what is assignment process

Understanding Assignments

What this handout is about.

The first step in any successful college writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms and practices into meaningful clues to the type of writing your instructor expects. See our short video for more tips.

Basic beginnings

Regardless of the assignment, department, or instructor, adopting these two habits will serve you well :

• Read the assignment carefully as soon as you receive it. Do not put this task off—reading the assignment at the beginning will save you time, stress, and problems later. An assignment can look pretty straightforward at first, particularly if the instructor has provided lots of information. That does not mean it will not take time and effort to complete; you may even have to learn a new skill to complete the assignment.
• Ask the instructor about anything you do not understand. Do not hesitate to approach your instructor. Instructors would prefer to set you straight before you hand the paper in. That’s also when you will find their feedback most useful.

Assignment formats

Many assignments follow a basic format. Assignments often begin with an overview of the topic, include a central verb or verbs that describe the task, and offer some additional suggestions, questions, or prompts to get you started.

An Overview of Some Kind

The instructor might set the stage with some general discussion of the subject of the assignment, introduce the topic, or remind you of something pertinent that you have discussed in class. For example:

“Throughout history, gerbils have played a key role in politics,” or “In the last few weeks of class, we have focused on the evening wear of the housefly …”

The Task of the Assignment

Pay attention; this part tells you what to do when you write the paper. Look for the key verb or verbs in the sentence. Words like analyze, summarize, or compare direct you to think about your topic in a certain way. Also pay attention to words such as how, what, when, where, and why; these words guide your attention toward specific information. (See the section in this handout titled “Key Terms” for more information.)

“Analyze the effect that gerbils had on the Russian Revolution”, or “Suggest an interpretation of housefly undergarments that differs from Darwin’s.”

Additional Material to Think about

Here you will find some questions to use as springboards as you begin to think about the topic. Instructors usually include these questions as suggestions rather than requirements. Do not feel compelled to answer every question unless the instructor asks you to do so. Pay attention to the order of the questions. Sometimes they suggest the thinking process your instructor imagines you will need to follow to begin thinking about the topic.

“You may wish to consider the differing views held by Communist gerbils vs. Monarchist gerbils, or Can there be such a thing as ‘the housefly garment industry’ or is it just a home-based craft?”

These are the instructor’s comments about writing expectations:

“Be concise”, “Write effectively”, or “Argue furiously.”

Technical Details

These instructions usually indicate format rules or guidelines.

“Your paper must be typed in Palatino font on gray paper and must not exceed 600 pages. It is due on the anniversary of Mao Tse-tung’s death.”

The assignment’s parts may not appear in exactly this order, and each part may be very long or really short. Nonetheless, being aware of this standard pattern can help you understand what your instructor wants you to do.

Interpreting the assignment

Ask yourself a few basic questions as you read and jot down the answers on the assignment sheet:

Why did your instructor ask you to do this particular task?

Who is your audience.

• What kind of evidence do you need to support your ideas?

What kind of writing style is acceptable?

• What are the absolute rules of the paper?

Try to look at the question from the point of view of the instructor. Recognize that your instructor has a reason for giving you this assignment and for giving it to you at a particular point in the semester. In every assignment, the instructor has a challenge for you. This challenge could be anything from demonstrating an ability to think clearly to demonstrating an ability to use the library. See the assignment not as a vague suggestion of what to do but as an opportunity to show that you can handle the course material as directed. Paper assignments give you more than a topic to discuss—they ask you to do something with the topic. Keep reminding yourself of that. Be careful to avoid the other extreme as well: do not read more into the assignment than what is there.

Of course, your instructor has given you an assignment so that they will be able to assess your understanding of the course material and give you an appropriate grade. But there is more to it than that. Your instructor has tried to design a learning experience of some kind. Your instructor wants you to think about something in a particular way for a particular reason. If you read the course description at the beginning of your syllabus, review the assigned readings, and consider the assignment itself, you may begin to see the plan, purpose, or approach to the subject matter that your instructor has created for you. If you still aren’t sure of the assignment’s goals, try asking the instructor. For help with this, see our handout on getting feedback .

Given your instructor’s efforts, it helps to answer the question: What is my purpose in completing this assignment? Is it to gather research from a variety of outside sources and present a coherent picture? Is it to take material I have been learning in class and apply it to a new situation? Is it to prove a point one way or another? Key words from the assignment can help you figure this out. Look for key terms in the form of active verbs that tell you what to do.

Key Terms: Finding Those Active Verbs

Here are some common key words and definitions to help you think about assignment terms:

Information words Ask you to demonstrate what you know about the subject, such as who, what, when, where, how, and why.

• define —give the subject’s meaning (according to someone or something). Sometimes you have to give more than one view on the subject’s meaning
• describe —provide details about the subject by answering question words (such as who, what, when, where, how, and why); you might also give details related to the five senses (what you see, hear, feel, taste, and smell)
• explain —give reasons why or examples of how something happened
• illustrate —give descriptive examples of the subject and show how each is connected with the subject
• summarize —briefly list the important ideas you learned about the subject
• trace —outline how something has changed or developed from an earlier time to its current form
• research —gather material from outside sources about the subject, often with the implication or requirement that you will analyze what you have found

Relation words Ask you to demonstrate how things are connected.

• compare —show how two or more things are similar (and, sometimes, different)
• contrast —show how two or more things are dissimilar
• apply—use details that you’ve been given to demonstrate how an idea, theory, or concept works in a particular situation
• cause —show how one event or series of events made something else happen
• relate —show or describe the connections between things

Interpretation words Ask you to defend ideas of your own about the subject. Do not see these words as requesting opinion alone (unless the assignment specifically says so), but as requiring opinion that is supported by concrete evidence. Remember examples, principles, definitions, or concepts from class or research and use them in your interpretation.

• assess —summarize your opinion of the subject and measure it against something
• prove, justify —give reasons or examples to demonstrate how or why something is the truth
• evaluate, respond —state your opinion of the subject as good, bad, or some combination of the two, with examples and reasons
• support —give reasons or evidence for something you believe (be sure to state clearly what it is that you believe)
• synthesize —put two or more things together that have not been put together in class or in your readings before; do not just summarize one and then the other and say that they are similar or different—you must provide a reason for putting them together that runs all the way through the paper
• analyze —determine how individual parts create or relate to the whole, figure out how something works, what it might mean, or why it is important
• argue —take a side and defend it with evidence against the other side

More Clues to Your Purpose As you read the assignment, think about what the teacher does in class:

• What kinds of textbooks or coursepack did your instructor choose for the course—ones that provide background information, explain theories or perspectives, or argue a point of view?
• In lecture, does your instructor ask your opinion, try to prove their point of view, or use keywords that show up again in the assignment?
• What kinds of assignments are typical in this discipline? Social science classes often expect more research. Humanities classes thrive on interpretation and analysis.
• How do the assignments, readings, and lectures work together in the course? Instructors spend time designing courses, sometimes even arguing with their peers about the most effective course materials. Figuring out the overall design to the course will help you understand what each assignment is meant to achieve.

Now, what about your reader? Most undergraduates think of their audience as the instructor. True, your instructor is a good person to keep in mind as you write. But for the purposes of a good paper, think of your audience as someone like your roommate: smart enough to understand a clear, logical argument, but not someone who already knows exactly what is going on in your particular paper. Remember, even if the instructor knows everything there is to know about your paper topic, they still have to read your paper and assess your understanding. In other words, teach the material to your reader.

Aiming a paper at your audience happens in two ways: you make decisions about the tone and the level of information you want to convey.

• Tone means the “voice” of your paper. Should you be chatty, formal, or objective? Usually you will find some happy medium—you do not want to alienate your reader by sounding condescending or superior, but you do not want to, um, like, totally wig on the man, you know? Eschew ostentatious erudition: some students think the way to sound academic is to use big words. Be careful—you can sound ridiculous, especially if you use the wrong big words.
• The level of information you use depends on who you think your audience is. If you imagine your audience as your instructor and they already know everything you have to say, you may find yourself leaving out key information that can cause your argument to be unconvincing and illogical. But you do not have to explain every single word or issue. If you are telling your roommate what happened on your favorite science fiction TV show last night, you do not say, “First a dark-haired white man of average height, wearing a suit and carrying a flashlight, walked into the room. Then a purple alien with fifteen arms and at least three eyes turned around. Then the man smiled slightly. In the background, you could hear a clock ticking. The room was fairly dark and had at least two windows that I saw.” You also do not say, “This guy found some aliens. The end.” Find some balance of useful details that support your main point.

You’ll find a much more detailed discussion of these concepts in our handout on audience .

The Grim Truth

With a few exceptions (including some lab and ethnography reports), you are probably being asked to make an argument. You must convince your audience. It is easy to forget this aim when you are researching and writing; as you become involved in your subject matter, you may become enmeshed in the details and focus on learning or simply telling the information you have found. You need to do more than just repeat what you have read. Your writing should have a point, and you should be able to say it in a sentence. Sometimes instructors call this sentence a “thesis” or a “claim.”

So, if your instructor tells you to write about some aspect of oral hygiene, you do not want to just list: “First, you brush your teeth with a soft brush and some peanut butter. Then, you floss with unwaxed, bologna-flavored string. Finally, gargle with bourbon.” Instead, you could say, “Of all the oral cleaning methods, sandblasting removes the most plaque. Therefore it should be recommended by the American Dental Association.” Or, “From an aesthetic perspective, moldy teeth can be quite charming. However, their joys are short-lived.”

Convincing the reader of your argument is the goal of academic writing. It doesn’t have to say “argument” anywhere in the assignment for you to need one. Look at the assignment and think about what kind of argument you could make about it instead of just seeing it as a checklist of information you have to present. For help with understanding the role of argument in academic writing, see our handout on argument .

What kind of evidence do you need?

There are many kinds of evidence, and what type of evidence will work for your assignment can depend on several factors–the discipline, the parameters of the assignment, and your instructor’s preference. Should you use statistics? Historical examples? Do you need to conduct your own experiment? Can you rely on personal experience? See our handout on evidence for suggestions on how to use evidence appropriately.

Make sure you are clear about this part of the assignment, because your use of evidence will be crucial in writing a successful paper. You are not just learning how to argue; you are learning how to argue with specific types of materials and ideas. Ask your instructor what counts as acceptable evidence. You can also ask a librarian for help. No matter what kind of evidence you use, be sure to cite it correctly—see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial .

You cannot always tell from the assignment just what sort of writing style your instructor expects. The instructor may be really laid back in class but still expect you to sound formal in writing. Or the instructor may be fairly formal in class and ask you to write a reflection paper where you need to use “I” and speak from your own experience.

Try to avoid false associations of a particular field with a style (“art historians like wacky creativity,” or “political scientists are boring and just give facts”) and look instead to the types of readings you have been given in class. No one expects you to write like Plato—just use the readings as a guide for what is standard or preferable to your instructor. When in doubt, ask your instructor about the level of formality they expect.

