your study.
All the sources that you have used for your proposal must be listed in alphabetical order using a referencing style that your lecturer has prescribed for your subject field.
Click here for more information on the various reference styles.
This section of the proposal must provide a broad overview of the topic. The jargon and key terms used in the particular topic must also be thoroughly explained in order to avoid confusion. The interest of the researcher in the particular topic must also be clearly outlined while at the same time mentioning, albeit briefly at this point, a critical review of the main literature that covers the topic. The researcher must also provide the aim of the research by clearly and concisely stating the problem, as well as the research questions to be dealt with. This section must also indicate what the research study will not be covering .
The research questions must state clearly what your proposed study is meant to address or answer. Ensure that you use simple language that is easy to understand, while being cognisant of the level of your intended audience .
This section outlines the approach which the researcher will follow in order to address the research problem and to answer all the research questions from the researcher. The research design must be clearly defined, e.g., is the research Descriptive, Correlational, Causal-Comparative/Quasi-Experimental, Experimental, Diagnostic or Explanatory.
State clearly
Research design
Selecting the approach to use
Research approach
Research design and methodology
Importance of research
Attributes of a good research scholar
Summary of different research methodologies
The researcher must provide justification for the need to conduct the study. What is the gap that the study will fill, and what is its contribution to the existing body of knowledge? The originality and importance of the research which will be level appropriate, must be clearly described, for instance, the required level of originality for a fourth year research project is different to that of a doctoral candidate.
The impact of the study for the subject field must be indicated. In other words, how will the research improve the field, who will it impact, how will it make changes in your industy or field etc.? Lastly, the proposed resaerch must be relatable , interesting and engaging .
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Chapter 14: The Research Proposal
Krathwohl (2005) suggests and describes a variety of components to include in a research proposal. The following sections – Introductions, Background and significance, Literature Review; Research design and methods, Preliminary suppositions and implications; and Conclusion present these components in a suggested template for you to follow in the preparation of your research proposal.
The introduction sets the tone for what follows in your research proposal – treat it as the initial pitch of your idea. After reading the introduction your reader should:
As you begin writing your research proposal, it is helpful to think of the introduction as a narrative of what it is you want to do, written in one to three paragraphs. Within those one to three paragraphs, it is important to briefly answer the following questions:
Note : You may be asked by your instructor to include an abstract with your research proposal. In such cases, an abstract should provide an overview of what it is you plan to study, your main research question, a brief explanation of your methods to answer the research question, and your expected findings. All of this information must be carefully crafted in 150 to 250 words. A word of advice is to save the writing of your abstract until the very end of your research proposal preparation. If you are asked to provide an abstract, you should include 5 to 7 key words that are of most relevance to your study. List these in order of relevance.
The purpose of this section is to explain the context of your proposal and to describe, in detail, why it is important to undertake this research. Assume that the person or people who will read your research proposal know nothing or very little about the research problem. While you do not need to include all knowledge you have learned about your topic in this section, it is important to ensure that you include the most relevant material that will help to explain the goals of your research.
While there are no hard and fast rules, you should attempt to address some or all of the following key points:
This key component of the research proposal is the most time-consuming aspect in the preparation of your research proposal. As described in Chapter 5 , the literature review provides the background to your study and demonstrates the significance of the proposed research. Specifically, it is a review and synthesis of prior research that is related to the problem you are setting forth to investigate. Essentially, your goal in the literature review is to place your research study within the larger whole of what has been studied in the past, while demonstrating to your reader that your work is original, innovative, and adds to the larger whole.
As the literature review is information dense, it is essential that this section be intelligently structured to enable your reader to grasp the key arguments underpinning your study. However, this can be easier to state and harder to do, simply due to the fact there is usually a plethora of related research to sift through. Consequently, a good strategy for writing the literature review is to break the literature into conceptual categories or themes, rather than attempting to describe various groups of literature you reviewed. Chapter 5 describes a variety of methods to help you organize the themes.
Here are some suggestions on how to approach the writing of your literature review:
It is important to note that a significant challenge related to undertaking a literature review is knowing when to stop. As such, it is important to know when you have uncovered the key conceptual categories underlying your research topic. Generally, when you start to see repetition in the conclusions or recommendations, you can have confidence that you have covered all of the significant conceptual categories in your literature review. However, it is also important to acknowledge that researchers often find themselves returning to the literature as they collect and analyze their data. For example, an unexpected finding may develop as you collect and/or analyze the data; in this case, it is important to take the time to step back and review the literature again, to ensure that no other researchers have found a similar finding. This may include looking to research outside your field.
This situation occurred with one of this textbook’s authors’ research related to community resilience. During the interviews, the researchers heard many participants discuss individual resilience factors and how they believed these individual factors helped make the community more resilient, overall. Sheppard and Williams (2016) had not discovered these individual factors in their original literature review on community and environmental resilience. However, when they returned to the literature to search for individual resilience factors, they discovered a small body of literature in the child and youth psychology field. Consequently, Sheppard and Williams had to go back and add a new section to their literature review on individual resilience factors. Interestingly, their research appeared to be the first research to link individual resilience factors with community resilience factors.
The objective of this section of the research proposal is to convince the reader that your overall research design and methods of analysis will enable you to solve the research problem you have identified and also enable you to accurately and effectively interpret the results of your research. Consequently, it is critical that the research design and methods section is well-written, clear, and logically organized. This demonstrates to your reader that you know what you are going to do and how you are going to do it. Overall, you want to leave your reader feeling confident that you have what it takes to get this research study completed in a timely fashion.
Essentially, this section of the research proposal should be clearly tied to the specific objectives of your study; however, it is also important to draw upon and include examples from the literature review that relate to your design and intended methods. In other words, you must clearly demonstrate how your study utilizes and builds upon past studies, as it relates to the research design and intended methods. For example, what methods have been used by other researchers in similar studies?
While it is important to consider the methods that other researchers have employed, it is equally, if not more, important to consider what methods have not been but could be employed. Remember, the methods section is not simply a list of tasks to be undertaken. It is also an argument as to why and how the tasks you have outlined will help you investigate the research problem and answer your research question(s).
Tips for writing the research design and methods section:
Specify the methodological approaches you intend to employ to obtain information and the techniques you will use to analyze the data.
Specify the research operations you will undertake and the way you will interpret the results of those operations in relation to the research problem.
Go beyond stating what you hope to achieve through the methods you have chosen. State how you will actually implement the methods (i.e., coding interview text, running regression analysis, etc.).
Anticipate and acknowledge any potential barriers you may encounter when undertaking your research, and describe how you will address these barriers.
Explain where you believe you will find challenges related to data collection, including access to participants and information.
The purpose of this section is to argue how you anticipate that your research will refine, revise, or extend existing knowledge in the area of your study. Depending upon the aims and objectives of your study, you should also discuss how your anticipated findings may impact future research. For example, is it possible that your research may lead to a new policy, theoretical understanding, or method for analyzing data? How might your study influence future studies? What might your study mean for future practitioners working in the field? Who or what might benefit from your study? How might your study contribute to social, economic or environmental issues? While it is important to think about and discuss possibilities such as these, it is equally important to be realistic in stating your anticipated findings. In other words, you do not want to delve into idle speculation. Rather, the purpose here is to reflect upon gaps in the current body of literature and to describe how you anticipate your research will begin to fill in some or all of those gaps.
The conclusion reiterates the importance and significance of your research proposal, and provides a brief summary of the entire proposed study. Essentially, this section should only be one or two paragraphs in length. Here is a potential outline for your conclusion:
Discuss why the study should be done. Specifically discuss how you expect your study will advance existing knowledge and how your study is unique.
Explain the specific purpose of the study and the research questions that the study will answer.
Explain why the research design and methods chosen for this study are appropriate, and why other designs and methods were not chosen.
State the potential implications you expect to emerge from your proposed study,
Provide a sense of how your study fits within the broader scholarship currently in existence, related to the research problem.
As with any scholarly research paper, you must cite the sources you used in composing your research proposal. In a research proposal, this can take two forms: a reference list or a bibliography. A reference list lists the literature you referenced in the body of your research proposal. All references in the reference list must appear in the body of the research proposal. Remember, it is not acceptable to say “as cited in …” As a researcher you must always go to the original source and check it for yourself. Many errors are made in referencing, even by top researchers, and so it is important not to perpetuate an error made by someone else. While this can be time consuming, it is the proper way to undertake a literature review.
In contrast, a bibliography , is a list of everything you used or cited in your research proposal, with additional citations to any key sources relevant to understanding the research problem. In other words, sources cited in your bibliography may not necessarily appear in the body of your research proposal. Make sure you check with your instructor to see which of the two you are expected to produce.
Overall, your list of citations should be a testament to the fact that you have done a sufficient level of preliminary research to ensure that your project will complement, but not duplicate, previous research efforts. For social sciences, the reference list or bibliography should be prepared in American Psychological Association (APA) referencing format. Usually, the reference list (or bibliography) is not included in the word count of the research proposal. Again, make sure you check with your instructor to confirm.
Research Methods for the Social Sciences: An Introduction Copyright © 2020 by Valerie Sheppard is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.
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A research proposal is a type of text which maps out a proposed central research problem or question and a suggested approach to its investigation.
In many universities, including RMIT, the research proposal is a formal requirement. It is central to achieving your first milestone: your Confirmation of Candidature. The research proposal is useful for both you and the University: it gives you the opportunity to get valuable feedback about your intended research aims, objectives and design. It also confirms that your proposed research is worth doing, which puts you on track for a successful candidature supported by your School and the University.
Although there may be specific School or disciplinary requirements that you need to be aware of, all research proposals address the following central themes:
Before venturing into writing a research purposal, it is important to think about the purpose and audience of this type of text. Spend a moment or two to reflect on what these might be.
What do you think is the purpose of your research proposal and who is your audience?
The purpose of your research proposal is:
1. To allow experienced researchers (your supervisors and their peers) to assess whether
2. To help you clarify and focus on what you want to do, why you want to do it, and how you’ll do it. The research proposal helps you position yourself as a researcher in your field. It will also allow you to:
The main audience for your research proposal is your reviewers. Universities usually assign a panel of reviewers to which you need to submit your research proposal. Often this is within the first year of study for PhD candidates, and within the first six months for Masters by Research candidates.
Your reviewers may have a strong disciplinary understanding of the area of your proposed research, but depending on your specialisation, they may not. It is therefore important to create a clear context, rationale and framework for your proposed research. Limit jargon and specialist terminology so that non-specialists can comprehend it. You need to convince the reviewers that your proposed research is worth doing and that you will be able to effectively ‘interrogate’ your research questions or address the research problems through your chosen research design.
Your review panel will expect you to demonstrate:
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Home » Research Proposal – Types, Template and Example
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Research proposal is a document that outlines a proposed research project . It is typically written by researchers, scholars, or students who intend to conduct research to address a specific research question or problem.
Research proposals can vary depending on the nature of the research project and the specific requirements of the funding agency, academic institution, or research program. Here are some common types of research proposals:
This is the most common type of research proposal, which is prepared by students, scholars, or researchers to seek approval and funding for an academic research project. It includes all the essential components mentioned earlier, such as the introduction, literature review , methodology , and expected outcomes.
A grant proposal is specifically designed to secure funding from external sources, such as government agencies, foundations, or private organizations. It typically includes additional sections, such as a detailed budget, project timeline, evaluation plan, and a description of the project’s alignment with the funding agency’s priorities and objectives.
