Presentation

Structure and Formatting

• Title page: The title of the essay, the research question, the subject (boths subjects and theme for world studies, category for group 1 and 2 essays), and the word count.

• Table of Contents page (for all subjects)

• Introduction

• Main body

• Conclusion

• Works cited list

• Appendices if requires.

Page numbers must be included.

The candidate or school name should not appear on the title page or headers.

Font, font size and spacing should be conducive to on-screen marking e.g. Arial or Calibri, 12 pt, double-spaced, with standard margins.

The size of the file you upload should not exceed 10MB.

Citations and References

No style is prescribed by the IB, but VSA requires you to use MLA. Note that while MLA does not require access dates for online resources, these are required by the IB and do need to be included.

Do not use footnotes. These are not used in MLA for citations and are not required to be read by the examiner.

Don’t use “padding” when completing your bibliography. Only include works that you have cited or consulted (in which case you can include a separate Works Consulted list).

Any visual material including graphs and images should only be included if it is directly inked to your argument and referred to in the tex. It also needs to be captioned and reference correctly.

Credit must be given to all sources used. Clearly distinguish between your thoughts and those of others.

Word Count: 4000 words

Included in the word count	Not included in the word count
The introduction	The contents page
The main body	Maps, charts, diagrams, annotated illustrations
The conclusion	Tables
Quotations	Equations, formulas and calculations
Footnotes and/or endnotes that are not references	Citations/references (whether parenthetical, numbered, footnotes or endnotes)
	The bibliography
	The Reflections on planning and progress form
	Headers

Source: Extended Essay Guide (International Baccalaureate Organization).

Chinese: 1 word = approximately 1.2 Chinese characters (upper limit 4,800 characters). Exclude punctuation in word/character count.

Note that quotations are included in the word count, but the works cited page and in-text citations are not included in the word count.