No matter what field you are writing for or what facts you are including, if you do not write so that your reader can understand your main idea, you have wasted your time. So make clarity your main goal. For specific help with style, see our handout on style .

Technical details about the assignment

The technical information you are given in an assignment always seems like the easy part. This section can actually give you lots of little hints about approaching the task. Find out if elements such as page length and citation format (see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial ) are negotiable. Some professors do not have strong preferences as long as you are consistent and fully answer the assignment. Some professors are very specific and will deduct big points for deviations.

Usually, the page length tells you something important: The instructor thinks the size of the paper is appropriate to the assignment’s parameters. In plain English, your instructor is telling you how many pages it should take for you to answer the question as fully as you are expected to. So if an assignment is two pages long, you cannot pad your paper with examples or reword your main idea several times. Hit your one point early, defend it with the clearest example, and finish quickly. If an assignment is ten pages long, you can be more complex in your main points and examples—and if you can only produce five pages for that assignment, you need to see someone for help—as soon as possible.

Tricks that don’t work

Your instructors are not fooled when you:

• spend more time on the cover page than the essay —graphics, cool binders, and cute titles are no replacement for a well-written paper.
• use huge fonts, wide margins, or extra spacing to pad the page length —these tricks are immediately obvious to the eye. Most instructors use the same word processor you do. They know what’s possible. Such tactics are especially damning when the instructor has a stack of 60 papers to grade and yours is the only one that low-flying airplane pilots could read.
• use a paper from another class that covered “sort of similar” material . Again, the instructor has a particular task for you to fulfill in the assignment that usually relates to course material and lectures. Your other paper may not cover this material, and turning in the same paper for more than one course may constitute an Honor Code violation . Ask the instructor—it can’t hurt.
• get all wacky and “creative” before you answer the question . Showing that you are able to think beyond the boundaries of a simple assignment can be good, but you must do what the assignment calls for first. Again, check with your instructor. A humorous tone can be refreshing for someone grading a stack of papers, but it will not get you a good grade if you have not fulfilled the task.

Critical reading of assignments leads to skills in other types of reading and writing. If you get good at figuring out what the real goals of assignments are, you are going to be better at understanding the goals of all of your classes and fields of study.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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Home » Assignment – Types, Examples and Writing Guide

Assignment – Types, Examples and Writing Guide

Table of Contents

Definition:

Assignment is a task given to students by a teacher or professor, usually as a means of assessing their understanding and application of course material. Assignments can take various forms, including essays, research papers, presentations, problem sets, lab reports, and more.

Assignments are typically designed to be completed outside of class time and may require independent research, critical thinking, and analysis. They are often graded and used as a significant component of a student’s overall course grade. The instructions for an assignment usually specify the goals, requirements, and deadlines for completion, and students are expected to meet these criteria to earn a good grade.

History of Assignment

The use of assignments as a tool for teaching and learning has been a part of education for centuries. Following is a brief history of the Assignment.

• Ancient Times: Assignments such as writing exercises, recitations, and memorization tasks were used to reinforce learning.
• Medieval Period : Universities began to develop the concept of the assignment, with students completing essays, commentaries, and translations to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of the subject matter.
• 19th Century : With the growth of schools and universities, assignments became more widespread and were used to assess student progress and achievement.
• 20th Century: The rise of distance education and online learning led to the further development of assignments as an integral part of the educational process.
• Present Day: Assignments continue to be used in a variety of educational settings and are seen as an effective way to promote student learning and assess student achievement. The nature and format of assignments continue to evolve in response to changing educational needs and technological innovations.

Types of Assignment

Here are some of the most common types of assignments:

An essay is a piece of writing that presents an argument, analysis, or interpretation of a topic or question. It usually consists of an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

Essay structure:

• Introduction : introduces the topic and thesis statement
• Body paragraphs : each paragraph presents a different argument or idea, with evidence and analysis to support it
• Conclusion : summarizes the key points and reiterates the thesis statement

Research paper

A research paper involves gathering and analyzing information on a particular topic, and presenting the findings in a well-structured, documented paper. It usually involves conducting original research, collecting data, and presenting it in a clear, organized manner.

Research paper structure:

• Title page : includes the title of the paper, author’s name, date, and institution
• Abstract : summarizes the paper’s main points and conclusions
• Introduction : provides background information on the topic and research question
• Literature review: summarizes previous research on the topic
• Methodology : explains how the research was conducted
• Results : presents the findings of the research
• Discussion : interprets the results and draws conclusions
• Conclusion : summarizes the key findings and implications

A case study involves analyzing a real-life situation, problem or issue, and presenting a solution or recommendations based on the analysis. It often involves extensive research, data analysis, and critical thinking.

Case study structure:

• Introduction : introduces the case study and its purpose
• Background : provides context and background information on the case
• Analysis : examines the key issues and problems in the case
• Solution/recommendations: proposes solutions or recommendations based on the analysis
• Conclusion: Summarize the key points and implications

A lab report is a scientific document that summarizes the results of a laboratory experiment or research project. It typically includes an introduction, methodology, results, discussion, and conclusion.

Lab report structure:

• Title page : includes the title of the experiment, author’s name, date, and institution
• Abstract : summarizes the purpose, methodology, and results of the experiment
• Methods : explains how the experiment was conducted
• Results : presents the findings of the experiment

Presentation

A presentation involves delivering information, data or findings to an audience, often with the use of visual aids such as slides, charts, or diagrams. It requires clear communication skills, good organization, and effective use of technology.

Presentation structure:

• Introduction : introduces the topic and purpose of the presentation
• Body : presents the main points, findings, or data, with the help of visual aids
• Conclusion : summarizes the key points and provides a closing statement

Creative Project

A creative project is an assignment that requires students to produce something original, such as a painting, sculpture, video, or creative writing piece. It allows students to demonstrate their creativity and artistic skills.

Creative project structure:

• Introduction : introduces the project and its purpose
• Body : presents the creative work, with explanations or descriptions as needed
• Conclusion : summarizes the key elements and reflects on the creative process.

Examples of Assignments

Following are Examples of Assignment templates samples:

Essay template:

I. Introduction

• Hook: Grab the reader’s attention with a catchy opening sentence.
• Background: Provide some context or background information on the topic.
• Thesis statement: State the main argument or point of your essay.

II. Body paragraphs

• Topic sentence: Introduce the main idea or argument of the paragraph.
• Evidence: Provide evidence or examples to support your point.
• Analysis: Explain how the evidence supports your argument.
• Transition: Use a transition sentence to lead into the next paragraph.

III. Conclusion

• Restate thesis: Summarize your main argument or point.
• Review key points: Summarize the main points you made in your essay.
• Concluding thoughts: End with a final thought or call to action.

Research paper template:

I. Title page

• Title: Give your paper a descriptive title.
• Author: Include your name and institutional affiliation.
• Date: Provide the date the paper was submitted.

II. Abstract

• Background: Summarize the background and purpose of your research.
• Methodology: Describe the methods you used to conduct your research.
• Results: Summarize the main findings of your research.
• Conclusion: Provide a brief summary of the implications and conclusions of your research.

III. Introduction

• Background: Provide some background information on the topic.
• Research question: State your research question or hypothesis.
• Purpose: Explain the purpose of your research.

IV. Literature review

• Background: Summarize previous research on the topic.
• Gaps in research: Identify gaps or areas that need further research.

V. Methodology

• Participants: Describe the participants in your study.
• Procedure: Explain the procedure you used to conduct your research.
• Measures: Describe the measures you used to collect data.

VI. Results

• Quantitative results: Summarize the quantitative data you collected.
• Qualitative results: Summarize the qualitative data you collected.

VII. Discussion

• Interpretation: Interpret the results and explain what they mean.
• Implications: Discuss the implications of your research.
• Limitations: Identify any limitations or weaknesses of your research.

VIII. Conclusion

• Review key points: Summarize the main points you made in your paper.

Case study template:

• Background: Provide background information on the case.
• Research question: State the research question or problem you are examining.
• Purpose: Explain the purpose of the case study.

II. Analysis

• Problem: Identify the main problem or issue in the case.
• Factors: Describe the factors that contributed to the problem.
• Alternative solutions: Describe potential solutions to the problem.

III. Solution/recommendations

• Proposed solution: Describe the solution you are proposing.
• Rationale: Explain why this solution is the best one.
• Implementation: Describe how the solution can be implemented.

IV. Conclusion

• Summary: Summarize the main points of your case study.

Lab report template:

• Title: Give your report a descriptive title.
• Date: Provide the date the report was submitted.
• Background: Summarize the background and purpose of the experiment.
• Methodology: Describe the methods you used to conduct the experiment.
• Results: Summarize the main findings of the experiment.
• Conclusion: Provide a brief summary of the implications and conclusions
• Background: Provide some background information on the experiment.
• Hypothesis: State your hypothesis or research question.
• Purpose: Explain the purpose of the experiment.

IV. Materials and methods

• Materials: List the materials and equipment used in the experiment.
• Procedure: Describe the procedure you followed to conduct the experiment.
• Data: Present the data you collected in tables or graphs.
• Analysis: Analyze the data and describe the patterns or trends you observed.

VI. Discussion

• Implications: Discuss the implications of your findings.
• Limitations: Identify any limitations or weaknesses of the experiment.

VII. Conclusion

• Restate hypothesis: Summarize your hypothesis or research question.
• Review key points: Summarize the main points you made in your report.

Presentation template:

• Attention grabber: Grab the audience’s attention with a catchy opening.
• Purpose: Explain the purpose of your presentation.
• Overview: Provide an overview of what you will cover in your presentation.

II. Main points

• Main point 1: Present the first main point of your presentation.
• Supporting details: Provide supporting details or evidence to support your point.
• Main point 2: Present the second main point of your presentation.
• Main point 3: Present the third main point of your presentation.
• Summary: Summarize the main points of your presentation.
• Call to action: End with a final thought or call to action.

Creative writing template:

• Setting: Describe the setting of your story.
• Characters: Introduce the main characters of your story.
• Rising action: Introduce the conflict or problem in your story.
• Climax: Present the most intense moment of the story.
• Falling action: Resolve the conflict or problem in your story.
• Resolution: Describe how the conflict or problem was resolved.
• Final thoughts: End with a final thought or reflection on the story.