Students pursuing a master’s or doctoral degree often need to submit a proposal outlining their intended research for their dissertation or thesis. These proposals are usually more extensive and comprehensive, including an in-depth literature review, theoretical framework, research questions or hypotheses, and a detailed methodology.
This type of proposal is often prepared by researchers or research teams within an organization or institution. It outlines a specific research project that aims to address a particular problem, explore a specific area of interest, or provide insights for decision-making. Research project proposals may include sections on project management, collaboration, and dissemination of results.
Researchers or scholars applying for research fellowships may be required to submit a proposal outlining their proposed research project. These proposals often emphasize the novelty and significance of the research and its alignment with the goals and objectives of the fellowship program.
In cases where researchers from multiple institutions or disciplines collaborate on a research project, a collaborative research proposal is prepared. This proposal highlights the objectives, responsibilities, and contributions of each collaborator, as well as the overall research plan and coordination mechanisms.
A research proposal typically follows a standard outline that helps structure the document and ensure all essential components are included. While the specific headings and subheadings may vary slightly depending on the requirements of your institution or funding agency, the following outline provides a general structure for a research proposal:
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Here’s an example of a research proposal to give you an idea of how it can be structured:
Title: The Impact of Social Media on Adolescent Well-being: A Mixed-Methods Study
This research proposal aims to investigate the impact of social media on the well-being of adolescents. The study will employ a mixed-methods approach, combining quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews to gather comprehensive data. The research objectives include examining the relationship between social media use and mental health, exploring the role of peer influence in shaping online behaviors, and identifying strategies for promoting healthy social media use among adolescents. The findings of this study will contribute to the understanding of the effects of social media on adolescent well-being and inform the development of targeted interventions.
1. Introduction
1.1 Background and Context:
Adolescents today are immersed in social media platforms, which have become integral to their daily lives. However, concerns have been raised about the potential negative impact of social media on their well-being, including increased rates of depression, anxiety, and body dissatisfaction. It is crucial to investigate this phenomenon further and understand the underlying mechanisms to develop effective strategies for promoting healthy social media use among adolescents.
1.2 Research Objectives:
The main objectives of this study are:
2. Literature Review
Extensive research has been conducted on the impact of social media on adolescents. Existing literature suggests that excessive social media use can contribute to negative outcomes, such as low self-esteem, cyberbullying, and addictive behaviors. However, some studies have also highlighted the positive aspects of social media, such as providing opportunities for self-expression and social support. This study will build upon this literature by incorporating both quantitative and qualitative approaches to gain a more nuanced understanding of the relationship between social media and adolescent well-being.
3. Methodology
3.1 Research Design:
This study will adopt a mixed-methods approach, combining quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews. The quantitative phase will involve administering standardized questionnaires to a representative sample of adolescents to assess their social media use, mental health indicators, and perceived social support. The qualitative phase will include in-depth interviews with a subset of participants to explore their experiences, motivations, and perceptions related to social media use.
3.2 Data Collection Methods:
Quantitative data will be collected through an online survey distributed to schools in the target region. The survey will include validated scales to measure social media use, mental health outcomes, and perceived social support. Qualitative data will be collected through semi-structured interviews with a purposive sample of participants. The interviews will be audio-recorded and transcribed for thematic analysis.
3.3 Data Analysis:
Quantitative data will be analyzed using descriptive statistics and regression analysis to examine the relationships between variables. Qualitative data will be analyzed thematically to identify common themes and patterns within participants’ narratives. Integration of quantitative and qualitative findings will provide a comprehensive understanding of the research questions.
4. Timeline
The research project will be conducted over a period of 12 months, divided into specific phases, including literature review, study design, data collection, analysis, and report writing. A detailed timeline outlining the key milestones and activities is provided in Appendix A.
5. Expected Outcomes and Significance
This study aims to contribute to the existing literature on the impact of social media on adolescent well-being by employing a mixed-methods approach. The findings will inform the development of evidence-based interventions and guidelines to promote healthy social media use among adolescents. This research has the potential to benefit adolescents, parents, educators, and policymakers by providing insights into the complex relationship between social media and well-being and offering strategies for fostering positive online experiences.
6. Resources
The resources required for this research include access to a representative sample of adolescents, research assistants for data collection, statistical software for data analysis, and funding to cover survey administration and participant incentives. Ethical considerations will be taken into account, ensuring participant confidentiality and obtaining informed consent.
7. References
Writing a research proposal can be a complex task, but with proper guidance and organization, you can create a compelling and well-structured proposal. Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you through the process:
The length of a research proposal can vary depending on the specific guidelines provided by your institution or funding agency. However, research proposals typically range from 1,500 to 3,000 words, excluding references and any additional supporting documents.
The purpose of a research proposal is to outline and communicate your research project to others, such as academic institutions, funding agencies, or potential collaborators. It serves several important purposes:
The research proposal holds significant importance in the research process. Here are some key reasons why research proposals are important:
The timing of when to write a research proposal can vary depending on the specific requirements and circumstances. However, here are a few common situations when it is appropriate to write a research proposal:
Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer
Detailed Walkthrough + Free Proposal Template
If you’re getting started crafting your research proposal and are looking for a few examples of research proposals , you’ve come to the right place.
In this video, we walk you through two successful (approved) research proposals , one for a Master’s-level project, and one for a PhD-level dissertation. We also start off by unpacking our free research proposal template and discussing the four core sections of a research proposal, so that you have a clear understanding of the basics before diving into the actual proposals.
If you’re working on a research proposal for a dissertation or thesis, you may also find the following useful:
PS – If you’re working on a dissertation, be sure to also check out our collection of dissertation and thesis examples here .
Research proposal example: frequently asked questions, are the sample proposals real.
Yes. The proposals are real and were approved by the respective universities.
As we discuss in the video, every research proposal will be slightly different, depending on the university’s unique requirements, as well as the nature of the research itself. Therefore, you’ll need to tailor your research proposal to suit your specific context.
You can learn more about the basics of writing a research proposal here .
You can access our free proposal template here .
Yes. There is no cost for the proposal template and you are free to use it as a foundation for your research proposal.
For self-directed learners, our Research Proposal Bootcamp is a great starting point.
For students that want hands-on guidance, our private coaching service is recommended.
This post is an extract from our bestselling short course, Research Proposal Bootcamp . If you want to work smart, you don't want to miss this .
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Parts of a research proposal, prosana model, introduction, research question, methodology.
A research proposal's purpose is to capture the evaluator's attention, demonstrate the study's potential benefits, and prove that it is a logical and consistent approach (Van Ekelenburg, 2010). To ensure that your research proposal contains these elements, there are several aspects to include in your proposal (Al-Riyami, 2008):
Details about what to include in each element are included in the boxes below. Depending on the topic of your study, some parts may not apply to your proposal. You can also watch the video below for a brief overview about writing a successful research proposal.
Van Ekelenburg (2010) uses the PROSANA Model to guide researchers in developing rationale and justification for their research projects. It is an acronym that connects the problem, solution, and benefits of a particular research project. It is an easy way to remember the critical parts of a research proposal and how they relate to one another. It includes the following letters (Van Ekelenburg, 2010):
Research proposal titles should be concise and to the point, but informative. The title of your proposal may be different from the title of your final research project, but that is completely normal! Your findings may help you come up with a title that is more fitting for the final project. Characteristics of good proposal titles are (Al-Riyami, 2008):
It is also common for proposal titles to be very similar to your research question, hypothesis, or thesis statement (Locke et al., 2007).
An abstract is a brief summary (about 300 words) of the study you are proposing. It includes the following elements (Al-Riyami, 2008):
Our guide on writing summaries may help you with this step.
The purpose of the introduction is to give readers background information about your topic. it gives the readers a basic understanding of your topic so that they can further understand the significance of your proposal. A good introduction will explain (Al-Riyami, 2008):
Your research objectives are the desired outcomes that you will achieve from the research project. Depending on your research design, these may be generic or very specific. You may also have more than one objective (Al-Riyami, 2008).
Be careful not to have too many objectives in your proposal, as having too many can make your project lose focus. Plus, it may not be possible to achieve several objectives in one study.
This section describes the different types of variables that you plan to have in your study and how you will measure them. According to Al-Riyami (2008), there are four types of research variables:
Your research proposal should describe each of your variables and how they relate to one another. Depending on your study, you may not have all four types of variables present. However, there will always be an independent and dependent variable.
A research question is the main piece of your research project because it explains what your study will discover to the reader. It is the question that fuels the study, so it is important for it to be precise and unique. You do not want it to be too broad, and it should identify a relationship between two variables (an independent and a dependent) (Al-Riyami, 2008). There are six types of research questions (Academic Writer, n.d.):
For more information on the different types of research questions, you can view the "Research Questions and Hypotheses" tutorial on Academic Writer, located below. If you are unfamiliar with Academic Writer, we also have a tutorial on using the database located below.
Compose papers in pre-formatted APA templates. Manage references in forms that help craft APA citations. Learn the rules of APA style through tutorials and practice quizzes.
Academic Writer will continue to use the 6th edition guidelines until August 2020. A preview of the 7th edition is available in the footer of the resource's site. Previously known as APA Style Central.
If you know enough about your research topic that you believe a particular outcome may occur as a result of the study, you can include a hypothesis (thesis statement) in your proposal. A hypothesis is a prediction that you believe will be the outcome of your study. It explains what you think the relationship will be between the independent and dependent variable (Al-Riyami, 2008). It is ok if the hypothesis in your proposal turns out to be incorrect, because it is only a prediction! If you are writing a proposal in the humanities, you may be writing a thesis statement instead of a hypothesis. A thesis presents the main argument of your research project and leads to corresponding evidence to support your argument.
Hypotheses vs. Theories
Hypotheses are different from theories in that theories represent general principles and sets of rules that explain different phenomena. They typically represent large areas of study because they are applicable to anything in a particular field. Hypotheses focus on specific areas within a field and are educated guesses, meaning that they have the potential to be proven wrong (Academic Writer, n.d.). Because of this, hypotheses can also be formed from theories.
For more information on writing effective thesis statements, you can view our guide on writing thesis statements below.
In a research proposal, you must thoroughly explain how you will conduct your study. This includes things such as (Al-Riyami, 2008):
For more information on research methodologies, you can view our guide on research methods and methodologies below.
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Department of Anaesthesiology, Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Writing the proposal of a research work in the present era is a challenging task due to the constantly evolving trends in the qualitative research design and the need to incorporate medical advances into the methodology. The proposal is a detailed plan or ‘blueprint’ for the intended study, and once it is completed, the research project should flow smoothly. Even today, many of the proposals at post-graduate evaluation committees and application proposals for funding are substandard. A search was conducted with keywords such as research proposal, writing proposal and qualitative using search engines, namely, PubMed and Google Scholar, and an attempt has been made to provide broad guidelines for writing a scientifically appropriate research proposal.
A clean, well-thought-out proposal forms the backbone for the research itself and hence becomes the most important step in the process of conduct of research.[ 1 ] The objective of preparing a research proposal would be to obtain approvals from various committees including ethics committee [details under ‘Research methodology II’ section [ Table 1 ] in this issue of IJA) and to request for grants. However, there are very few universally accepted guidelines for preparation of a good quality research proposal. A search was performed with keywords such as research proposal, funding, qualitative and writing proposals using search engines, namely, PubMed, Google Scholar and Scopus.
