Sample Summary

The summary below is one of the same article students in my Spring 2011 ENG 099 class were asked to summarize as part of their midterm exam.  This is the kind of thing I look for when I grade.

On February 28, 2011, the online New York Times published Richard Parker’s “The Lone Star State Turns South.”  The article briefly outlines the position of Texas as it aligned itself with the Confederacy, noting the fervor with which the Confederate cause was embraced by Texans and the material support that Texas offered to the Confederacy.  It also comments in greater detail on the effects of secession on Samuel Houston and Gen. David Twiggs.  The former was ousted from the governor’s office for refusing to swear a loyalty oath to the Confederacy.  The latter was forced to surrender all Union bases and lead Union troops out of the state, for which he was stripped of his rank in the Union army.  Later, Twiggs was awarded a generalship with the Confederacy.  The article draws attention to the conflicted nature of Texas’s alignment with the Confederacy, effectively adding more nuance to and thereby increasing understanding of the event.