How to Write Assignment

Here is a general guide on how to write an assignment:

• Understand the assignment prompt: Before you begin writing, make sure you understand what the assignment requires. Read the prompt carefully and make note of any specific requirements or guidelines.
• Research and gather information: Depending on the type of assignment, you may need to do research to gather information to support your argument or points. Use credible sources such as academic journals, books, and reputable websites.
• Organize your ideas : Once you have gathered all the necessary information, organize your ideas into a clear and logical structure. Consider creating an outline or diagram to help you visualize your ideas.
• Write a draft: Begin writing your assignment using your organized ideas and research. Don’t worry too much about grammar or sentence structure at this point; the goal is to get your thoughts down on paper.
• Revise and edit: After you have written a draft, revise and edit your work. Make sure your ideas are presented in a clear and concise manner, and that your sentences and paragraphs flow smoothly.
• Proofread: Finally, proofread your work for spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors. It’s a good idea to have someone else read over your assignment as well to catch any mistakes you may have missed.
• Submit your assignment : Once you are satisfied with your work, submit your assignment according to the instructions provided by your instructor or professor.

Applications of Assignment

Assignments have many applications across different fields and industries. Here are a few examples:

• Education : Assignments are a common tool used in education to help students learn and demonstrate their knowledge. They can be used to assess a student’s understanding of a particular topic, to develop critical thinking skills, and to improve writing and research abilities.
• Business : Assignments can be used in the business world to assess employee skills, to evaluate job performance, and to provide training opportunities. They can also be used to develop business plans, marketing strategies, and financial projections.
• Journalism : Assignments are often used in journalism to produce news articles, features, and investigative reports. Journalists may be assigned to cover a particular event or topic, or to research and write a story on a specific subject.
• Research : Assignments can be used in research to collect and analyze data, to conduct experiments, and to present findings in written or oral form. Researchers may be assigned to conduct research on a specific topic, to write a research paper, or to present their findings at a conference or seminar.
• Government : Assignments can be used in government to develop policy proposals, to conduct research, and to analyze data. Government officials may be assigned to work on a specific project or to conduct research on a particular topic.
• Non-profit organizations: Assignments can be used in non-profit organizations to develop fundraising strategies, to plan events, and to conduct research. Volunteers may be assigned to work on a specific project or to help with a particular task.

Purpose of Assignment

The purpose of an assignment varies depending on the context in which it is given. However, some common purposes of assignments include:

• Assessing learning: Assignments are often used to assess a student’s understanding of a particular topic or concept. This allows educators to determine if a student has mastered the material or if they need additional support.
• Developing skills: Assignments can be used to develop a wide range of skills, such as critical thinking, problem-solving, research, and communication. Assignments that require students to analyze and synthesize information can help to build these skills.
• Encouraging creativity: Assignments can be designed to encourage students to be creative and think outside the box. This can help to foster innovation and original thinking.
• Providing feedback : Assignments provide an opportunity for teachers to provide feedback to students on their progress and performance. Feedback can help students to understand where they need to improve and to develop a growth mindset.
• Meeting learning objectives : Assignments can be designed to help students meet specific learning objectives or outcomes. For example, a writing assignment may be designed to help students improve their writing skills, while a research assignment may be designed to help students develop their research skills.

When to write Assignment

Assignments are typically given by instructors or professors as part of a course or academic program. The timing of when to write an assignment will depend on the specific requirements of the course or program, but in general, assignments should be completed within the timeframe specified by the instructor or program guidelines.

It is important to begin working on assignments as soon as possible to ensure enough time for research, writing, and revisions. Waiting until the last minute can result in rushed work and lower quality output.

It is also important to prioritize assignments based on their due dates and the amount of work required. This will help to manage time effectively and ensure that all assignments are completed on time.

In addition to assignments given by instructors or professors, there may be other situations where writing an assignment is necessary. For example, in the workplace, assignments may be given to complete a specific project or task. In these situations, it is important to establish clear deadlines and expectations to ensure that the assignment is completed on time and to a high standard.

Characteristics of Assignment

Here are some common characteristics of assignments:

• Purpose : Assignments have a specific purpose, such as assessing knowledge or developing skills. They are designed to help students learn and achieve specific learning objectives.
• Requirements: Assignments have specific requirements that must be met, such as a word count, format, or specific content. These requirements are usually provided by the instructor or professor.
• Deadline: Assignments have a specific deadline for completion, which is usually set by the instructor or professor. It is important to meet the deadline to avoid penalties or lower grades.
• Individual or group work: Assignments can be completed individually or as part of a group. Group assignments may require collaboration and communication with other group members.
• Feedback : Assignments provide an opportunity for feedback from the instructor or professor. This feedback can help students to identify areas of improvement and to develop their skills.
• Academic integrity: Assignments require academic integrity, which means that students must submit original work and avoid plagiarism. This includes citing sources properly and following ethical guidelines.
• Learning outcomes : Assignments are designed to help students achieve specific learning outcomes. These outcomes are usually related to the course objectives and may include developing critical thinking skills, writing abilities, or subject-specific knowledge.

Advantages of Assignment

There are several advantages of assignment, including:

• Helps in learning: Assignments help students to reinforce their learning and understanding of a particular topic. By completing assignments, students get to apply the concepts learned in class, which helps them to better understand and retain the information.
• Develops critical thinking skills: Assignments often require students to think critically and analyze information in order to come up with a solution or answer. This helps to develop their critical thinking skills, which are important for success in many areas of life.
• Encourages creativity: Assignments that require students to create something, such as a piece of writing or a project, can encourage creativity and innovation. This can help students to develop new ideas and perspectives, which can be beneficial in many areas of life.
• Builds time-management skills: Assignments often come with deadlines, which can help students to develop time-management skills. Learning how to manage time effectively is an important skill that can help students to succeed in many areas of life.
• Provides feedback: Assignments provide an opportunity for students to receive feedback on their work. This feedback can help students to identify areas where they need to improve and can help them to grow and develop.

Limitations of Assignment

There are also some limitations of assignments that should be considered, including:

• Limited scope: Assignments are often limited in scope, and may not provide a comprehensive understanding of a particular topic. They may only cover a specific aspect of a topic, and may not provide a full picture of the subject matter.
• Lack of engagement: Some assignments may not engage students in the learning process, particularly if they are repetitive or not challenging enough. This can lead to a lack of motivation and interest in the subject matter.
• Time-consuming: Assignments can be time-consuming, particularly if they require a lot of research or writing. This can be a disadvantage for students who have other commitments, such as work or extracurricular activities.
• Unreliable assessment: The assessment of assignments can be subjective and may not always accurately reflect a student’s understanding or abilities. The grading may be influenced by factors such as the instructor’s personal biases or the student’s writing style.
• Lack of feedback : Although assignments can provide feedback, this feedback may not always be detailed or useful. Instructors may not have the time or resources to provide detailed feedback on every assignment, which can limit the value of the feedback that students receive.

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Researcher, Academic Writer, Web developer

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Undergraduate Writing: Understanding the Assignment

Introduction, common writing terms.

Analyze = explain a multifaceted text or idea by breaking it into its parts.

Example: Analyze the relationship between hand sanitizer and disease transmission in hospitals.

Tips: Remember to state what the relationship is, but also why . The why involves critical thinking to determine all the factors in the scenario.

Assess or evaluate = determine the significance or value of something by examining it closely.

Example: Evaluate whether hand sanitizer decreases disease transmission.

Tips: Come to an overall, educated opinion on the issue based on course readings, other research, and reasoning. Write a thesis statement at the beginning of your paper to tell the reader what that opinion is.

Compare and contrast = to examine two items to discover similarities and differences.

Example : Compare and contrast three brands of hand sanitizer for effectiveness and cost.

Tips : To provide a well-rounded comparison, give equal attention to the similarities and the differences. Follow our compare/contrast guidelines before submission.

Paraphrase =  restate a passage in your own words.

Example : Paraphrase the CDC's recent announcement on the use of hand sanitizer.

Tips : It can be tempting to directly quote the statement, but paraphrasing builds your academic skills. Read the announcement carefully and then open a new document on your computer. Without looking back, reword the announcement using your own vocabulary. Finally, compare yours to the original.

Reflect =  think about an idea deeply and consider its impact.

Example : Reflect on your own use of hand sanitizer in the medical profession.

Tips : You might find that sitting in a quiet place, away from the computer, allows you to think easier. Even if you are reflecting on a bad situation in your workplace, remain neutral and objective when writing about the incident. 

Summarize =  express the main points of a reading in a shorter form.

Example : Summarize Chapter 3 of your course text on disease transmission.

Tips : While reading, pay attention to the who, what, why, where, and how in the text. It could be helpful to take notes or highlight the important information that jumps out at you.

Support your work/ideas =  justify your point of view by providing evidence.

Tips : Evidence can come in the form of statistics, examples, or other research. Such evidence is usually accompanied by a citation crediting the original source.

Once you understand the assignment instructions, jot down each component or outline the paper. Keep these tools handy as you write.

Still unsure what a word or concept means? Look it up in Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary .

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NCI LIBRARY

Academic writing skills guide: planning your assignments.

• Key Features of Academic Writing
• The Writing Process
• Understanding Assignments
• Brainstorming Techniques
• Planning Your Assignments
• Thesis Statements
• Writing Drafts
• Structuring Your Assignment
• How to Deal With Writer's Block
• Using Paragraphs
• Conclusions
• Introductions
• Revising & Editing
• Proofreading
• Grammar & Punctuation
• Reporting Verbs
• Signposting, Transitions & Linking Words/Phrases
• Using Lecturers' Feedback

There may be a temptation to skip the planning stage, especially when deadlines are approaching and you are keen to get on with researching but planning has multiple benefits.

• Make a rough outline plan - the plan begins with your own interpretation of the question; this initial plan helps you order your ideas and focus your reading
• If you really know nothing at all about the topic, some initial skimming and browsing through recommended readings or your lecturer’s course material can provide a few ideas.
• Once you have an initial plan, further familiarise yourself with all relevant module content and sources posted on your Moodle page. These resources have been specifically chosen by your lecturer to help you with your coursework so using these will help you refine your plan and make writing your assignment easier.

Before you start searching the library for resources or information, you need to have some idea of what you are looking for - note down all the questions you can think of that might relate to your assignment title and criteria and list some keywords around the topic you need to research. By taking time to properly understand the assignment title or question and brainstorming for initial ideas, it can help you make informed decisions about what you need to read for a particular assignment.

In this way, you can decide what information you need and then start gathering it. If left unplanned, the reading stage can swallow up huge amounts of time. Making intelligent decisions, based on your initial planning, about which sources to target, can help you to avoid spending time reading less relevant, inappropriate, or even completely irrelevant material. You will be much more efficient in your reading and your research if you have some idea of where your argument is headed. You can then search for evidence for the points in your tentative plan while you are reading and researching

Communications from the Library:  Please note all communications from the library, concerning renewal of books, overdue books and reservations will be sent to your NCI student email account.