Five ‘C’s while writing a literature review
A proposal needs to show how your work fits into what is already known about the topic and what new paradigm will it add to the literature, while specifying the question that the research will answer, establishing its significance, and the implications of the answer.[ 2 ] The proposal must be capable of convincing the evaluation committee about the credibility, achievability, practicality and reproducibility (repeatability) of the research design.[ 3 ] Four categories of audience with different expectations may be present in the evaluation committees, namely academic colleagues, policy-makers, practitioners and lay audiences who evaluate the research proposal. Tips for preparation of a good research proposal include; ‘be practical, be persuasive, make broader links, aim for crystal clarity and plan before you write’. A researcher must be balanced, with a realistic understanding of what can be achieved. Being persuasive implies that researcher must be able to convince other researchers, research funding agencies, educational institutions and supervisors that the research is worth getting approval. The aim of the researcher should be clearly stated in simple language that describes the research in a way that non-specialists can comprehend, without use of jargons. The proposal must not only demonstrate that it is based on an intelligent understanding of the existing literature but also show that the writer has thought about the time needed to conduct each stage of the research.[ 4 , 5 ]
The contents or formats of a research proposal vary depending on the requirements of evaluation committee and are generally provided by the evaluation committee or the institution.
In general, a cover page should contain the (i) title of the proposal, (ii) name and affiliation of the researcher (principal investigator) and co-investigators, (iii) institutional affiliation (degree of the investigator and the name of institution where the study will be performed), details of contact such as phone numbers, E-mail id's and lines for signatures of investigators.
The main contents of the proposal may be presented under the following headings: (i) introduction, (ii) review of literature, (iii) aims and objectives, (iv) research design and methods, (v) ethical considerations, (vi) budget, (vii) appendices and (viii) citations.[ 4 ]
It is also sometimes termed as ‘need for study’ or ‘abstract’. Introduction is an initial pitch of an idea; it sets the scene and puts the research in context.[ 6 ] The introduction should be designed to create interest in the reader about the topic and proposal. It should convey to the reader, what you want to do, what necessitates the study and your passion for the topic.[ 7 ] Some questions that can be used to assess the significance of the study are: (i) Who has an interest in the domain of inquiry? (ii) What do we already know about the topic? (iii) What has not been answered adequately in previous research and practice? (iv) How will this research add to knowledge, practice and policy in this area? Some of the evaluation committees, expect the last two questions, elaborated under a separate heading of ‘background and significance’.[ 8 ] Introduction should also contain the hypothesis behind the research design. If hypothesis cannot be constructed, the line of inquiry to be used in the research must be indicated.
It refers to all sources of scientific evidence pertaining to the topic in interest. In the present era of digitalisation and easy accessibility, there is an enormous amount of relevant data available, making it a challenge for the researcher to include all of it in his/her review.[ 9 ] It is crucial to structure this section intelligently so that the reader can grasp the argument related to your study in relation to that of other researchers, while still demonstrating to your readers that your work is original and innovative. It is preferable to summarise each article in a paragraph, highlighting the details pertinent to the topic of interest. The progression of review can move from the more general to the more focused studies, or a historical progression can be used to develop the story, without making it exhaustive.[ 1 ] Literature should include supporting data, disagreements and controversies. Five ‘C's may be kept in mind while writing a literature review[ 10 ] [ Table 1 ].
The research purpose (or goal or aim) gives a broad indication of what the researcher wishes to achieve in the research. The hypothesis to be tested can be the aim of the study. The objectives related to parameters or tools used to achieve the aim are generally categorised as primary and secondary objectives.
The objective here is to convince the reader that the overall research design and methods of analysis will correctly address the research problem and to impress upon the reader that the methodology/sources chosen are appropriate for the specific topic. It should be unmistakably tied to the specific aims of your study.
In this section, the methods and sources used to conduct the research must be discussed, including specific references to sites, databases, key texts or authors that will be indispensable to the project. There should be specific mention about the methodological approaches to be undertaken to gather information, about the techniques to be used to analyse it and about the tests of external validity to which researcher is committed.[ 10 , 11 ]
The components of this section include the following:[ 4 ]
Population refers to all the elements (individuals, objects or substances) that meet certain criteria for inclusion in a given universe,[ 12 ] and sample refers to subset of population which meets the inclusion criteria for enrolment into the study. The inclusion and exclusion criteria should be clearly defined. The details pertaining to sample size are discussed in the article “Sample size calculation: Basic priniciples” published in this issue of IJA.
The researcher is expected to give a detailed account of the methodology adopted for collection of data, which include the time frame required for the research. The methodology should be tested for its validity and ensure that, in pursuit of achieving the results, the participant's life is not jeopardised. The author should anticipate and acknowledge any potential barrier and pitfall in carrying out the research design and explain plans to address them, thereby avoiding lacunae due to incomplete data collection. If the researcher is planning to acquire data through interviews or questionnaires, copy of the questions used for the same should be attached as an annexure with the proposal.
This addresses the strength of the research with respect to its neutrality, consistency and applicability. Rigor must be reflected throughout the proposal.
It refers to the robustness of a research method against bias. The author should convey the measures taken to avoid bias, viz. blinding and randomisation, in an elaborate way, thus ensuring that the result obtained from the adopted method is purely as chance and not influenced by other confounding variables.
Consistency considers whether the findings will be consistent if the inquiry was replicated with the same participants and in a similar context. This can be achieved by adopting standard and universally accepted methods and scales.
Applicability refers to the degree to which the findings can be applied to different contexts and groups.[ 13 ]
This section deals with the reduction and reconstruction of data and its analysis including sample size calculation. The researcher is expected to explain the steps adopted for coding and sorting the data obtained. Various tests to be used to analyse the data for its robustness, significance should be clearly stated. Author should also mention the names of statistician and suitable software which will be used in due course of data analysis and their contribution to data analysis and sample calculation.[ 9 ]
Medical research introduces special moral and ethical problems that are not usually encountered by other researchers during data collection, and hence, the researcher should take special care in ensuring that ethical standards are met. Ethical considerations refer to the protection of the participants' rights (right to self-determination, right to privacy, right to autonomy and confidentiality, right to fair treatment and right to protection from discomfort and harm), obtaining informed consent and the institutional review process (ethical approval). The researcher needs to provide adequate information on each of these aspects.
Informed consent needs to be obtained from the participants (details discussed in further chapters), as well as the research site and the relevant authorities.
When the researcher prepares a research budget, he/she should predict and cost all aspects of the research and then add an additional allowance for unpredictable disasters, delays and rising costs. All items in the budget should be justified.
Appendices are documents that support the proposal and application. The appendices will be specific for each proposal but documents that are usually required include informed consent form, supporting documents, questionnaires, measurement tools and patient information of the study in layman's language.
As with any scholarly research paper, you must cite the sources you used in composing your proposal. Although the words ‘references and bibliography’ are different, they are used interchangeably. It refers to all references cited in the research proposal.
Successful, qualitative research proposals should communicate the researcher's knowledge of the field and method and convey the emergent nature of the qualitative design. The proposal should follow a discernible logic from the introduction to presentation of the appendices.
Conflicts of interest.
There are no conflicts of interest.
The goal of a research proposal is twofold: to present and justify the need to study a research problem and to present the practical ways in which the proposed study should be conducted. The design elements and procedures for conducting research are governed by standards of the predominant discipline in which the problem resides, therefore, the guidelines for research proposals are more exacting and less formal than a general project proposal. Research proposals contain extensive literature reviews. They must provide persuasive evidence that a need exists for the proposed study. In addition to providing a rationale, a proposal describes detailed methodology for conducting the research consistent with requirements of the professional or academic field and a statement on anticipated outcomes and benefits derived from the study's completion.
Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences . Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005.
Your professor may assign the task of writing a research proposal for the following reasons:
A proposal should contain all the key elements involved in designing a completed research study, with sufficient information that allows readers to assess the validity and usefulness of your proposed study. The only elements missing from a research proposal are the findings of the study and your analysis of those findings. Finally, an effective proposal is judged on the quality of your writing and, therefore, it is important that your proposal is coherent, clear, and compelling.
Regardless of the research problem you are investigating and the methodology you choose, all research proposals must address the following questions:
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal. The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Sanford, Keith. Information for Students: Writing a Research Proposal. Baylor University; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal. International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences, Articles, and Books. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal. University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Beginning the Proposal Process
As with writing most college-level academic papers, research proposals are generally organized the same way throughout most social science disciplines. The text of proposals generally vary in length between ten and thirty-five pages, followed by the list of references. However, before you begin, read the assignment carefully and, if anything seems unclear, ask your professor whether there are any specific requirements for organizing and writing the proposal.
A good place to begin is to ask yourself a series of questions:
In general, a compelling research proposal should document your knowledge of the topic and demonstrate your enthusiasm for conducting the study. Approach it with the intention of leaving your readers feeling like, "Wow, that's an exciting idea and I can’t wait to see how it turns out!"
Most proposals should include the following sections:
I. Introduction
In the real world of higher education, a research proposal is most often written by scholars seeking grant funding for a research project or it's the first step in getting approval to write a doctoral dissertation. Even if this is just a course assignment, treat your introduction as the initial pitch of an idea based on a thorough examination of the significance of a research problem. After reading the introduction, your readers should not only have an understanding of what you want to do, but they should also be able to gain a sense of your passion for the topic and to be excited about the study's possible outcomes. Note that most proposals do not include an abstract [summary] before the introduction.
Think about your introduction as a narrative written in two to four paragraphs that succinctly answers the following four questions :
II. Background and Significance
This is where you explain the scope and context of your proposal and describe in detail why it's important. It can be melded into your introduction or you can create a separate section to help with the organization and narrative flow of your proposal. Approach writing this section with the thought that you can’t assume your readers will know as much about the research problem as you do. Note that this section is not an essay going over everything you have learned about the topic; instead, you must choose what is most relevant in explaining the aims of your research.
To that end, while there are no prescribed rules for establishing the significance of your proposed study, you should attempt to address some or all of the following:
III. Literature Review
Connected to the background and significance of your study is a section of your proposal devoted to a more deliberate review and synthesis of prior studies related to the research problem under investigation . The purpose here is to place your project within the larger whole of what is currently being explored, while at the same time, demonstrating to your readers that your work is original and innovative. Think about what questions other researchers have asked, what methodological approaches they have used, and what is your understanding of their findings and, when stated, their recommendations. Also pay attention to any suggestions for further research.
Since a literature review is information dense, it is crucial that this section is intelligently structured to enable a reader to grasp the key arguments underpinning your proposed study in relation to the arguments put forth by other researchers. A good strategy is to break the literature into "conceptual categories" [themes] rather than systematically or chronologically describing groups of materials one at a time. Note that conceptual categories generally reveal themselves after you have read most of the pertinent literature on your topic so adding new categories is an on-going process of discovery as you review more studies. How do you know you've covered the key conceptual categories underlying the research literature? Generally, you can have confidence that all of the significant conceptual categories have been identified if you start to see repetition in the conclusions or recommendations that are being made.
NOTE: Do not shy away from challenging the conclusions made in prior research as a basis for supporting the need for your proposal. Assess what you believe is missing and state how previous research has failed to adequately examine the issue that your study addresses. Highlighting the problematic conclusions strengthens your proposal. For more information on writing literature reviews, GO HERE .
To help frame your proposal's review of prior research, consider the "five C’s" of writing a literature review:
IV. Research Design and Methods
This section must be well-written and logically organized because you are not actually doing the research, yet, your reader must have confidence that you have a plan worth pursuing . The reader will never have a study outcome from which to evaluate whether your methodological choices were the correct ones. Thus, the objective here is to convince the reader that your overall research design and proposed methods of analysis will correctly address the problem and that the methods will provide the means to effectively interpret the potential results. Your design and methods should be unmistakably tied to the specific aims of your study.
