All college students are required to write academic papers either it is a technical report, feasibility study, case study or research paper. Technical writing is being taught during lower years to prepare students in a much complex academic writing in the higher years. Aside from examinations, students consider it as "traumatic" whenever they were asked to submit an academic writing. Stress and panic over deadline of submission is the most common scenario.

In my 5 years of teaching college students, it became a common picture inside my classroom that students are begging for extension of deadline for submission of their required academic paper. The way I analyze the situation, the reason why students failed to submit their required writings on time is not because they lack the knowledge about academic writing. Instead, it is because they failed to follow the right procedures in writing an academic paper.

Academic writing is truly a tedious work but it is not really hard to do. Here are some procedural tips on how to make your academic writing less stressful:

CHOOSE A TOPIC. This is the hardest part I believe. Students are into a blank sheet of not knowing what to write. The basic core of choosing a topic is to choose something that interest you and you have a wide knowledge with. It will be favorable if the topic chosen will be in line with your field of specialization.

For technical writing, mostly the topic is being assigned by instructor or in case its not, choose something you knew so well. Remember, the word technical refers to being expert in a certain field. All detailed aspects of the topics should be elaborated and well explained in the report.

For feasibility study, choose something that doesn't exist yet but it is possible for you to create. It can be totally something new or a substitute for an existing product or it can also be an existing product with additional new features to offer.

For a case study, adopting an actual company currently experiencing a problem is a good example. Just take note that the problem must be in relation within the boundaries of your course.

For a research study or thesis, topic should be something researchable and hypothesis can be created out of the given problem. Answer to the problem statement and hypothesis can only be derived by conducting a research survey, keen observation, deeper analysis or an experiment result. Quantitative type of study is much favorable for this kind. Future research direction of previous research works can be possible topic reference.

AVAILABLE RESOURCES. It is advisable that before you finalize your topic, check first if resources are available. Aside from online sites, books, previous academic writings and magazine articles, make sure that you will be allowed access to some valid information within the subject of your academic writing.

SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS. There are lots of interesting topics to undertake for an academic writing. But as a student, make sure that the boundaries covered for your academic writings are within the time frame given to you by your instructor. Make your subject as particular as possible by narrowing it to the main problem but not sacrificing its relevance.

TECHNICAL METHODOLOGY. Familiarize yourself with the writing methodology. Make sure you knew what particular technique you will adopt from gathering data, presentation, analysis and interpretation of results. If it is quantitative in nature, be sure to know the specific statistical tool or quantitative methods to use in order for you to easily come-up with conclusions.

PRESENTATION. Make the presentation as simple as possible but with valuable details. Only direct relative data will be included and omit others that will only add confusion but not really related to the subject. Make your discussion as clearly as possible. Use graphs if necessary to illustrate what you wanted to relay.

CONCLUSIONS. Present all the findings either negative or positive. Conclusions will be supported basically by the results and not from your own assumptions.