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Understanding Your Assignment

The first step in the writing process is to carefully examine the assignment. Don't underestimate the importance of spending a few minutes to think about what your professor is looking for. A well-written paper can receive a lower grade simply because it does not meet the requirements of the assignment. Here are some strategies for decoding a prompt:

• Look for key words. Look for words in the assignment that indicate what type of writing the professor wants you to produce. Such words help you frame your paper, find your audience, and generate the type of writing your professor expects. For example, there is a difference between "summarize" and "analyze." Be aware of the meanings of words like "discuss", "evaluate", "explain", "describe", and "define." If you aren't sure what your professor means by a certain word in the assignment, don't be afraid to ask for clarification.
• Know the purpose of the paper. Once you've figured out what the assignment is telling you, think about how you will write to fulfill the expectations of your audience. The assignment may require you to persuade your reader, compare and contrast ideas, or summarize an author's point of view. Considering your purpose at this point will make it easier for you to figure out what kind of thesis you'll need when you start to write the paper.
• Fulfill the criteria in the prompt. This point may seem self-evident, but it's important! It's easy to get off-topic when you're in the brainstorming stage. When considering your ideas, look back at the assignment to make sure you're still within the parameters set by your professor. Be aware of the specific details of the assignment and know your audience, word limit, and other guidelines.
• Ask for clarity. Sometimes professors make assignments vague or open-ended so that you have an opportunity to work on a topic that interests you. If you don't understand the assignment, if you're having trouble developing a topic, or if you're worried that your topic may stray from your assignment, ask your professor for guidance or visit the Writing Center.

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Part II: Writing Process

Assignment: writing process.

The writing process is different for every person and for every writing type, but there are common steps that are important to practice. Generally, the writing process consists of:

• Prewriting (the early planning stages often as mindmapping, brainstorming, freewriting)
• Organizing (developing logical order)
• Drafting (creating the paper and demonstrating the recursive nature of writing)
• Revising (conforming to Standard Edited English and style formatting, such as MLA and APA, for most academic writing)
• Publishing (the final version that is submitted)

For this assignment, you will create a summary of the writing process from a proficient writer’s perspective in a Google Doc.

• Review the grading rubric as listed on this page.
• Review and take notes of the video about the writing process:

• Summarize the key points of the video in one paragraph.
• In another paragraph, include what you thought and learned from the video.
• Include techniques you found interesting that you might apply to your process of writing.
• When you are finished developing your response in the Google Doc, copy, paste, and publish your journal onto a new blog post at your WordPress site.
• Submit the URL of your blog to your instructor.
• Developmental Writing. Authored by : Elisabeth Ellington and Ronda Dorsey Neugebauer. Provided by : Chadron State College. Located at : http://www.csc.edu/ . Project : Kaleidoscope Open Course Initiative. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Writing Process Animation. Authored by : CIS*2050*DE. Located at : http://youtu.be/V1pnpL8295E . License : All Rights Reserved . License Terms : Standard YouTube license

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How Do I Create Meaningful and Effective Assignments?

Prepared by allison boye, ph.d. teaching, learning, and professional development center.

Assessment is a necessary part of the teaching and learning process, helping us measure whether our students have really learned what we want them to learn. While exams and quizzes are certainly favorite and useful methods of assessment, out of class assignments (written or otherwise) can offer similar insights into our students' learning.  And just as creating a reliable test takes thoughtfulness and skill, so does creating meaningful and effective assignments. Undoubtedly, many instructors have been on the receiving end of disappointing student work, left wondering what went wrong… and often, those problems can be remedied in the future by some simple fine-tuning of the original assignment.  This paper will take a look at some important elements to consider when developing assignments, and offer some easy approaches to creating a valuable assessment experience for all involved.

First Things First…

Before assigning any major tasks to students, it is imperative that you first define a few things for yourself as the instructor:

• Your goals for the assignment . Why are you assigning this project, and what do you hope your students will gain from completing it? What knowledge, skills, and abilities do you aim to measure with this assignment?  Creating assignments is a major part of overall course design, and every project you assign should clearly align with your goals for the course in general.  For instance, if you want your students to demonstrate critical thinking, perhaps asking them to simply summarize an article is not the best match for that goal; a more appropriate option might be to ask for an analysis of a controversial issue in the discipline. Ultimately, the connection between the assignment and its purpose should be clear to both you and your students to ensure that it is fulfilling the desired goals and doesn't seem like “busy work.” For some ideas about what kinds of assignments match certain learning goals, take a look at this page from DePaul University's Teaching Commons.
• Have they experienced “socialization” in the culture of your discipline (Flaxman, 2005)? Are they familiar with any conventions you might want them to know? In other words, do they know the “language” of your discipline, generally accepted style guidelines, or research protocols?
• Do they know how to conduct research?  Do they know the proper style format, documentation style, acceptable resources, etc.? Do they know how to use the library (Fitzpatrick, 1989) or evaluate resources?
• What kinds of writing or work have they previously engaged in?  For instance, have they completed long, formal writing assignments or research projects before? Have they ever engaged in analysis, reflection, or argumentation? Have they completed group assignments before?  Do they know how to write a literature review or scientific report?

In his book Engaging Ideas (1996), John Bean provides a great list of questions to help instructors focus on their main teaching goals when creating an assignment (p.78):

1. What are the main units/modules in my course?

2. What are my main learning objectives for each module and for the course?

3. What thinking skills am I trying to develop within each unit and throughout the course?

4. What are the most difficult aspects of my course for students?

5. If I could change my students' study habits, what would I most like to change?

6. What difference do I want my course to make in my students' lives?

What your students need to know

Once you have determined your own goals for the assignment and the levels of your students, you can begin creating your assignment.  However, when introducing your assignment to your students, there are several things you will need to clearly outline for them in order to ensure the most successful assignments possible.

• First, you will need to articulate the purpose of the assignment . Even though you know why the assignment is important and what it is meant to accomplish, you cannot assume that your students will intuit that purpose. Your students will appreciate an understanding of how the assignment fits into the larger goals of the course and what they will learn from the process (Hass & Osborn, 2007). Being transparent with your students and explaining why you are asking them to complete a given assignment can ultimately help motivate them to complete the assignment more thoughtfully.
• If you are asking your students to complete a writing assignment, you should define for them the “rhetorical or cognitive mode/s” you want them to employ in their writing (Flaxman, 2005). In other words, use precise verbs that communicate whether you are asking them to analyze, argue, describe, inform, etc.  (Verbs like “explore” or “comment on” can be too vague and cause confusion.) Provide them with a specific task to complete, such as a problem to solve, a question to answer, or an argument to support.  For those who want assignments to lead to top-down, thesis-driven writing, John Bean (1996) suggests presenting a proposition that students must defend or refute, or a problem that demands a thesis answer.
• It is also a good idea to define the audience you want your students to address with their assignment, if possible – especially with writing assignments.  Otherwise, students will address only the instructor, often assuming little requires explanation or development (Hedengren, 2004; MIT, 1999). Further, asking students to address the instructor, who typically knows more about the topic than the student, places the student in an unnatural rhetorical position.  Instead, you might consider asking your students to prepare their assignments for alternative audiences such as other students who missed last week's classes, a group that opposes their position, or people reading a popular magazine or newspaper.  In fact, a study by Bean (1996) indicated the students often appreciate and enjoy assignments that vary elements such as audience or rhetorical context, so don't be afraid to get creative!
• Obviously, you will also need to articulate clearly the logistics or “business aspects” of the assignment . In other words, be explicit with your students about required elements such as the format, length, documentation style, writing style (formal or informal?), and deadlines.  One caveat, however: do not allow the logistics of the paper take precedence over the content in your assignment description; if you spend all of your time describing these things, students might suspect that is all you care about in their execution of the assignment.
• Finally, you should clarify your evaluation criteria for the assignment. What elements of content are most important? Will you grade holistically or weight features separately? How much weight will be given to individual elements, etc?  Another precaution to take when defining requirements for your students is to take care that your instructions and rubric also do not overshadow the content; prescribing too rigidly each element of an assignment can limit students' freedom to explore and discover. According to Beth Finch Hedengren, “A good assignment provides the purpose and guidelines… without dictating exactly what to say” (2004, p. 27).  If you decide to utilize a grading rubric, be sure to provide that to the students along with the assignment description, prior to their completion of the assignment.

A great way to get students engaged with an assignment and build buy-in is to encourage their collaboration on its design and/or on the grading criteria (Hudd, 2003). In his article “Conducting Writing Assignments,” Richard Leahy (2002) offers a few ideas for building in said collaboration:

• Ask the students to develop the grading scale themselves from scratch, starting with choosing the categories.

• Set the grading categories yourself, but ask the students to help write the descriptions.

• Draft the complete grading scale yourself, then give it to your students for review and suggestions.

A Few Do's and Don'ts…

Determining your goals for the assignment and its essential logistics is a good start to creating an effective assignment. However, there are a few more simple factors to consider in your final design. First, here are a few things you should do :

• Do provide detail in your assignment description . Research has shown that students frequently prefer some guiding constraints when completing assignments (Bean, 1996), and that more detail (within reason) can lead to more successful student responses.  One idea is to provide students with physical assignment handouts , in addition to or instead of a simple description in a syllabus.  This can meet the needs of concrete learners and give them something tangible to refer to.  Likewise, it is often beneficial to make explicit for students the process or steps necessary to complete an assignment, given that students – especially younger ones – might need guidance in planning and time management (MIT, 1999).
• Do use open-ended questions.  The most effective and challenging assignments focus on questions that lead students to thinking and explaining, rather than simple yes or no answers, whether explicitly part of the assignment description or in the  brainstorming heuristics (Gardner, 2005).
• Do direct students to appropriate available resources . Giving students pointers about other venues for assistance can help them get started on the right track independently. These kinds of suggestions might include information about campus resources such as the University Writing Center or discipline-specific librarians, suggesting specific journals or books, or even sections of their textbook, or providing them with lists of research ideas or links to acceptable websites.
• Do consider providing models – both successful and unsuccessful models (Miller, 2007). These models could be provided by past students, or models you have created yourself.  You could even ask students to evaluate the models themselves using the determined evaluation criteria, helping them to visualize the final product, think critically about how to complete the assignment, and ideally, recognize success in their own work.
• Do consider including a way for students to make the assignment their own. In their study, Hass and Osborn (2007) confirmed the importance of personal engagement for students when completing an assignment.  Indeed, students will be more engaged in an assignment if it is personally meaningful, practical, or purposeful beyond the classroom.  You might think of ways to encourage students to tap into their own experiences or curiosities, to solve or explore a real problem, or connect to the larger community.  Offering variety in assignment selection can also help students feel more individualized, creative, and in control.
• If your assignment is substantial or long, do consider sequencing it. Far too often, assignments are given as one-shot final products that receive grades at the end of the semester, eternally abandoned by the student.  By sequencing a large assignment, or essentially breaking it down into a systematic approach consisting of interconnected smaller elements (such as a project proposal, an annotated bibliography, or a rough draft, or a series of mini-assignments related to the longer assignment), you can encourage thoughtfulness, complexity, and thoroughness in your students, as well as emphasize process over final product.