Describe the overall research design by building upon and drawing examples from your review of the literature. Consider not only methods that other researchers have used, but methods of data gathering that have not been used but perhaps could be. Be specific about the methodological approaches you plan to undertake to obtain information, the techniques you would use to analyze the data, and the tests of external validity to which you commit yourself [i.e., the trustworthiness by which you can generalize from your study to other people, places, events, and/or periods of time].
When describing the methods you will use, be sure to cover the following:
V. Preliminary Suppositions and Implications
Just because you don't have to actually conduct the study and analyze the results, doesn't mean you can skip talking about the analytical process and potential implications . The purpose of this section is to argue how and in what ways you believe your research will refine, revise, or extend existing knowledge in the subject area under investigation. Depending on the aims and objectives of your study, describe how the anticipated results will impact future scholarly research, theory, practice, forms of interventions, or policy making. Note that such discussions may have either substantive [a potential new policy], theoretical [a potential new understanding], or methodological [a potential new way of analyzing] significance. When thinking about the potential implications of your study, ask the following questions:
NOTE: This section should not delve into idle speculation, opinion, or be formulated on the basis of unclear evidence . The purpose is to reflect upon gaps or understudied areas of the current literature and describe how your proposed research contributes to a new understanding of the research problem should the study be implemented as designed.
ANOTHER NOTE : This section is also where you describe any potential limitations to your proposed study. While it is impossible to highlight all potential limitations because the study has yet to be conducted, you still must tell the reader where and in what form impediments may arise and how you plan to address them.
VI. Conclusion
The conclusion reiterates the importance or significance of your proposal and provides a brief summary of the entire study . This section should be only one or two paragraphs long, emphasizing why the research problem is worth investigating, why your research study is unique, and how it should advance existing knowledge.
Someone reading this section should come away with an understanding of:
VII. Citations
As with any scholarly research paper, you must cite the sources you used . In a standard research proposal, this section can take two forms, so consult with your professor about which one is preferred.
In either case, this section should testify to the fact that you did enough preparatory work to ensure the project will complement and not just duplicate the efforts of other researchers. It demonstrates to the reader that you have a thorough understanding of prior research on the topic.
Most proposal formats have you start a new page and use the heading "References" or "Bibliography" centered at the top of the page. Cited works should always use a standard format that follows the writing style advised by the discipline of your course [e.g., education=APA; history=Chicago] or that is preferred by your professor. This section normally does not count towards the total page length of your research proposal.
Develop a Research Proposal: Writing the Proposal. Office of Library Information Services. Baltimore County Public Schools; Heath, M. Teresa Pereira and Caroline Tynan. “Crafting a Research Proposal.” The Marketing Review 10 (Summer 2010): 147-168; Jones, Mark. “Writing a Research Proposal.” In MasterClass in Geography Education: Transforming Teaching and Learning . Graham Butt, editor. (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015), pp. 113-127; Juni, Muhamad Hanafiah. “Writing a Research Proposal.” International Journal of Public Health and Clinical Sciences 1 (September/October 2014): 229-240; Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences . Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005; Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal. The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Punch, Keith and Wayne McGowan. "Developing and Writing a Research Proposal." In From Postgraduate to Social Scientist: A Guide to Key Skills . Nigel Gilbert, ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006), 59-81; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal. International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences , Articles, and Books. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal. University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
The goal of a research proposal is to present and justify the need to study a research problem and to present the practical ways in which the proposed study should be conducted. The design elements and procedures for conducting the research are governed by standards within the predominant discipline in which the problem resides, so guidelines for research proposals are more exacting and less formal than a general project proposal. Research proposals contain extensive literature reviews. They must provide persuasive evidence that a need exists for the proposed study. In addition to providing a rationale, a proposal describes detailed methodology for conducting the research consistent with requirements of the professional or academic field and a statement on anticipated outcomes and/or benefits derived from the study's completion.
Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences . Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005.
Your professor may assign the task of writing a research proposal for the following reasons:
A proposal should contain all the key elements involved in designing a completed research study, with sufficient information that allows readers to assess the validity and usefulness of your proposed study. The only elements missing from a research proposal are the findings of the study and your analysis of those results. Finally, an effective proposal is judged on the quality of your writing and, therefore, it is important that your writing is coherent, clear, and compelling.
Regardless of the research problem you are investigating and the methodology you choose, all research proposals must address the following questions:
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal . The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Sanford, Keith. Information for Students: Writing a Research Proposal . Baylor University; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal . International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences, Articles, and Books . The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal . University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Beginning the Proposal Process
As with writing a regular academic paper, research proposals are generally organized the same way throughout most social science disciplines. Proposals vary between ten and twenty-five pages in length. However, before you begin, read the assignment carefully and, if anything seems unclear, ask your professor whether there are any specific requirements for organizing and writing the proposal.
A good place to begin is to ask yourself a series of questions:
In general, a compelling research proposal should document your knowledge of the topic and demonstrate your enthusiasm for conducting the study. Approach it with the intention of leaving your readers feeling like--"Wow, that's an exciting idea and I can’t wait to see how it turns out!"
In general your proposal should include the following sections:
I. Introduction
In the real world of higher education, a research proposal is most often written by scholars seeking grant funding for a research project or it's the first step in getting approval to write a doctoral dissertation. Even if this is just a course assignment, treat your introduction as the initial pitch of an idea or a thorough examination of the significance of a research problem. After reading the introduction, your readers should not only have an understanding of what you want to do, but they should also be able to gain a sense of your passion for the topic and be excited about the study's possible outcomes. Note that most proposals do not include an abstract [summary] before the introduction.
Think about your introduction as a narrative written in one to three paragraphs that succinctly answers the following four questions :
II. Background and Significance
This section can be melded into your introduction or you can create a separate section to help with the organization and narrative flow of your proposal. This is where you explain the context of your proposal and describe in detail why it's important. Approach writing this section with the thought that you can’t assume your readers will know as much about the research problem as you do. Note that this section is not an essay going over everything you have learned about the topic; instead, you must choose what is relevant to help explain the goals for your study.
To that end, while there are no hard and fast rules, you should attempt to address some or all of the following key points:
III. Literature Review
Connected to the background and significance of your study is a section of your proposal devoted to a more deliberate review and synthesis of prior studies related to the research problem under investigation . The purpose here is to place your project within the larger whole of what is currently being explored, while demonstrating to your readers that your work is original and innovative. Think about what questions other researchers have asked, what methods they have used, and what is your understanding of their findings and, where stated, their recommendations. Do not be afraid to challenge the conclusions of prior research. Assess what you believe is missing and state how previous research has failed to adequately examine the issue that your study addresses. For more information on writing literature reviews, GO HERE .
Since a literature review is information dense, it is crucial that this section is intelligently structured to enable a reader to grasp the key arguments underpinning your study in relation to that of other researchers. A good strategy is to break the literature into "conceptual categories" [themes] rather than systematically describing groups of materials one at a time. Note that conceptual categories generally reveal themselves after you have read most of the pertinent literature on your topic so adding new categories is an on-going process of discovery as you read more studies. How do you know you've covered the key conceptual categories underlying the research literature? Generally, you can have confidence that all of the significant conceptual categories have been identified if you start to see repetition in the conclusions or recommendations that are being made.
To help frame your proposal's literature review, here are the "five C’s" of writing a literature review:
IV. Research Design and Methods
This section must be well-written and logically organized because you are not actually doing the research, yet, your reader must have confidence that it is worth pursuing . The reader will never have a study outcome from which to evaluate whether your methodological choices were the correct ones. Thus, the objective here is to convince the reader that your overall research design and methods of analysis will correctly address the problem and that the methods will provide the means to effectively interpret the potential results. Your design and methods should be unmistakably tied to the specific aims of your study.
Describe the overall research design by building upon and drawing examples from your review of the literature. Consider not only methods that other researchers have used but methods of data gathering that have not been used but perhaps could be. Be specific about the methodological approaches you plan to undertake to obtain information, the techniques you would use to analyze the data, and the tests of external validity to which you commit yourself [i.e., the trustworthiness by which you can generalize from your study to other people, places, events, and/or periods of time].
When describing the methods you will use, be sure to cover the following:
Develop a Research Proposal: Writing the Proposal . Office of Library Information Services. Baltimore County Public Schools; Heath, M. Teresa Pereira and Caroline Tynan. “Crafting a Research Proposal.” The Marketing Review 10 (Summer 2010): 147-168; Jones, Mark. “Writing a Research Proposal.” In MasterClass in Geography Education: Transforming Teaching and Learning . Graham Butt, editor. (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2015), pp. 113-127; Juni, Muhamad Hanafiah. “Writing a Research Proposal.” International Journal of Public Health and Clinical Sciences 1 (September/October 2014): 229-240; Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences . Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005; Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal . The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Punch, Keith and Wayne McGowan. "Developing and Writing a Research Proposal." In From Postgraduate to Social Scientist: A Guide to Key Skills . Nigel Gilbert, ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006), 59-81; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal . International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences, Articles, and Books . The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal . University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
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Published on 30 October 2022 by Shona McCombes and Tegan George. Revised on 13 June 2023.
A research proposal describes what you will investigate, why it’s important, and how you will conduct your research.
The format of a research proposal varies between fields, but most proposals will contain at least these elements:
Literature review.
While the sections may vary, the overall objective is always the same. A research proposal serves as a blueprint and guide for your research plan, helping you get organised and feel confident in the path forward you choose to take.
Research proposal purpose, research proposal examples, research design and methods, contribution to knowledge, research schedule, frequently asked questions.
Academics often have to write research proposals to get funding for their projects. As a student, you might have to write a research proposal as part of a grad school application , or prior to starting your thesis or dissertation .
In addition to helping you figure out what your research can look like, a proposal can also serve to demonstrate why your project is worth pursuing to a funder, educational institution, or supervisor.
Show your reader why your project is interesting, original, and important. | |
Demonstrate your comfort and familiarity with your field. Show that you understand the current state of research on your topic. | |
Make a case for your . Demonstrate that you have carefully thought about the data, tools, and procedures necessary to conduct your research. | |
Confirm that your project is feasible within the timeline of your program or funding deadline. |
The length of a research proposal can vary quite a bit. A bachelor’s or master’s thesis proposal can be just a few pages, while proposals for PhD dissertations or research funding are usually much longer and more detailed. Your supervisor can help you determine the best length for your work.
One trick to get started is to think of your proposal’s structure as a shorter version of your thesis or dissertation , only without the results , conclusion and discussion sections.
Download our research proposal template
Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We’ve included a few for you below.
Like your dissertation or thesis, the proposal will usually have a title page that includes:
The first part of your proposal is the initial pitch for your project. Make sure it succinctly explains what you want to do and why.
Your introduction should:
To guide your introduction , include information about:
As you get started, it’s important to demonstrate that you’re familiar with the most important research on your topic. A strong literature review shows your reader that your project has a solid foundation in existing knowledge or theory. It also shows that you’re not simply repeating what other people have already done or said, but rather using existing research as a jumping-off point for your own.
In this section, share exactly how your project will contribute to ongoing conversations in the field by:
Following the literature review, restate your main objectives . This brings the focus back to your own project. Next, your research design or methodology section will describe your overall approach, and the practical steps you will take to answer your research questions.
? or ? , , or research design? | |
, )? ? | |
, , , )? | |
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To finish your proposal on a strong note, explore the potential implications of your research for your field. Emphasise again what you aim to contribute and why it matters.
For example, your results might have implications for:
Last but not least, your research proposal must include correct citations for every source you have used, compiled in a reference list . To create citations quickly and easily, you can use our free APA citation generator .