Next are a few elements to avoid in your assignments:

• Do not ask too many questions in your assignment.  In an effort to challenge students, instructors often err in the other direction, asking more questions than students can reasonably address in a single assignment without losing focus. Offering an overly specific “checklist” prompt often leads to externally organized papers, in which inexperienced students “slavishly follow the checklist instead of integrating their ideas into more organically-discovered structure” (Flaxman, 2005).
• Do not expect or suggest that there is an “ideal” response to the assignment. A common error for instructors is to dictate content of an assignment too rigidly, or to imply that there is a single correct response or a specific conclusion to reach, either explicitly or implicitly (Flaxman, 2005). Undoubtedly, students do not appreciate feeling as if they must read an instructor's mind to complete an assignment successfully, or that their own ideas have nowhere to go, and can lose motivation as a result. Similarly, avoid assignments that simply ask for regurgitation (Miller, 2007). Again, the best assignments invite students to engage in critical thinking, not just reproduce lectures or readings.
• Do not provide vague or confusing commands . Do students know what you mean when they are asked to “examine” or “discuss” a topic? Return to what you determined about your students' experiences and levels to help you decide what directions will make the most sense to them and what will require more explanation or guidance, and avoid verbiage that might confound them.
• Do not impose impossible time restraints or require the use of insufficient resources for completion of the assignment.  For instance, if you are asking all of your students to use the same resource, ensure that there are enough copies available for all students to access – or at least put one copy on reserve in the library. Likewise, make sure that you are providing your students with ample time to locate resources and effectively complete the assignment (Fitzpatrick, 1989).

The assignments we give to students don't simply have to be research papers or reports. There are many options for effective yet creative ways to assess your students' learning! Here are just a few:

Journals, Posters, Portfolios, Letters, Brochures, Management plans, Editorials, Instruction Manuals, Imitations of a text, Case studies, Debates, News release, Dialogues, Videos, Collages, Plays, Power Point presentations

Ultimately, the success of student responses to an assignment often rests on the instructor's deliberate design of the assignment. By being purposeful and thoughtful from the beginning, you can ensure that your assignments will not only serve as effective assessment methods, but also engage and delight your students. If you would like further help in constructing or revising an assignment, the Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center is glad to offer individual consultations. In addition, look into some of the resources provided below.

Online Resources

“Creating Effective Assignments” http://www.unh.edu/teaching-excellence/resources/Assignments.htm This site, from the University of New Hampshire's Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning,  provides a brief overview of effective assignment design, with a focus on determining and communicating goals and expectations.

Gardner, T.  (2005, June 12). Ten Tips for Designing Writing Assignments. Traci's Lists of Ten. http://www.tengrrl.com/tens/034.shtml This is a brief yet useful list of tips for assignment design, prepared by a writing teacher and curriculum developer for the National Council of Teachers of English .  The website will also link you to several other lists of “ten tips” related to literacy pedagogy.

“How to Create Effective Assignments for College Students.”  http:// tilt.colostate.edu/retreat/2011/zimmerman.pdf     This PDF is a simplified bulleted list, prepared by Dr. Toni Zimmerman from Colorado State University, offering some helpful ideas for coming up with creative assignments.

“Learner-Centered Assessment” http://cte.uwaterloo.ca/teaching_resources/tips/learner_centered_assessment.html From the Centre for Teaching Excellence at the University of Waterloo, this is a short list of suggestions for the process of designing an assessment with your students' interests in mind. “Matching Learning Goals to Assignment Types.” http://teachingcommons.depaul.edu/How_to/design_assignments/assignments_learning_goals.html This is a great page from DePaul University's Teaching Commons, providing a chart that helps instructors match assignments with learning goals.

Additional References Bean, J.C. (1996). Engaging ideas: The professor's guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, and active learning in the classroom . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Fitzpatrick, R. (1989). Research and writing assignments that reduce fear lead to better papers and more confident students. Writing Across the Curriculum , 3.2, pp. 15 – 24.

Flaxman, R. (2005). Creating meaningful writing assignments. The Teaching Exchange .  Retrieved Jan. 9, 2008 from http://www.brown.edu/Administration/Sheridan_Center/pubs/teachingExchange/jan2005/01_flaxman.pdf

Hass, M. & Osborn, J. (2007, August 13). An emic view of student writing and the writing process. Across the Disciplines, 4. 

Hedengren, B.F. (2004). A TA's guide to teaching writing in all disciplines . Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's.

Hudd, S. S. (2003, April). Syllabus under construction: Involving students in the creation of class assignments.  Teaching Sociology , 31, pp. 195 – 202.

Leahy, R. (2002). Conducting writing assignments. College Teaching , 50.2, pp. 50 – 54.

Miller, H. (2007). Designing effective writing assignments.  Teaching with writing .  University of Minnesota Center for Writing. Retrieved Jan. 9, 2008, from http://writing.umn.edu/tww/assignments/designing.html

MIT Online Writing and Communication Center (1999). Creating Writing Assignments. Retrieved January 9, 2008 from http://web.mit.edu/writing/Faculty/createeffective.html .

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Definition of assignment

task , duty , job , chore , stint , assignment mean a piece of work to be done.

task implies work imposed by a person in authority or an employer or by circumstance.

duty implies an obligation to perform or responsibility for performance.

job applies to a piece of work voluntarily performed; it may sometimes suggest difficulty or importance.

chore implies a minor routine activity necessary for maintaining a household or farm.

stint implies a carefully allotted or measured quantity of assigned work or service.

assignment implies a definite limited task assigned by one in authority.

Examples of assignment in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'assignment.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

see assign entry 1

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Phrases Containing assignment

• self - assignment

Dictionary Entries Near assignment

Cite this entry.

“Assignment.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assignment. Accessed 22 May. 2024.

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Legal definition of assignment, more from merriam-webster on assignment.

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CSR’s primary role is to handle the receipt and review of ~ 75% of the grant applications that NIH receives. NIH separates the review process from funding decisions.

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Reviewers are critical to our mission to see that NIH grant applications receive, fair, independent, expert, and timely scientific reviews. We appreciate the generosity with which reviewers give their time.

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Applications are reviewed in study sections (Scientific Review Group, SRG). Review Branches (RBs) are clusters of study sections based on scientific discipline.

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The Assignment Process

How application assignments are made.

The Division of Receipt and Referral (DRR) in the Center for Scientific Review (CSR) assigns each application to a review group with the expertise to evaluate the scientific and technical merit of the application and to one or more institutes/centers for funding consideration.

While many NIH policies give authority to the DRR to determine assignments, staff of the DRR consult with institutes, scientific review officers (SROs) and their supervisors, and with applicants to reach the most appropriate assignment. How much of the application is read in making an assignment? The honest answer is as much of the application as is needed to make the determination. Referral staff have access to the entire application. In many cases, they concentrate on the Abstract and Specific Aims in making an assignment, with attention also paid to the Research Strategy. Requests made by investigators and the assignment of previous applications are also considered. Referral staff regularly discuss the assignment of applications and how to handle unusual situations.

The assignment of a grant application involves a series of decisions:

• An institute or center is identified for primary assignment for funding consideration. This determination is based on the focus and mission of each of the institutes and centers of NIH. Due to the increasingly multidisciplinary nature of scientific inquiry, the complex biological problems being addressed, and the use of many common research methodologies the institutes/centers share many common interests. Their interests are described on the main NIH Web site . Assignments are limited to the institutes/centers that participate in the specific NOFO used for application submission.
• Applications may also receive dual assignments . Dual assignments acknowledge shared interests in a topic and make all appropriate institutes/centers aware of the application. The primary assignment is reflected in the assignment number (CA for the National Cancer Institute, AG for the National Institute on Aging, etc.). When multiple dual assignments are made, a rank order (secondary, tertiary, etc.) is not established. Both the primary and dual institute/center have access to the application and summary statement and advisory councils of both consider it. However, a dual assignment does not necessarily increase the chance of an award. The frequency of a dual assignment leading to a change to primary and award is less than 2%.
• Finally, the grant application is assigned for review to CSR or to one of the study sections (scientific review groups) at an institute/center. CSR reviews most R01s, fellowships, and small business applications. Institute review groups handle applications that have institute-specific features such as program projects, training grants, career development awards, and many responses to Requests for Applications.

For applications assigned to an institute review branch for peer review, a general assignment is made to that institute; the staff in the review unit subsequently decides whether the application is to be reviewed by a standing committee or by a special emphasis panel.

For applications to be reviewed within CSR, a two-stage process is employed with initial assignment to the review branch level and subsequent assignment to a specific study section. By assigning all applications to the review branch rather than directly to an individual study section, the Chief and the SROs have the opportunity to gain a broad perspective of the areas of science covered by the review branch and to appreciate changes in emphasis and the emergence of new areas. A number of methods are used to determine assignments to study section, though all involve discussions among the scientific review officers and the Chief. Finally, the review branches also have the option of suggesting that the application is more appropriate for a different review branch; they may discuss this with other SROs or review branch Chiefs or return the application to the DRR for reassignment.

Note: The terms study section and scientific review group (SRG) are normally used for continuing review groups in CSR and the institutes/centers, respectively. These are groups with members who have been appointed for multi-year terms of service; at any given meeting there are also usually temporary members present to provide any additional expertise needed. Special emphasis panels (SEPs) are review groups formed on an ad hoc basis to review applications requiring special expertise or when a conflict of interest situation occurs.

Information about the assignment (review and institute/center) is accessed through the eRA Commons :

• The type Type 1 = new application Type 2 = renewal application Type 3 = revision application
• The activity code (R01, F32, etc.)
• The IC with primary assignment (in this example CA stands for the National Cancer Institute)
• A unique identifier - "987654"
• The year and any suffix (01 is year 1, A1 indicates the first resubmission, S is used for revision)
• Any dual assignments are indicated by the additional two-letter code.
• The review assignment , including the name of the study section/special emphasis panel and the name, address, and telephone number of the scientific review officer (SRO). The SRO is now the primary point of contact for the investigator throughout the peer review process.

If the above information is not available in eRA Commons within three weeks of submission, you should promptly contact the Division of Receipt and Referral [email protected] .

If there are questions about the appropriateness of the assignment, the investigator should contact the SRO for review assignment questions or the DRR for institute/center assignment questions. If a change in institute assignment is requested, it is most efficient to e-mail the request to [email protected] . The DRR will notify the investigator if the change is not possible. When the review location, primary institute, or timetable for consideration (council round) is changed for an application, the information will be updated in eRA Commons.