Some institutions or funders require a detailed timeline of the project, asking you to forecast what you will do at each stage and how long it may take. While not always required, be sure to check the requirements of your project.
Here’s an example schedule to help you get started. You can also download a template at the button below.
Download our research schedule template
Research phase | Objectives | Deadline |
---|---|---|
1. Background research and literature review | 20th January | |
2. Research design planning | and data analysis methods | 13th February |
3. Data collection and preparation | with selected participants and code interviews | 24th March |
4. Data analysis | of interview transcripts | 22nd April |
5. Writing | 17th June | |
6. Revision | final work | 28th July |
If you are applying for research funding, chances are you will have to include a detailed budget. This shows your estimates of how much each part of your project will cost.
Make sure to check what type of costs the funding body will agree to cover. For each item, include:
To determine your budget, think about:
Once you’ve decided on your research objectives , you need to explain them in your paper, at the end of your problem statement.
Keep your research objectives clear and concise, and use appropriate verbs to accurately convey the work that you will carry out for each one.
I will compare …
A research aim is a broad statement indicating the general purpose of your research project. It should appear in your introduction at the end of your problem statement , before your research objectives.
Research objectives are more specific than your research aim. They indicate the specific ways you’ll address the overarching aim.
A PhD, which is short for philosophiae doctor (doctor of philosophy in Latin), is the highest university degree that can be obtained. In a PhD, students spend 3–5 years writing a dissertation , which aims to make a significant, original contribution to current knowledge.
A PhD is intended to prepare students for a career as a researcher, whether that be in academia, the public sector, or the private sector.
A master’s is a 1- or 2-year graduate degree that can prepare you for a variety of careers.
All master’s involve graduate-level coursework. Some are research-intensive and intend to prepare students for further study in a PhD; these usually require their students to write a master’s thesis . Others focus on professional training for a specific career.
Critical thinking refers to the ability to evaluate information and to be aware of biases or assumptions, including your own.
Like information literacy , it involves evaluating arguments, identifying and solving problems in an objective and systematic way, and clearly communicating your ideas.
If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the ‘Cite this Scribbr article’ button to automatically add the citation to our free Reference Generator.
McCombes, S. & George, T. (2023, June 13). How to Write a Research Proposal | Examples & Templates. Scribbr. Retrieved 22 July 2024, from https://www.scribbr.co.uk/the-research-process/research-proposal-explained/
Other students also liked, what is a research methodology | steps & tips, what is a literature review | guide, template, & examples, how to write a results section | tips & examples.
The goal of a research proposal is to present and justify a research idea you have and to present the practical ways in which you think this research should be conducted. The forms and procedures for such research are defined by the field of study, so guidelines for research proposals are generally more exacting and less formal than a project proposal. Research proposals contain extensive literature reviews and must provide persuasive evidence that there is a need for the research study being proposed. In addition to providing rationale for the proposed research, a proposal describes detailed methodology for conducting the research consistent with requirements of the professional or academic field and a statement on anticipated outcomes and/or benefits derived from the study.
Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences . Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005.
Your professor may assign the task of writing a research proposal for the following reasons:
A proposal should contain all the key elements involved in designing a complete research study, with sufficient information that allows readers to assess the validity and usefulness of your proposed study. The only elements missing from a research proposal are the results of the study and your analysis of those results. Finally, an effective proposal is judged on the quality of your writing. It is, therefore, important that your writing is coherent, clear, and compelling.
Regardless of the research problem you are investigating and the methodology you choose, all research proposals must address the following questions:
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal . The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Sanford, Keith. Information for Students: Writing a Research Proposal . Baylor University; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal . International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences, Articles, and Books . The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal. University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Beginning the Proposal Process
As with writing a traditional research paper, research proposals are generally organized the same way throughout the social sciences. Most proposals are between ten and fifteen pages in length. However, before you begin, read the assignment carefully and, if anything seems unclear, ask your professor whether there are any specific requirements for organizing and writing the proposal.
A good place to begin is to ask yourself a series of questions:
In the end, your research proposal should document your knowledge of the topic and highlight enthusiasm for conducting the study. Approach it with the intention of leaving your readers feeling like--"Wow, that's an exciting idea and I can’t wait to see how it turns out!"
In general your proposal should include the following sections:
I. Introduction
In the real world of higher education, a research proposal is most often written by scholars seeking grant funding for a research project or it's the first step in getting approval to write your doctoral dissertation. Even if this is just a course assignment, treat your introduction as the initial pitch of an idea. After reading the introduction, your readers should not only have an understanding of what you want to do, but they should also be able to sense your passion for the topic and be excited about its possible outcomes.
Think about your introduction as a narrative written in one to three paragraphs that succinctly answers the following four questions :
II. Background and Significance
This section can be melded into your introduction or you can create a separate section to help with the organization and flow of your proposal. This is where you explain the context of your project and outline why it's important. Approach writing this section with the thought that you can’t assume your readers will know as much about the research problem as you do. Note that this section is not an essay going over everything you have learned about the research problem; instead, you must choose what is relevant to help explain your goals for the study.
To that end, while there are no hard and fast rules, you should attempt to deal with some or all of the following:
III. Literature Review
Connected to the background and significance of your study is a more deliberate review and synthesis of prior studies related to the research problem under investigation . The purpose here is to place your project within the larger whole of what is currently being explored, while demonstrating to your readers that your work is original and innovative. Think about what questions other researchers have asked, what methods they've used, and what is your understanding of their findings. Assess what you believe is still missing, and state how previous research has failed to examine the issue that your study addresses.
Since a literature review is information dense, it is crucial that this section is intelligently structured to enable a reader to grasp the key arguments underpinning your study in relation to that of other researchers. A good strategy is to break the literature into "conceptual categories" [themes] rather than systematically describing materials one at a time.
To help frame your proposal's literature review, here are the "five C’s" of writing a literature review:
IV. Research Design and Methods
This section must be well-written and logically organized because you are not actually doing the research . As a consequence, the reader will never have a study outcome from which to evaluate whether your methodological choices were the correct ones. The objective here is to ensure that the reader is convinced that your overall research design and methods of analysis will correctly address the research problem. Your design and methods should be absolutely and unmistakably tied to the specific aims of your study.
Describe the overall research design by building upon and drawing examples from your review of the literature. Be specific about the methodological approaches you plan to undertake to collect information, about the techniques you will use to analyze it, and about tests of external validity to which you commit yourself [i.e., the trustworthiness by which you can generalize from your study to other people, places or times].
When describing the methods you will use, be sure to cover these issues:
V. Preliminary Suppositions and Implications
Just because you don't have to actually conduct the study and analyze the results, it doesn't mean that you can skip talking about the process and potential implications . The purpose of this section is to argue how and in what ways you believe your research will refine, revise, or extend existing knowledge in the subject area under investigation. Depending on the aims and objectives of your study, describe how the anticipated results of your study will impact future scholarly research, theory, practice, forms of interventions, or policy. Note that such discussions may have either substantive [a potential new policy], theoretical [a potential new understanding], or methodological [a potential new way of analyzing] significance. When thinking about the potential implications of your study, ask the following questions:
VI. Conclusion
The conclusion reiterates the importance or significance of your proposal and provides a brief recap of the entire study . This section should be only one or two paragraphs long, emphasizing why your research study is unique, why it advances knowledge, and why the research problem is worth investigating.
Someone reading this section should come away with an understanding of:
VII. Citations
As with any scholarly research paper, you must cite the sources you used in composing your proposal. In a standard research proposal, this section can take two forms, so speak with your professor about which one is preferred.
In either case, this section should testify to the fact that you did enough preparatory work to make sure the project will complement and not duplicate the efforts of other researchers. Start a new page and use the heading "References" or "Bibliography" at the top of the page. Cited works should always use a standard format that follows the writing style advised by the discipline of your course [i.e., education=APA; history=Chicago, etc]. This section normally does not count towards the total length of your proposal.
Develop a Research Proposal: Writing the Proposal . Office of Library Information Services. Baltimore County Public Schools; Krathwohl, David R. How to Prepare a Dissertation Proposal: Suggestions for Students in Education and the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005; Procter, Margaret. The Academic Proposal . The Lab Report. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Punch, Keith and Wayne McGowan. Developing and Writing a Research Proposal. In From Postgraduate to Social Scientist: A Guide to Key Skills. Nigel Gilbert, ed. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2006), 59-81; Sanford, Keith. Information for Students: Writing a Research Proposal . Baylor University; Wong, Paul T. P. How to Write a Research Proposal . International Network on Personal Meaning. Trinity Western University; Writing Academic Proposals: Conferences, Articles, and Books . The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Writing a Research Proposal . University Library. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
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Former President Donald Trump will speak at the Republican National Convention on Thursday after he formally clinched the party’s nomination , bringing renewed attention to Project 2025, a conservative think tank’s wide-ranging blueprint for a potential second Trump term that covers everything from recruiting like-minded personnel to eliminating entire agencies—a platform assembled partly by ex-Trump staffers, though the former president has tried to distance himself.
Then-President Donald Trump gives a speech at the Heritage Foundation's President's Club Meeting on ... [+] October 17, 2017, in Washington D.C.
Project 2025, spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation with help from more than 100 other conservative groups , is a multi-part plan for the next conservative administration—namely a Trump presidency—which includes a LinkedIn-style database for presidential personnel hopefuls, training programs for executive branch positions and an as-yet-unreleased “playbook” laying out what Trump should do in his first 180 days.
Though the project is led by the Heritage Foundation and other private third-party groups and is not formally tied to Trump, who has tried to distance himself from the operation, its proposals were developed in part by former members of his administration and other Trump allies, and the ex-president has previously praised Heritage for its policy work.
The project has drawn the most attention for its “Mandate for Leadership,” a 900-page proposed policy agenda that describes itself as a “plan to unite the conservative movement and the American people against elite rule and woke culture warriors,” laying out plans for all aspects of the executive branch.
Personnel: Project 2025 broadly proposes to insert far more political appointees who are ideologically aligned with the president into the executive branch—replacing many of the nonpartisan career civil servants who serve in it now—proposing an executive order that would put political appointees into any “confidential, policy-determining, policymaking, or policy-advocating positions” (which Trump previously did at the end of his presidency, but President Joe Biden then overturned it).
Federal Agencies: It proposes a scaled-down federal government, including the abolishment of multiple agencies—including the Department of Education, Department of Homeland Security, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau—whose remaining departments would be folded into other agencies or privatized, including the Transportation Security Administration.
Transgender Rights: Transgender rights and gender identity beyond biological sex are roundly rejected, with such steps as reinstating the ban on transgender Americans serving in the military, prohibiting public school educators from referring to students by anything other than their birth name and pronouns without parental permission, and ensuring no federal funds are used to provide gender-affirming care.
DEI and LGBTQ Rights: Project 2025 seeks to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs from throughout the federal government and in universities, and while it doesn’t outlaw same-sex marriage, it supports “nuclear families” that include a “married mother, father, and their children,” and calls for restricting laws that bar discrimination on the basis of sex to exclude sexual orientation and gender identity.
Climate Change: The proposal would undo much of the federal government’s climate work, including by leaving the Paris Climate Agreement, overhauling the Department of Energy to promote oil and natural gas and deemphasize green energy sources, removing the Department of Agriculture’s focus on sustainability and curtailing climate research.
Abortion: While Project 2025 doesn’t explicitly call for an abortion ban, it would take many steps to restrict the procedure, including directing the Food and Drug Administration to revoke its approval of abortion drug mifepristone, using the Comstock Act to block any abortion equipment or medication from being mailed—which abortion rights advocates have said would be a “backdoor” way to ban abortion—barring federal funds being used to provide healthcare coverage for abortion and requiring states to report all abortions that take place there to the federal government.