Last updated: 04/27/2023 10:57

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Assignment: Definition in Finance, How It Works, and Examples

Adam Hayes, Ph.D., CFA, is a financial writer with 15+ years Wall Street experience as a derivatives trader. Besides his extensive derivative trading expertise, Adam is an expert in economics and behavioral finance. Adam received his master's in economics from The New School for Social Research and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in sociology. He is a CFA charterholder as well as holding FINRA Series 7, 55 & 63 licenses. He currently researches and teaches economic sociology and the social studies of finance at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Yarilet Perez is an experienced multimedia journalist and fact-checker with a Master of Science in Journalism. She has worked in multiple cities covering breaking news, politics, education, and more. Her expertise is in personal finance and investing, and real estate.

What Is an Assignment?

Assignment most often refers to one of two definitions in the financial world:

• The transfer of an individual's rights or property to another person or business. This concept exists in a variety of business transactions and is often spelled out contractually.
• In trading, assignment occurs when an option contract is exercised. The owner of the contract exercises the contract and assigns the option writer to an obligation to complete the requirements of the contract.

Key Takeaways

• Assignment is a transfer of rights or property from one party to another.
• Options assignments occur when option buyers exercise their rights to a position in a security.
• Other examples of assignments can be found in wages, mortgages, and leases.

Uses For Assignments

Assignment refers to the transfer of some or all property rights and obligations associated with an asset, property, contract, or other asset of value. to another entity through a written agreement.

Assignment rights happen every day in many different situations. A payee, like a utility or a merchant, assigns the right to collect payment from a written check to a bank. A merchant can assign the funds from a line of credit to a manufacturing third party that makes a product that the merchant will eventually sell. A trademark owner can transfer, sell, or give another person interest in the trademark or logo. A homeowner who sells their house assigns the deed to the new buyer.

To be effective, an assignment must involve parties with legal capacity, consideration, consent, and legality of the object.

A wage assignment is a forced payment of an obligation by automatic withholding from an employee’s pay. Courts issue wage assignments for people late with child or spousal support, taxes, loans, or other obligations. Money is automatically subtracted from a worker's paycheck without consent if they have a history of nonpayment. For example, a person delinquent on $100 monthly loan payments has a wage assignment deducting the money from their paycheck and sent to the lender. Wage assignments are helpful in paying back long-term debts.

Another instance can be found in a mortgage assignment. This is where a mortgage deed gives a lender interest in a mortgaged property in return for payments received. Lenders often sell mortgages to third parties, such as other lenders. A mortgage assignment document clarifies the assignment of contract and instructs the borrower in making future mortgage payments, and potentially modifies the mortgage terms.

A final example involves a lease assignment. This benefits a relocating tenant wanting to end a lease early or a landlord looking for rent payments to pay creditors. Once the new tenant signs the lease, taking over responsibility for rent payments and other obligations, the previous tenant is released from those responsibilities. In a separate lease assignment, a landlord agrees to pay a creditor through an assignment of rent due under rental property leases. The agreement is used to pay a mortgage lender if the landlord defaults on the loan or files for bankruptcy . Any rental income would then be paid directly to the lender.

Options Assignment

Options can be assigned when a buyer decides to exercise their right to buy (or sell) stock at a particular strike price . The corresponding seller of the option is not determined when a buyer opens an option trade, but only at the time that an option holder decides to exercise their right to buy stock. So an option seller with open positions is matched with the exercising buyer via automated lottery. The randomly selected seller is then assigned to fulfill the buyer's rights. This is known as an option assignment.

Once assigned, the writer (seller) of the option will have the obligation to sell (if a call option ) or buy (if a put option ) the designated number of shares of stock at the agreed-upon price (the strike price). For instance, if the writer sold calls they would be obligated to sell the stock, and the process is often referred to as having the stock called away . For puts, the buyer of the option sells stock (puts stock shares) to the writer in the form of a short-sold position.

Suppose a trader owns 100 call options on company ABC's stock with a strike price of $10 per share. The stock is now trading at $30 and ABC is due to pay a dividend shortly. As a result, the trader exercises the options early and receives 10,000 shares of ABC paid at $10. At the same time, the other side of the long call (the short call) is assigned the contract and must deliver the shares to the long.

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Understanding the Assignment of Mortgages: What You Need To Know

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A mortgage is a legally binding agreement between a home buyer and a lender that dictates a borrower's ability to pay off a loan. Every mortgage has an interest rate, a term length, and specific fees attached to it.

Written by Attorney Todd Carney .  Updated November 26, 2021

If you’re like most people who want to purchase a home, you’ll start by going to a bank or other lender to get a mortgage loan. Though you can choose your lender, after the mortgage loan is processed, your mortgage may be transferred to a different mortgage servicer . A transfer is also called an assignment of the mortgage. 

No matter what it’s called, this change of hands may also change who you’re supposed to make your house payments to and how the foreclosure process works if you default on your loan. That’s why if you’re a homeowner, it’s important to know how this process works. This article will provide an in-depth look at what an assignment of a mortgage entails and what impact it can have on homeownership.

Assignment of Mortgage – The Basics

When your original lender transfers your mortgage account and their interests in it to a new lender, that’s called an assignment of mortgage. To do this, your lender must use an assignment of mortgage document. This document ensures the loan is legally transferred to the new owner. It’s common for mortgage lenders to sell the mortgages to other lenders. Most lenders assign the mortgages they originate to other lenders or mortgage buyers.

Home Loan Documents

When you get a loan for a home or real estate, there will usually be two mortgage documents. The first is a mortgage or, less commonly, a deed of trust . The other is a promissory note. The mortgage or deed of trust will state that the mortgaged property provides the security interest for the loan. This basically means that your home is serving as collateral for the loan. It also gives the loan servicer the right to foreclose if you don’t make your monthly payments. The promissory note provides proof of the debt and your promise to pay it.

When a lender assigns your mortgage, your interests as the mortgagor are given to another mortgagee or servicer. Mortgages and deeds of trust are usually recorded in the county recorder’s office. This office also keeps a record of any transfers. When a mortgage is transferred so is the promissory note. The note will be endorsed or signed over to the loan’s new owner. In some situations, a note will be endorsed in blank, which turns it into a bearer instrument. This means whoever holds the note is the presumed owner.

Using MERS To Track Transfers

Banks have collectively established the Mortgage Electronic Registration System , Inc. (MERS), which keeps track of who owns which loans. With MERS, lenders are no longer required to do a separate assignment every time a loan is transferred. That’s because MERS keeps track of the transfers. It’s crucial for MERS to maintain a record of assignments and endorsements because these land records can tell who actually owns the debt and has a legal right to start the foreclosure process.

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Assignment of Mortgage Requirements and Effects

The assignment of mortgage needs to include the following:

The original information regarding the mortgage. Alternatively, it can include the county recorder office’s identification numbers. 

The borrower’s name.

The mortgage loan’s original amount.

The date of the mortgage and when it was recorded.

Usually, there will also need to be a legal description of the real property the mortgage secures, but this is determined by state law and differs by state.

Notice Requirements

The original lender doesn’t need to provide notice to or get permission from the homeowner prior to assigning the mortgage. But the new lender (sometimes called the assignee) has to send the homeowner some form of notice of the loan assignment. The document will typically provide a disclaimer about who the new lender is, the lender’s contact information, and information about how to make your mortgage payment. You should make sure you have this information so you can avoid foreclosure.

Mortgage Terms

When an assignment occurs your loan is transferred, but the initial terms of your mortgage will stay the same. This means you’ll have the same interest rate, overall loan amount, monthly payment, and payment due date. If there are changes or adjustments to the escrow account, the new lender must do them under the terms of the original escrow agreement. The new lender can make some changes if you request them and the lender approves. For example, you may request your new lender to provide more payment methods.

Taxes and Insurance

If you have an escrow account and your mortgage is transferred, you may be worried about making sure your property taxes and homeowners insurance get paid. Though you can always verify the information, the original loan servicer is responsible for giving your local tax authority the new loan servicer’s address for tax billing purposes. The original lender is required to do this after the assignment is recorded. The servicer will also reach out to your property insurance company for this reason.  

If you’ve received notice that your mortgage loan has been assigned, it’s a good idea to reach out to your loan servicer and verify this information. Verifying that all your mortgage information is correct, that you know who to contact if you have questions about your mortgage, and that you know how to make payments to the new servicer will help you avoid being scammed or making payments incorrectly.

Let's Summarize…

In a mortgage assignment, your original lender or servicer transfers your mortgage account to another loan servicer. When this occurs, the original mortgagee or lender’s interests go to the next lender. Even if your mortgage gets transferred or assigned, your mortgage’s terms should remain the same. Your interest rate, loan amount, monthly payment, and payment schedule shouldn’t change. 

Your original lender isn’t required to notify you or get your permission prior to assigning your mortgage. But you should receive correspondence from the new lender after the assignment. It’s important to verify any change in assignment with your original loan servicer before you make your next mortgage payment, so you don’t fall victim to a scam.

Attorney Todd Carney

Attorney Todd Carney is a writer and graduate of Harvard Law School. While in law school, Todd worked in a clinic that helped pro-bono clients file for bankruptcy. Todd also studied several aspects of how the law impacts consumers. Todd has written over 40 articles for sites such... read more about Attorney Todd Carney

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Assignment of Contract (What It Is And How It Works: Best Overview)

Looking for Assignment of Contract ?

What is the assignment of a contract in simple terms?

How does it work?

In this article, I will break down the meaning of contract assignment so you know all there is to know about it!

Keep reading as I have gathered exactly the information that you need!

Let me explain to you what assignment of contract means and why it matters!

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Let’s get started!

Table of Contents

What Is Assignment of Contract

The assignment of contract refers to instances where one party to a contract transfers its rights and obligations to another party.

In other words, one contracting party exits the contract and another party steps in the exiting party’s shoes.

For instance, Mary and Joe are parties to a contract.

Joe assigns his rights and obligations under the contract to Tim.

The original contract now continues between Mary and Tim where Joe has stepped out.

The party assigning the contract is called the “assignor” and the third party stepping in to the assignor’s shoes is the “assignee”.

Be sure to keep reading as I will explain to you how the assignment works and it’s important that you know more about the assignor’s liability when assigning the contract.

Assignment Under Contract Law

Under contract law , the assignment of a contract is considered to include the assignment of rights and the delegation of the party’s duties to another.

This means that the assignor’s rights are passed on to the assignee.

In addition to that, the assignor’s duties under the contract are also assigned to the assignee.

Assignment Under Property Law

In property law, the assignment of contract generally takes place between landlords and tenants.

Typically, a person (the tenant) will sign a lease with another party (the landlord) to rent an apartment or premises.

If the tenant wishes to leave the premise without breaching the terms of the contract, an assignment may be an option.

In that case, the tenant will assign its rights and duties under the lease agreement to another party (a new tenant).

How Assignment of Contract Works

To better understand the assignment of contract, let’s look more closely at how it works.