Education: Project 2025 emphasizes a “school choice” policy that directs public funds to be used for students to attend private or religious schools, bars “critical race theory” from being taught in federally funded schools and advocates for legislation that would allow parents to sue schools they feel have acted improperly—such as by teaching controversial subjects or requiring students to disclose information about their religious beliefs.
Student Loans: Student loan relief efforts would come to an end—including the public service loan forgiveness program and income-driven repayment plans—as the proposal states “borrowers should be expected to repay their loans.”
Big Tech: TikTok would be banned, and the proposal calls for reforming Section 230 —which shields tech companies and social media networks from being sued over content on their platforms—and allowing laws like those passed in Florida and Texas that seek to punish social media companies who ban or suspend users based on their “viewpoints.”
Justice Department: Project 2025 calls for a “top-to-bottom overhaul” of the DOJ and FBI that gets rid of what it calls an “unaccountable bureaucratic managerial class and radical Left ideologues,” proposing an agency that would be more focused on violent crime and filing litigation that’s “consistent with the President’s agenda” and filled with far more political appointees; it also proposes prohibiting the FBI from investigating misinformation or making “politically motivated” moves against U.S. citizens.
Taxes: Project 2025 would seek to get rid of current tax rates and most deductions and credits, instead proposing a 15% rate for anyone under the Social Security wage base ( $168,000 in 2024) and 30% for taxpayers earning more than that—which means the lowest-income taxpayers will now pay more and some higher earners will pay less, and it would also lower the corporate income tax rate to 18%.
Federal Reserve: The project seeks to reform the Federal Reserve by “tak[ing] the monetary steering wheel out of [its] hands and return[ing] it to the people,” which the authors propose could be done by getting rid of the government’s control over the nation’s money entirely—instead leaving it up to banks—or returning to the gold standard, in which the dollar’s value would be tied to a specific weight of gold.
Foreign Relations: Project 2025 emphasizes opposing China, which it describes as “a totalitarian enemy of the United States,” and directs the U.S. to pull out of international organizations when they don’t serve the administration’s interests, including the World Health Organization and various United Nations agencies.
Healthcare: Project 2025 does not seek to overturn the Affordable Care Act, but would make significant cuts to Medicaid and impose work requirements to receive coverage, as well as reform Medicare—including by making Medicare Advantage, a paid supplement to Medicare, the default option for patients.
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Trump has denied any connection to Project 2025, claiming on Truth Social last week that he has “nothing to do with them,” has “no idea” who’s behind the plan and finds some of its ideas “absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.” But many aren’t buying his claims: The team behind Project 2025 includes 140 people who worked for Trump in his administration, according to CNN , including six former Cabinet secretaries and four people he nominated as ambassadors. The ex-president has also seemingly endorsed the project in the past, saying at a 2022 dinner for the Heritage Foundation that the group was “going to lay the groundwork and detail plans for exactly what our movement will do … when the American people give us a colossal mandate.”
Experts have warned Project 2025’s proposals could have seismic impacts on how the federal government operates if carried out. In an article for Justia , criminal defense attorney and former prosecutor John May suggested Project 2025’s language endorsing the executive branch being able to “restrain the excesses” of the judicial branch and Congress means “if the President wants to, the President can defy any decision of the Supreme Court, any legislation by Congress, maybe even the act of impeachment and removal from office.”
The main team behind Project 2025 includes Heritage Foundation director Paul Gans and former Trump White House personnel leaders Spencer Chretien (who also served as Trump’s special assistant) and Troup Hemenway, according to the project’s website. Other groups listed as participating in the project include ex-Trump adviser Stephen Miller’s America First Legal, legal group Alliance Defending Freedom, Liberty University, Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America and Turning Point USA. The 900-page policy agenda was co-authored by a series of conservative figures, with chapters penned by such Trump allies as former Housing Secretary Dr. Ben Carson, former Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli, former HHS Civil Rights Director Roger Severino and former Trump advisor Peter Navarro, who went to prison in March for contempt of Congress.
Trump will not be under any obligation to follow Project 2025’s proposals if he wins the presidency, though history suggests he’ll listen to at least some of them. The Heritage Foundation made a similar policy proposal for Trump ahead of his presidency in 2016, and boasted two years into his tenure that Trump had already followed 64% of its recommendations, CBS News notes .
One area that Project 2025 doesn’t touch on is Social Security benefits and any potential cuts to the program, even as proposals outline changes to numerous other government “entitlements.” Changing Social Security and making cuts to its spending has been a priority for the GOP for decades, though the American public has long opposed slashing benefits. Republicans’ efforts have waned under Trump, however, and the ex-president publicly claimed in March he “will never do anything that will jeopardize or hurt Social Security or Medicare,” after he came under fire for suggesting otherwise in an interview with CNBC.
While much of Project 2025’s policy agenda concerns federal agencies, the proposal has also gotten attention for its call to outlaw all pornography, which it claims is tied to “the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children” and is not protected under the First Amendment. Project 2025 calls not only for pornography to be made illegal, but also for anyone involved with its production and distribution to be imprisoned, for any librarians or educators who “purvey it” to be registered as sex offenders and for telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its distribution to be shut down.
The Heritage Foundation’s practice of laying out a policy roadmap for a future Republican administration actually dates back to the Reagan era, founder Edwin J. Feulner noted in the afterword of the 2025 edition. The organization first laid out a blueprint in 1981 that President Ronald Reagan ultimately adopted, fulfilling half of its recommendations by the end of his first year in office. The Heritage Foundation has continued to come out with blueprints for potential conservative presidents each election since, it notes, and its 2025 Mandate for Leadership was published in 2023. While it came out last year, Project 2025 gained new attention in the past week since Trump disavowed it—sparking a wave of reports highlighting his ties to the figures behind the project that debunk his claims. Democrats have also used the controversial proposal as a key talking point and argument for why the left should unite behind President Joe Biden and focus on defeating Trump, particularly as Biden’s candidacy has come under widespread scrutiny in the wake of the president’s poor debate performance in June.
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The 2025 Presidential Transition Project, more commonly known as 'Project 2025' has stirred controversy in recent weeks.
Following the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump on July 13, and the start of the 2024 Republican National Convention just days later, the political playbook of Project 2025 adds yet another layer of discourse surrounding the GOP.
Trump has since claimed to know nothing about Project 2025 and "disagree with some of the things they’re saying, and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal," he wrote in a July 5 post on Truth Social . "Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.”
Here's what we know about Project 2025.
Project 2025 is a plan created by The Heritage Foundation to usher in the country's next conservative president, but whether or not that includes Trump is uncertain.
The conservative blueprint has policy recommendations that are divided into four pillars, according to a Heritage Foundation article : a policy agenda, a personnel database known as the "Conservative LinkedIn," Presidential Administration Academy training, and a playbook for the first 180 days of the next Administration in an effort that the organization claims will "pave the way for an effective conservative Administration."
Some of the main proposals of the 900-page initiative drew concern among political groups, and as of now, there aren't many conservatives who have openly supported the idea. Per USA TODAY , here are some takeaways from Project 2025:
The Heritage Foundation , with the help of other conservative groups, introduced the roadmap and is the organization that created Project 2025. The people behind Project 2025 include Paul Dans and Spencer Chretien, who worked under the Trump administration and serve as directors of the effort. Dans was Trump's former chief of staff at the Office of Personnel Management, while Chretien was the former special assistant to Trump and associate director of Presidential Personnel.
Project 2025 was published in April 2023, according to USA TODAY. A conservative commentary piece by the Associate Director Spencer Chretien outlined the initiative in January 2023, stating that "It’s past time to lay the groundwork for a White House more friendly to the right."
The plan faced a wave of criticism by President Joe Biden, who said in a video posted to X that "Project 2025 will destroy America." Democrats, such as Representative Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), have also called it a "playbook for authoritarianism." The 920-page plan was created by The Heritage Foundation , a conservative think tank. Several key figures involved in Project 2025 also worked in Trump's first administration .
This blueprint has become a major talking point among left- and right-wing supporters. Regarding the goal of Project 2025, The Heritage Foundation said that "With the right conservative policy recommendations and properly vetted and trained personnel to implement them, we will take back our government." Project 2025 is a wish list for conservative policies, that, if successful, could sway the opinions of voters this November, USA TODAY reported.
Is it connected to the trump campaign, what are the project's main proposals, does trump agree with the project's proposals, why is project 2025 such a big deal at the moment.
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Reporting by Gram Slattery, editing by Ross Colvin and Rosalba O'Brien
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. , opens new tab
Thomson Reuters
Washington-based correspondent covering campaigns and Congress. Previously posted in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Santiago, Chile, and has reported extensively throughout Latin America. Co-winner of the 2021 Reuters Journalist of the Year Award in the business coverage category for a series on corruption and fraud in the oil industry. He was born in Massachusetts and graduated from Harvard College.
Vice President Kamala Harris is seeking to reset the Democratic campaign after Joe Biden's withdrawal from the presidential race.
C.20 Interdisciplinary Consortia for Astrobiology Research (ICAR) seeks proposals focused on ensuring that the NASA Astrobiology community is prepared to respond to the challenge of planning and implementing these missions. Accordingly, proposals that place emphasis on research that will help prepare for current or future flight programs directed at astrobiological targets are encouraged. Proposals for ICAR must describe an interdisciplinary approach to a single compelling question in astrobiology, and address at least one aspect of the 2015 Astrobiology Strategy .
ROSES-2024 Amendment 35 releases final text and due dates for C.20 ICAR that had been listed as "TBD". Step-1 proposals are due September 24, 2024, and Step-2 proposals are due January 16, 2025.
Proposals submitted to this program will be evaluated using a dual-anonymous peer review process, so both Step-1 and Step-2 proposals must be anonymized. See Section 3.2 and the associated "Guidelines for Anonymous Proposals" document under "Other Documents" on the NSPIRES page for this program element.
On or about July 22, 2024, this Amendment to the NASA Research Announcement "Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES) 2024" (NNH24ZDA001N) will be posted on the NASA research opportunity homepage at https://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2024
Questions concerning C.20 ICAR may be directed to Lindsay Hays at [email protected] .
NASA selected a new team of four research volunteers to participate in a simulated mission to Mars within HERA (Human Exploration Research Analog) at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. Erin Anderson, Sergii Iakymov, Brandon Kent, and Sarah Elizabeth McCandless will begin their simulated trek to Mars on Friday, Aug. 9. The volunteer crew […]
Researchers used more than 120 years of data to decipher how melting ice, dwindling groundwater, and rising seas are nudging the planet’s spin axis and lengthening days. Days on Earth are growing slightly longer, and that change is accelerating. The reason is connected to the same mechanisms that also have caused the planet’s axis to […]
Discover more topics from nasa.
Perseverance Rover
Parker Solar Probe
A team of New York Times reporters followed the developments and fact-checked the speakers, providing context and explanation.
Former President Donald J. Trump accepted his party’s nomination during the final night of the Republican National Convention on Thursday, delivering a freewheeling, factually challenged and often ad-libbed speech.
Mr. Trump began by describing in detail the assassination attempt that left him with a bandaged ear. Then, he essentially staged a campaign rally, repeating familiar boasts and delving into a cascade of false and misleading claims about his own record and the state of the border, the economy and the world.
Here’s a fact-check of his remarks.
— Former President Donald J. Trump
The “right to try” law of 2018 allows terminally ill patients to seek access to experimental medicine that is not yet fully approved by the Food and Drug Administration, but a similar program has been in place since the 1970s.
Jeanna Smialek
This is false..
Inflation peaked at 9.1 percent in the summer of 2022, but that is considerably lower than its peak of nearly 15 percent in the early 1980s.
Republicans will sometimes point out that the inflation methodology has changed since then — meaning that we are measuring price increases differently — but even accounting for those tweaks, economists have said that inflation was lower in 2022 than it was four decades earlier. Inflation is not, based on the data, crushing people like never before.
Advertisement
This lacks evidence..
While there is an active war between Russia and Ukraine, and between Hamas and Israel, and fighting in Sudan, Myanmar and other countries, there is no evidence that a third world war is imminent.
In terms of previous world wars, according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, an estimated 8.5 million soldiers were killed in World War I and an estimated 35 million to 60 million people died during World War II.
The concept of World War III has traditionally referred to a potential war between the United States and Russia, which is not imminent. President Biden has often said he is actively trying to avoid such a conflict even as he arms Kyiv in its war with Moscow.
Brad Plumer
More drilling doesn’t always cause gasoline prices to plunge. Case in point: The United States is actually producing significantly more crude oil today under the Biden administration than it did under the Trump administration, yet gasoline prices are still higher than they were four years ago.
That’s because gasoline costs are also influenced by broader market forces that can cause the global price of crude oil to rise or fall. For instance, a big reason prices increased in 2022 was Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which disrupted the flow of crude across the globe. All else equal, an increase in U.S. oil drilling should put downward pressure on prices, but those other global factors also play a considerable role.
Angelo Fichera
Mr. Trump presented an immigration graphic that he credited with saving his life during an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania days earlier.
Moments before a gunman opened fire at the rally, Mr. Trump turned to gesture at the chart, a move that he said prevented him from being shot in the head . The shooting left his ear bloodied, killed one spectator and seriously injured two others.
In his acceptance speech on Thursday, he referred to a thick red arrow on the chart, titled “Illegal Immigration Into the U.S.,” that points to a significant drop in migrant crossings at the southern border during his presidency.
But despite text on the chart and Mr. Trump’s description at the convention, the arrow is actually pointing to a dip in early 2020 — when migration slowed globally during the coronavirus pandemic and the restrictions that followed — not during his last week in office. And that low did not last.
In March 2020, there were about 30,000 encounters at the southern border recorded by Border Patrol, according to Customs and Border Protection statistics . That dropped in April 2020 by almost half, to about 16,000.
In the months that followed, however, the number of migrants encountered at the border then climbed back up. During Mr. Trump’s last month in office, there were about 75,000 encounters by Border Patrol.
And contrary to Mr. Trump’s claim, even the low in 2020 was not the lowest “in recorded history.” Earlier in Mr. Trump’s presidency, the number of apprehensions at the border had dipped to about 11,000 in April 2017 , before the flow increased again.
Also, since 1925, total annual apprehensions nationwide by Border Patrol have often been lower than they were under Mr. Trump’s presidency, noted Michelle Mittelstadt, a spokeswoman for the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute.
There is no arguing that the situation at the southern border grew worse during the Biden administration: In December, there were around 250,000 encounters .
In an effort to reverse course, President Biden recently announced severe restrictions on asylum, and illegal crossings have since significantly dropped . Border Patrol reported about 83,500 encounters in June.
The $1.5 trillion tax cut, enacted in December 2017, ranks below at least half a dozen other tax cuts by several metrics. The 1981 Reagan tax cut was the largest as a percentage of the economy and by its reduction to federal revenue. The 2012 Obama tax cut amounted to the largest reduction in inflation-adjusted dollars: $321 billion a year.
During Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign, he promised to build a wall spanning at least 1,000 miles along the southern border and have Mexico pay for it. That did not happen. Overall, the Trump administration constructed 458 miles of border barriers — most of which upgraded or replaced existing structures. Officials put up new primary barriers where none previously existed along only 47 miles.
There is no evidence that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia would not have invaded Ukraine if Donald J. Trump had been president of the United States in February 2022, when Russian forces began a full-scale war on Ukraine.
In fact, Mr. Trump supported one of Mr. Putin’s greatest desires — weakening the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Senior administration officials told The New York Times that several times over the course of 2018 Mr. Trump privately said he wanted to withdraw from NATO . And Mr. Trump was impeached for withholding Javelin missiles from Ukraine in 2019. Those missiles proved effective in blunting Russian armor advances into Ukraine in 2022.
Mr. Trump has continued to falsely claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. His assertions about widespread cheating are unsubstantiated. Since the election, the former president has used claims mischaracterizing the voting and counting process, cited baseless examples of fraud and peddled conspiracy theories.
This is exaggerated..
Apprehensions of unauthorized crossings along the southwest border in the 2017 fiscal year, which includes several months of the Obama administration, fell to the lowest point since the 1970s.
But they increased in subsequent years. In the 2019 fiscal year, apprehensions topped 800,000 and were the highest in a decade. And in the 2020 fiscal year, even as the coronavirus pandemic ground global movement to a halt, apprehensions were higher than in 2011, 2012 and 2015.
And when Mr. Trump left office, the coronavirus pandemic had decimated the economy with an unemployment rate of 6.4 percent in January 2021 and gross domestic product had not yet rebounded to pre-Covid levels. But even before all of that, annual average growth was lower under Mr. Trump than under Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan.
The rate of inflation was indeed low under Mr. Trump, but it was not completely nonexistent.
Under Mr. Trump, the rate of inflation measured by the overall Consumer Price Index largely gravitated around 2 percent — with the rate slightly lower and higher some months — according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics . That dropped at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, and inflation reached a low of 0.1 percent in May 2020 before trending upward.
Official estimates of employment do not support Mr. Trump’s statement, which makes little sense. And estimates from various groups show that the population of unauthorized immigrants has grown in recent years, but not nearly enough to take all the jobs created during Mr. Biden’s presidency.
The economy has added more than 15 million jobs since January 2021. Two groups that advocate for lower levels of migration and stricter border security have estimated that there are 2.3 million to 2.5 million more unauthorized immigrants in 2023 than in 2020.
Overall, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that 29.9 million foreign-born workers — both authorized and unauthorized — and 131.1 million native-born workers were employed in 2023. That is an increase of 5.1 million in employed foreign-born workers and 8.1 million native-born workers since 2020 .
Grocery prices are up substantially since Joseph R. Biden Jr. took office in early 2021, but not by 57 percent: The Consumer Price Index’s food-at-home index is up about 21 percent . Gas prices are up about 35 percent , depending upon the measure used.
Lisa Friedman
This is misleading..
Under the Trump administration, the United States for the first time began to export more oil than it imported. Energy experts say that is not because of Trump’s policies, but because of the fracking boom that began during the George W. Bush administration and soared under President Barack Obama. It’s still happening.
In fact, under President Biden, the United States has become the biggest oil producer in the world and is producing more natural gas than ever before. The phrases “energy independence” and “energy dominance” also fail to take into account wind, solar and other renewable energy, which is growing at a rapid pace.
Alan Rappeport
Mr. Trump suggested that the national debt would be paid down by jump-starting economic growth. He made this promise during his first term, promising that $2 trillion of tax cuts would pay for themselves, and ended up approving more than $8 trillion of borrowing. The Republican platform this year makes no mention of debt or deficits but does call for cutting wasteful spending.
Also, the national debt currently stands at $34.9 trillion, not $36 trillion.
Many elements of the 2017 tax cut Mr. Trump signed into law will expire in 2025, and Mr. Biden has proposed some tax increases on high-income earners and corporations. But this does not amount to a quadrupling of taxes.
The 2017 tax cuts are expected to reduce the average tax rate by 1.4 percent in 2025, according to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, a left-leaning Washington think tank. Most in the top 5 percent of income would see the greatest change, by 2.4 percent. Mr. Biden has also consistently said he does not support raising taxes on people making under $400,000 a year and, in his latest budget, proposed extending tax cuts for those making under that threshold.
Mr. Biden’s proposals would increase the average tax rate by about 1.9 percent, according to a Tax Policy Center analysis . The top 0.1 percent would see the biggest increase of about 13.9 percent, while the low income filers would see a reduction in taxes. That is no nowhere near the 300 percent increase Mr. Trump warned of.
There is no electric vehicle mandate. The Biden administration has imposed rules requiring carmakers to meet new average emissions limits across their entire product line. It is up to auto manufacturers how to comply. The Environmental Protection Agency has estimated that the rule would mean that by 2032, about 56 percent of new passenger vehicles sold would be electric and another 16 percent would be hybrids. Autoworkers do fear job losses because electric vehicles could require less than half the number of workers to assemble than cars with internal combustion engines do.
There is also no evidence that the rule or other policies aimed at encouraging electric vehicles are leading the automobile industry toward “obliteration.” Many automakers have, in fact, embraced electric vehicle production. General Motors, for example, has been talking about preparing for an “all-electric future” since 2017. The Biden administration has argued that its policies are aimed at moving electric vehicle jobs from China to the United States.
The American auto industry lost jobs under the Trump administration, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. General Motors, Ford and Fiat Chrysler all closed factories during Mr. Trump’s presidency.
The trade agreement that Mr. Trump signed with China in 2020 was quickly derailed by the coronavirus pandemic, and China never fulfilled its obligations to purchase American goods. And Mr. Trump gave an incorrect total for how much American product China was supposed to buy. A 2022 analysis by the Peterson Institute for International Economics found that China had bought none of the extra $200 billion of U.S. exports in the trade pact.
President Biden has pledged not to make any cuts to America’s social safety net programs. Mr. Trump suggested this year that he was open to scaling back the programs when he said there was “a lot you can do in terms of entitlements in terms of cutting.” He later walked back those comments and pledged to protect the programs. But if changes to the programs are not made, the programs’ benefits will automatically be reduced eventually. Government reports released earlier this year projected that the Social Security and disability insurance programs, if combined, would not have enough money to pay all of their obligations in 2035. Medicare will be unable to pay all its hospital bills starting in 2036.
Hamed Aleaziz
The Biden administration kept in place the Trump-era policy, known as Title 42, which allowed border agents to quickly turn back migrants and cut off access to asylum protections for more than a year.
The Biden administration did not move to get rid of Title 42 until spring 2022. The move was later blocked by a federal judge, which forced the administration to keep the policy in place.
During that time, the Biden administration expanded the use of the policy and began expelling Venezuelans to Mexico. It was later rolled back in 2023 by the Biden administration.
Mr. Trump claimed that crime had fallen drastically in Venezuela because the country had sent “their murderers” and prisoners to the United States. Annual reports from the Venezuelan Violence Observatory, a research organization based in Caracas, shows a 25 percent decline in the country’s homicide rate from 2022 to 2023 , and a 41 percent decline since 2020 . In comparison, the homicide rate declined even more precipitously while Mr. Trump was president, by almost 50 percent from 2016 .
The Venezuelan Prison Observatory told Univision in 2022, when Mr. Trump first made the claim, that the prisons in the country had not been emptied and rather were at 170 percent capacity. According to the group’s latest annual report, Venezuela’s prison population stood at 33,558 in 2022, about level with its 2021 population of 33,710. Immigration experts have said they could not corroborate Mr. Trump’s claims that other countries were “dumping” their criminal and prison populations into the United States.
Depending on the definition of “modern times,” President Jimmy Carter started no new wars during his time in office between 1977 and 1981.