Contract Assignment Clause

One of the first things you should consider when contemplating an assignment of a contract is to find the contract assignment clause in your contract.

In most commercial contracts, the parties will include an assignment clause governing the possible assignment by the parties.

Some contracts will authorize the assignment, others will limit assignment to specific situations, while some contracts entirely prohibit assignments.

Be sure to read the contract assignment to see how your contract regulates assignments.

Consent To Assignment of Contract

In most cases, a contracting party looking to assign the contract to another party will need to get the consent of the other contracting party.

If the staying party consents to the assignment, the assignor can proceed with the assignment of the agreement to a third party (or assignee).

However, if the staying party does not consent to the assignment, then the other party must remain in the contract and observe its contractual obligations.

Assignor’s Liability

Assigning a contract does not necessarily mean that the assignor will be released of all liability under the contract.

Depending on the assignment clause language, the assignor may have the right to assign the contract but continue to remain liable under the contract.

In the event the assignor may continue to remain liable under the contract, it’s important that an assignment agreement be signed where the staying party releases and discharges the assignor of future contract liability .

Assignment Enforceability

Under the assignment law, when a contract is assigned as per the terms of the contract, the assignment will be legally enforceable.

However, assignment contracts are not enforceable if the contract prohibits the assignment, the assignment agreement is not materially consistent with the obligations under the original contract, or the assignment violates public policy or the law in some way.

In addition, a contract cannot be assigned if the assignor is not formally in a contract.

There are also instances where the contract requires that a party with special skills or unique characteristics render the services or perform the obligations, and an assignment would not work.

Keep reading as I will now give you an example of contract assignment so you can see how it works in practice.

Contract Assignment Process

The actual contract assignment process is fairly straightforward for most contracts.

Contract Assignment Steps

Here are the steps you’ll need to take to assign a contract:

• See if the contract has an assignment clause
• Make sure that the assignment clause authorizes assignments 
• If the assignment is authorized, follow the assignment logistic provided in the contract 
• If the assignment is prohibited, you may want to speak to the other contracting party to see if you could get consent to assign the contract

In some cases, all you may need to do is to give notice of assignment to provide the details of the assignment if the contract allows for an assignment this way.

In other cases, you may want to have an assignment agreement signed by the staying party, the exiting party, and the third party detailing the terms and conditions of the assignment.

Assignment Agreement Content

When a contract assignment agreement is needed, you should make sure that you include all the right information for the assignment to be valid and enforceable.

In most cases, the assignment of the contract is simple where you may find an assignment of contract form online to complete.

For simple assignment contracts, here is the content that you should expect:

• Identification of the parties (original contract parties and assignee)
• Contract assignment effective date
• Original contracting party’s consent to the assignment
• Assignee’s acceptance of the assignment 
• Assignor’s release and discharge of obligations going forward 
• Governing law 
• Signature block for the three parties 

Alternatives To Assignment Contracts

What are the alternatives to a contract assignment?

Here are the main alternatives to a contract assignment:

• Novation 

Licensing refers to situations when a party authorizes another party to use a property or asset (whether tangible or intangible).

Delegation is when someone authorizes another to act on its behalf under a contract.

Novation is when a new party takes on a contracting party’s rights and obligations where the existing party’s rights are relinquished and all liability under the original contract wiped out.

Assignment of Contract vs Delegation of Contract

What is the difference between the assignment of a contract and the delegation of a contract?

The “assignment” of contract refers to a situation where one contracting party “transfers” the contract to a third party.

Once the assignment is completed, the assignor will no longer be in a contract with the other contracting party and the assignee will take the assignor’s place.

For example, Party A and Party B are part of a service contract.

Party B assigns the contract to Party C.

Going forward, the contract will be between Party A and Party C.

On the other hand, a delegation is when a party to a contract subcontracts parts of a contract to another party.

The party delegating the contract to another remains a contracting party and will remain responsible for the contract even though the obligations were delegated to another.

For example, a general contractor may delegate the plumbing work in a project to a plumber.

Although the general contractor has delegated part of the project to a subcontractor, it remains a contracting party and will remain responsible for the overall project.

Assignment of Contract Example

Let’s look at a few examples of when a contract may be assigned to another.

Assignment of Contract In Bankruptcy

You have entered into a contract with a company providing you with phone services.

The company goes bankrupt.

In the context of the bankruptcy, another phone company buys out a portion of the bankrupt’s book of business and your contract is in the pool of assets purchased.

The bankruptcy trustee assigns your contract from the bankrupt phone company to the new phone company.

Assignment of Contract In Real Estate

In real estate, some investors engage in assignment transactions where they do not actually buy the property but enter into a purchase contract that it then assigns to another.

In essence, the real estate investor enters into a real estate purchase agreement defining the terms and conditions relating to the purchase of a property.

Following the executing of the real estate purchase agreement and prior to the “closing” of the transaction, it assigns the contract to another party in an attempt to make a profit without ever actually owning the property.

Assignment of Contract In Corporate Restructuring

In the corporate world, companies tend to restructure their operations to ensure they are legally and operationally optimized.

In the context of a corporate restructuring transaction, a company may assign a contract to another entity within its group, a subsidiary, or an affiliate.

Assignment of Agreement Takeaways 

So there you have it folks!

What Does Assignment of Contract Mean

“Assignment of contract” is a legal term used to refer to situations where a party to an existing contract transfers its contractual obligations to another party.

Following the assignment , the assignee becomes responsible to execute the contractual obligations in favor of the party staying in the original contract.

If you are looking to assign a contract, you may want to consult with a qualified contract attorney who can assess your rights and obligations.

Keep in mind that a simple assignment of a contract does not necessarily mean that the assignor is released from liability under the original contract.

Now that you know what is an assignment of contract, how it works, and what it entails, good luck with your transaction!

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If you enjoyed this article on what is an assignment contract, I recommend you look into the following terms and concepts. Enjoy!

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Assignment of Lease

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What is an assignment of lease.

The assignment of lease is a title document that transfers all rights possessed by a lessee or tenant to a property to another party. The assignee takes the assignor’s place in the landlord-tenant relationship.

You can view an example of a lease assignment here .

How Lease Assignment Works

In cases where a tenant wants to or needs to get out of their lease before it expires, lease assignment provides a legal option to assign or transfer rights of the lease to someone else. For instance, if in a commercial lease a business leases a place for 12 months but the business moves or shuts down after 10 months, the person can transfer the lease to someone else through an assignment of the lease. In this case, they will not have to pay rent for the last two months as the new assigned tenant will be responsible for that.

However, before the original tenant can be released of any responsibilities associated with the lease, other requirements need to be satisfied. The landlord needs to consent to the lease transfer through a “License to Assign” document. It is crucial to complete this document before moving on to the assignment of lease as the landlord may refuse to approve the assignment.

Difference Between Assignment of Lease and Subletting

A transfer of the remaining interest in a lease, also known as assignment, is possible when implied rights to assign exist. Some leases do not allow assignment or sharing of possessions or property under a lease. An assignment ensures the complete transfer of the rights to the property from one tenant to another.

The assignor is no longer responsible for rent or utilities and other costs that they might have had under the lease. Here, the assignee becomes the tenant and takes over all responsibilities such as rent. However, unless the assignee is released of all liabilities by the landlord, they remain responsible if the new tenant defaults.

A sublease is a new lease agreement between the tenant (or the sublessor) and a third-party (or the sublessee) for a portion of the lease. The original lease agreement between the landlord and the sublessor (or original tenant) still remains in place. The original tenant still remains responsible for all duties set under the lease.

Here are some key differences between subletting and assigning a lease:

• Under a sublease, the original lease agreement still remains in place.
• The original tenant retains all responsibilities under a sublease agreement.
• A sublease can be for less than all of the property, such as for a room, general area, portion of the leased premises, etc.
• Subleasing can be for a portion of the lease term. For instance, a tenant can sublease the property for a month and then retain it after the third-party completes their month-long sublet.
• Since the sublease agreement is between the tenant and the third-party, rent is often negotiable, based on the term of the sublease and other circumstances.
• The third-party in a sublease agreement does not have a direct relationship with the landlord.
• The subtenant will need to seek consent of both the tenant and the landlord to make any repairs or changes to the property during their sublease.

Here is more on an assignment of lease here .

Nicholas M.

Parties involved in lease assignment.

There are three parties involved in a lease assignment – the landlord or owner of the property, the assignor and the assignee. The original lease agreement is between the landlord and the tenant, or the assignor. The lease agreement outlines the duties and responsibilities of both parties when it comes to renting the property. Now, when the tenant decides to assign the lease to a third-party, the third-party is known as the assignee. The assignee takes on the responsibilities laid under the original lease agreement between the assignor and the landlord. The landlord must consent to the assignment of the lease prior to the assignment.

For example, Jake is renting a commercial property for his business from Paul for two years beginning January 2013 up until January 2015. In January 2014, Jake suffers a financial crisis and has to close down his business to move to a different city. Jake doesn’t want to continue paying rent on the property as he will not be using it for a year left of the lease. Jake’s friend, John would soon be turning his digital business into a brick-and-mortar store. John has been looking for a space to kick start his venture. Jake can assign his space for the rest of the lease term to John through an assignment of lease. Jake will need to seek the approval of his landlord and then begin the assignment process. Here, Jake will be the assignor who transfers all his lease related duties and responsibilities to John, who will be the assignee.

You can read more on lease agreements here .

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Assignment of Lease From Seller to Buyer

In case of a residential property, a landlord can assign his leases to the new buyer of the building. The landlord will assign the right to collect rent to the buyer. This will allow the buyer to collect any and all rent from existing tenants in that property. This assignment can also include the assignment of security deposits, if the parties agree to it. This type of assignment provides protection to the buyer so they can collect rent on the property.

The assignment of a lease from the seller to a buyer also requires that all tenants are made aware of the sale of the property. The buyer-seller should give proper notice to the tenants along with a notice of assignment of lease signed by both the buyer and the seller. Tenants should also be informed about the contact information of the new landlord and the payment methods to be used to pay rent to the new landlord.

You can read more on buyer-seller lease assignments here .

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Contract to lease land from a church.

I’m planning on leasing land from a church. Putting a gym on the property. And leasing it back to the school.

Ok; first step is that you will need a leasing contract with the church. Ask them to prepare one for you so you would just need an attorney to review the agreement and that should cost less than if you had to be the party to pay a lawyer to draft it from scratch. You need to ensure that the purpose of the lease is clearly stated - that you plan to put a gym on the land so that there are no issues if the church leadership changes. Step 2 - you will need a lease agreement with the school that your leasing it do (hopefully one that is similar to the original one your received from the church). Again, please ensure that all the terms that you discuss and agree to are in the document; including length of time, price and how to resolve disputes if you have one. I hope this is helpful. If you would like me to assist you further, you can contact me on Contracts Counsel and we can discuss a fee for my services. Regards, Donya Ramsay (Gordon)

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Setting Up Dynamics 365 Workflow Notifications via Email

There are many different areas that require setup within Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations to achieve the often-desired email notification functionality from workflow. In this document, I will detail how I have seen it setup and some tips and tricks along the way to help create a fuller understanding of the D365 email functionality. I will break up the setup into four main areas: Workflow Configuration, Email settings, Batch jobs, and User Setup. For this example, I will use the Purchase order workflow.