Under Mr. Trump’s presidency, there was not global peace. While Mr. Trump was in the Oval Office, there was an active war in eastern Ukraine between the Russian and Ukrainian armies, he authorized airstrikes and ground combat operations against fighters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and he ordered the assassination of an Iranian military leader in Iraq.
The American-led coalition campaign against the Islamic State began in 2014 . The research firm IHS Markit estimated that the Islamic State lost about a third of its territory from January 2015 to January 2017. Mr. Trump has largely stuck with, and taken advantage of, a strategy that Mr. Obama began , and the Islamic State lost its final territories in March 2019 , two years after Mr. Trump took office, not two months.
North Korea continued to test missiles during Mr. Trump’s time in the White House, a fact that the former president continually dismissed at the time .
While Russia had not invaded Ukraine and the war between Israel and Hamas had not broken out, it is a stretch to claim that the world was entirely peaceful under the Trump administration.
Average peacefulness declined in 2018 and 2020 , according to the Global Peace Index, an annual measure of violence around the world compiled by the Institute for Economics & Peace. During the Trump administration, the United States was also engaged in military conflicts in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan and more than 60 American soldiers died in hostile action . When Mr. Trump left office, there were 2,500 troops remaining in Afghanistan.
Mr. Trump was once again referring to the total amount that the United States spent on security in Afghanistan over the course of 20 years — not the value of equipment left behind in the 2021 withdrawal.
The United States provided $88.6 billion for security in Afghanistan from October 2001 to July 2021, and disbursed about $75 billion, according to Pentagon figures .
That figure includes the amount spent on training, antidrug trafficking efforts and infrastructure, as well as $18 billion for equipment. CNN previously reported that about $7 billion worth of military equipment that the United States transferred to the Afghan government was left behind during the withdrawal.
The U.S. military’s budget continues to grow year by year, and the Iron Dome missile defense system is effective only against relatively short-range rockets and missiles. Installing an Iron Dome across the country would in no way ensure that an enemy could not strike the United States.
— Former President Donald J. Trump.
This is an inflated claim of another false statement Mr. Trump has made on the campaign trail about electric vehicle charging stations. (He recently said that the Biden administration had “opened seven chargers for $8 billion.”)
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which President Biden signed in 2021, allocated $7.5 billion for electric vehicle charging stations, with the goal of installing 500,000 across the country.
So far, only seven chargers have been installed — not a great pace. But the suggestion that the entire amount was used on seven chargers is not accurate. The Biden administration has argued that the pace is the result of wanting to get a complex new national program done right.
— Eric Trump, a son of Donald J. Trump
Former President Donald J. Trump did not divest from his businesses when he assumed the presidency, and his critics argue that his companies did benefit from his being in public office. Mr. Trump’s businesses received nearly $8 million from 20 foreign governments during his time in office, according to documents released by House Democrats this year. Much of that was from China. The nonprofit OpenSecrets has also tracked millions of dollars flowing to Trump properties from political entities and groups in recent years, suggesting that those seeking favor with Mr. Trump may do so through his properties.
This needs context ..
As president, Donald J. Trump indeed slashed regulations, rolling back more than 100 environmental protections alone. The bulk of those were aimed at keeping the air and water clean, and cutting planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from automobiles and power plants.
However, the Trump administration’s attempt to deregulate was also often thwarted by the courts. All told, the Trump administration lost 57 percent of cases challenging its environmental policies, a much higher rate of loss than previous administrations, according to a database maintained by New York University’s Institute for Policy Integrity .
The value of the U.S. dollar is stronger than it has been in decades . This year, the dollar index, which measures the strength of the currency against the currencies of six major trading partners, has been hovering at levels last seen in the early 2000s.
Eric Trump’s suggestion that the dollar has been diminished is actually at odds with his father’s recent suggestion that the dollar is too strong, making American exports too expensive abroad.
Former President Donald J. Trump and Senator J.D. Vance, his running mate, have both argued that a weaker dollar would be better for the U.S. economy and have suggested that steps should be taken to depreciate the currency.
— Franklin Graham, the evangelical leader
President Donald J. Trump hosted a United Nations event on religious freedom in 2019 in New York. At the time, he characterized it as the first time a U.S. president had hosted such a meeting. But aside from specific meetings, Mr. Trump’s appearance was certainly not the first time that an American president had championed religious freedom before the United Nations. President Barack Obama did so in a 2012 address to the General Assembly . President George W. Bush pressed the importance of religious liberty in a 2008 interfaith event.
— Tucker Carlson, Trump ally and former Fox News host
Mr. Carlson can certainly argue that lawmakers have not done enough to address the opioid crisis in the United States, but his suggestion that they have done nothing is wrong. The Congressional Research Service listed several major legislative efforts in 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2021.
These laws, according to the research service, “addressed overprescribing and misuse of opioids, expanded substance use disorder prevention and treatment capacities, bolstered drug diversion capabilities, and enhanced international drug interdiction, counternarcotics cooperation and sanctions efforts.”
Annual funding for border security and the Drug Enforcement Administration has tried to directly address drug trafficking. The bipartisan border bill that failed this past spring would have also included increased funding for enforcement efforts and new technology to detect drug smuggling. Former President Donald J. Trump lobbied against its passage.
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Research proposal examples. Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We've included a few for you below. Example research proposal #1: "A Conceptual Framework for Scheduling Constraint Management".
The purpose of the research proposal (its job, so to speak) is to convince your research supervisor, committee or university that your research is suitable (for the requirements of the degree program) and manageable (given the time and resource constraints you will face). The most important word here is "convince" - in other words, your ...
Here is an explanation of each step: 1. Title and Abstract. Choose a concise and descriptive title that reflects the essence of your research. Write an abstract summarizing your research question, objectives, methodology, and expected outcomes. It should provide a brief overview of your proposal. 2.
A quality example of a research proposal shows one's above-average analytical skills, including the ability to coherently synthesize ideas and integrate lateral and vertical thinking. Communication skills. The proposal also demonstrates your proficiency to communicate your thoughts in concise and precise language.
Make sure you can ask the critical what, who, and how questions of your research before you put pen to paper. Your research proposal should include (at least) 5 essential components : Title - provides the first taste of your research, in broad terms. Introduction - explains what you'll be researching in more detail.
Key Takeaways. Developing a research proposal involves the following preliminary steps: identifying potential ideas, choosing ideas to explore further, choosing and narrowing a topic, formulating a research question, and developing a working thesis. A good topic for a research paper interests the writer and fulfills the requirements of the ...
Develop an Outline. Create a clear and logical structure: Divide your proposal into sections or headings that will guide your readers through the content. Introduction: Provide a concise overview of the problem, its significance, and the proposed solution. Background/Context: Offer relevant background information and context to help the readers ...
The background to the topic of your intended research must be clear and precise. It must not only include an in-depth explanation of the key points of your subject but also all the developments in the field as well as their timelines.The researcher must also explain the compelling interest in the research issue as well as the personal interest (if any) in the topic.
Literature review. This key component of the research proposal is the most time-consuming aspect in the preparation of your research proposal. As described in Chapter 5, the literature review provides the background to your study and demonstrates the significance of the proposed research.Specifically, it is a review and synthesis of prior research that is related to the problem you are setting ...
Overview. A research proposal is a type of text which maps out a proposed central research problem or question and a suggested approach to its investigation. In many universities, including RMIT, the research proposal is a formal requirement. It is central to achieving your first milestone: your Confirmation of Candidature.
The best research proposal definition states that it is a structured document that describes an intended study. This formal document reveals the importance and methodology of conducting the ...
Academic Research Proposal. This is the most common type of research proposal, which is prepared by students, scholars, or researchers to seek approval and funding for an academic research project. It includes all the essential components mentioned earlier, such as the introduction, literature review, methodology, and expected outcomes.
Research Proposal Example/Sample. Detailed Walkthrough + Free Proposal Template. If you're getting started crafting your research proposal and are looking for a few examples of research proposals, you've come to the right place. In this video, we walk you through two successful (approved) research proposals, one for a Master's-level ...
A research proposal is a vital tool that can help scholars and university students complete a dissertation, receive funding for projects or fulfill course requirements. It outlines the importance of your inquiry and summarizes how you plan to investigate your research problem. Before developing a project, it's often valuable to learn some ...
Parts of a Research Proposal. A research proposal's purpose is to capture the evaluator's attention, demonstrate the study's potential benefits, and prove that it is a logical and consistent approach (Van Ekelenburg, 2010). To ensure that your research proposal contains these elements, there are several aspects to include in your proposal (Al ...
A proposal needs to show how your work fits into what is already known about the topic and what new paradigm will it add to the literature, while specifying the question that the research will answer, establishing its significance, and the implications of the answer. [ 2] The proposal must be capable of convincing the evaluation committee about ...
Definition. The goal of a research proposal is twofold: to present and justify the need to study a research problem and to present the practical ways in which the proposed study should be conducted. The design elements and procedures for conducting research are governed by standards of the predominant discipline in which the problem resides ...
A research proposal is a document proposing a research project, generally in the sciences or academia, and generally constitutes a request for sponsorship of that research. Proposals are evaluated on the cost and potential impact of the proposed research, and on the soundness of the proposed plan for carrying it out. Research proposals generally address several key points:
Definition. The goal of a research proposal is to present and justify the need to study a research problem and to present the practical ways in which the proposed study should be conducted. The design elements and procedures for conducting the research are governed by standards within the predominant discipline in which the problem resides, so ...
Research proposal examples. Writing a research proposal can be quite challenging, but a good starting point could be to look at some examples. We've included a few for you below. Example research proposal #1: 'A Conceptual Framework for Scheduling Constraint Management'.
Definition. The goal of a research proposal is to present and justify a research idea you have and to present the practical ways in which you think this research should be conducted. The forms and procedures for such research are defined by the field of study, so guidelines for research proposals are generally more exacting and less formal than ...
A range of skills and expertise is needed for the task of proposal writing as well as for the research that follows a successful application. Therefore this book is intended to help those who are unfamiliar with the process of proposal writing or who want to improve their chances of success in a complex and demanding field.
The 2025 Presidential Transition Project, also known as Project 2025, is an initiative organized by the Heritage Foundation with the aim of promoting a collection of conservative and right-wing policy proposals to reshape the United States federal government and consolidate executive power should Donald Trump win the 2024 presidential election.
Climate Change: The proposal would undo much of the federal government's climate work, including by leaving the Paris Climate Agreement, overhauling the Department of Energy to promote oil and ...
What are the key highlights of Project 2025? Some of the main proposals of the 900-page initiative drew concern among political groups, and as of now, there aren't many conservatives who have ...
A set of conservative policy proposals known as Project 2025 has become a lightning rod for opponents of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as they seek to highlight what they say are ...
C.20 Interdisciplinary Consortia for Astrobiology Research (ICAR) seeks proposals focused on ensuring that the NASA Astrobiology community is prepared to respond to the challenge of planning and implementing these missions. Accordingly, proposals that place emphasis on research that will help prepare for current or future flight programs directed at astrobiological targets are encouraged.
Mr. Biden's proposals would increase the average tax rate by about 1.9 percent, according to a Tax Policy Center analysis. The top 0.1 percent would see the biggest increase of about 13.9 ...
Call for proposals: Developing & implementing health systems impact modelling approaches in LMICs 11 This section must also provide information on the gender breakdown of the core research team and indicate which team member is a policy-maker with decision-making authority at national or sub-national level.
The proposal also provides quantitative criteria to further clarify the definition of a planet. Jean-Luc Margot, lead author of the article and UCLA professor of earth, planetary and space sciences and of physics and astronomy, will present the proposed new definition at the IAU General Assembly in August 2024.