Email Settings

Email templates.

One of the most important setups required for workflow notification emails to be properly sent via the system is the email templates. These can be found in two places within Dynamics 365: the System administration module and the Organization administration module.

The module the template is set up in will depend on the association of the workflow that is being configured. If the workflow is associated to a specific legal entity within the company’s D365 framework, then this will need to be configured in the System email templates form. If the workflow is associated with an organization-wide hierarchy, then it will use the System email templates form. To check which template the workflow in question will use, you can navigate to the workflow and look under the Association column.

In my example below, the “Purchase requisition by Manager” workflow uses the System email template and the “Purchase order workflow” uses the Organization email template.

Setting up Email Templates

The actual setup of the templates is quite simple, and I have outlined how each field correlates in the setup below.

• This should be a unique value that is easily identifiable. This will be the value you select within the workflow configuration itself later in this document.
• This is not a mandatory field but can help to offer some clarification on what the template is used for. For instance, you might have different templates for various departments or workflows.
• This will be the name of the sender as it appears in your inbox once you receive the alert.
• This is the email address the notification should come from. Typically, there is a general admin email address that can be used.
• The language of the email.
• The priority of the email as it appears in your inbox.
• If you use different batch groups, specify which one to use here.
• The language of the actual emails content.
• The subject of the email as it appears in your inbox. You can use the %subject% placeholder here to use the “Work item subject” in the Assignment step of the workflow as the Subject line of the email.

The final step of this template setup is to create some basic HTML code. Here is an example of a very basic one I used.

The %message% placeholder can be used in the HTML code to send the Workflow configuration’s “Work item instructions” in the body of the email.

An example of HTML code that can be used for an example is as follows:

<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <body> <div style="font-family:Calibri;font-size:16px;"> <img src="path/to/logo.png" alt="Company Logo" style="width:200px;height:50px;"> <p> %message% </p> </div> </body> </html>

To add the HTML code to your email template, click the button labelled “Email Message” at the top of the form. This will open the following dialog where you can add your saved code via the “Browse” button.

Once added you should see a preview of your code output in the window. Once you are happy with the results, click the OK button to complete the upload of the body of your emails.

Email Parameters

Finally, there will be some basic configuration required within the System administration > Setup > Email > Email parameters form. In this example, I am using SMTP as the basis of the email server. I have outlined the setup used in the general tab of the Email parameters form.

• I am using an SMTP email server, so that is what is selected here.
• Make sure to enable the correct email provider that is being used.
• Add some general throttling guidelines to the email provider ID. This will be the maximum number of emails this provider can send per minute.

Workflow Configuration

There are multiple layers of setup required to successfully implement Dynamics 365 workflow email notifications. The first layer is the overall parameters of the workflow. The second layer is the parameters set at the approval elements within the workflow. The third and final layer is the parameters set at the assignment level within the approval elements of the workflow.

1. Overall Parameters of the Workflow

To navigate to the overall parameters of the workflow, simply click on the outside edge of the workflow space, or in an empty space of the workflow, and click Properties. You should see something like this:

Here, you need to assign the email template that is to be used for workflow notifications. In my purchase order example, I chose “WF Email,” which we set up below in Email settings as an email template. Additionally, you can specify instructions for end users to see when they are submitting a workflow in the box below. This would be seen here:

2. Approval Elements of the Workflow

Next, you will need to set up the notifications at the Approval steps within the workflow. Click on the approval step and click Properties. Alerts can be configured for the different events that can happen from an approval step in a workflow. This could be an “Accept,” “Reject,” “Escalate,” “Delegate,” or “Request Change.” In the example below, I show the setup required to send a notification back to the workflow originator, telling them their Purchase Order has been approved.

• The event in the upper half of the screen specifies what will trigger the text below to be sent via email.
• One of the best things about this text area is the ability to use placeholders to call certain fields from that purchase order or workflow instance. One common requirement from clients is to be able to send customized comments back through email.
• To pull in the comments associated with an accepted or rejected workflow instance, I utilized the %Workflow.Last note%
• Also, be sure to set a value in the Recipient tab. In this example, I selected “Workflow user,” which is why the third tab, Workflow user, appears.
• In the Workflow User tab, I then selected Workflow originator. This ensures that the person who initially submitted the purchase order will receive a notification that the purchase order has been approved.

3. Assignment Step Within the Approval Elements

Finally, most companies require a notification to be sent when there is a pending workflow instance to review for a designated approver. To set up notification alerts for this, you must go into the approval step’s assignment section. To navigate to this, double-click on the approval step. Then click on the inner box inside the approval step. With the approval step highlighted, click “Basic Settings” in the action pane.

In the Basic Settings of the assignment step, you can specify a specific subject line and email message to be sent to the person who needs to approve the purchase order. In my example below, you can see I used placeholders to create a customized subject (1) and body (2) of the email.

In addition to the email setup, there are also some batch jobs that must be configured in Dynamics 365 and running for the system to process and send these workflow email notifications and alerts. Below I have outlined the different batch jobs and the role they play for this overall functionality.

Email distributor batch

Navigate to System administration > Periodic tasks > Email processing > Email distributor batch . This enables the system to send out the emails at the time intervals set in the recurrence.

Next, Click Recurrence and set the time interval that you would like these emails to be sent out at. In the example below, the new emails are set to be sent out every minutes.

The four workflow specific batch jobs are all running in this example every 1-2 minutes. However, I want to document them here so they can at least serve as a checklist of other batch jobs to make sure you have running in the background:

• Workflow message processing
• Workflow line-item notifications
• Workflow due date processing
• Workflow Maintenance

Finally, you are ready to enable the notifications at the end user level. This can be done for an individual user by simply slicking in the top right corner on the gear icon of your screen and selecting User options.

Next, ensure your Account options are set up correctly with the Email provider ID and the sender email.

Finally, ensure under the Workflow tab that you have the “Send notifications in email” slider toggled to Yes.

Alternatively, this can also be done by system administrators using the excel add-in User information from the Users form.

Once you have the add-in opened, use the designer to add the required fields to the columns in the workbook so that you can quickly toggle the slider to yes or insert an email for a user.

Have any questions about how to set up workflow email notifications in Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations? Please reach out to one of our experts at any time!

This publication contains general information only and Sikich is not, by means of this publication, rendering accounting, business, financial, investment, legal, tax, or any other professional advice or services. This publication is not a substitute for such professional advice or services, nor should you use it as a basis for any decision, action or omission that may affect you or your business. Before making any decision, taking any action or omitting an action that may affect you or your business, you should consult a qualified professional advisor. In addition, this publication may contain certain content generated by an artificial intelligence (AI) language model. You acknowledge that Sikich shall not be responsible for any loss sustained by you or any person who relies on this publication.

About the Author

Quinn Munson

I am a Functional Consultant who joined Sikich in July 2022. I have worked on the Supply Chain Management side of an implementation within the medical device industry and also been on an assessment team for the Marina retail industry.

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Gerrit Cole Prepares for Significant Step, Set to Face Hitters on Tuesday

I n a major development for the Yankees, starting pitcher Gerrit Cole is scheduled to face live batters for the first time since early March. This upcoming session on Tuesday is seen as an essential milestone in his recovery process.

As the Yankees’ top pitcher works towards full health, he closes in on what is commonly a precursor to a minor league rehabilitation start.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone emphasized the importance of this session for Cole as he readies to get back on the mound against opposing hitters.

Boone highlighted the progress Cole has made, including a 40-pitch bullpen session, where players stood in without swinging, signifying that he is building up his stamina.

However, before embarking on a minor league assignment, Cole is expected to undergo additional live batting practice, eyeing a late June or early July return.

The Yankees have also made roster adjustments, with pitcher Ian Hamilton placed on the COVID-19 injured list and corresponding moves bringing Clayton Andrews into the mix while designating Colby White for assignment.

Andrews, a trade-acquisition left-hander, had an eventful call-up story, missing out on grocery shopping only to find himself heading to Yankee Stadium for the first time.

Notable performances mentioned in the report include Aaron Judge’s continuation of an eight-game hitting streak and Anthony Volpe’s career-best hitting streak reaching 13 games. Moreover, Luke Weaver has been yet another standout, going 18 innings without allowing a run and maintaining a 2.20 ERA.

Lastly, it’s been specified that DJ LeMahieu is expected to return from his rehab assignment to take up a primary post at third base.

When is Gerrit Cole expected to start facing live batters?

Gerrit Cole is scheduled to face live batters on Tuesday, marking a critical step in his recovery process.

What injury did Gerrit Cole suffer from?

Gerrit Cole was sidelined due to nerve inflammation and edema in his right elbow.

What is Cole’s potential timeline for returning to regular-season play?

The current projection is that Cole could make his regular-season debut around late June or early July.

What are some recent notables regarding the Yankees roster?

Ian Hamilton has been placed on the COVID-19 injured list, Clayton Andrews’ contract was selected, and DJ LeMahieu is set to return and play primarily at third base.

The anticipation is building as Gerrit Cole prepares to take a significant leap towards returning to the mound for the Yankees. Facing live batters provides a tangible sign of progress, with the team’s eyes set on reclaiming their star pitcher in the coming months. As roster moves and player performances continue to unfold, the Yankees adapt and aim to maintain their competitiveness in the league. The hope is that Cole’s comeback will cement this drive towards a commanding season.

The post Gerrit Cole Prepares for Significant Step, Set to Face Hitters on Tuesday appeared first on Kevin Hearld .

• Open access
• Published: 15 May 2024

Readsynth: short-read simulation for consideration of composition-biases in reduced metagenome sequencing approaches

• Ryan Kuster 1 &
• Margaret Staton 1  

BMC Bioinformatics volume  25 , Article number:  191 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

191 Accesses

8 Altmetric

Metrics details

The application of reduced metagenomic sequencing approaches holds promise as a middle ground between targeted amplicon sequencing and whole metagenome sequencing approaches but has not been widely adopted as a technique. A major barrier to adoption is the lack of read simulation software built to handle characteristic features of these novel approaches. Reduced metagenomic sequencing (RMS) produces unique patterns of fragmentation per genome that are sensitive to restriction enzyme choice, and the non-uniform size selection of these fragments may introduce novel challenges to taxonomic assignment as well as relative abundance estimates.

Through the development and application of simulation software, readsynth, we compare simulated metagenomic sequencing libraries with existing RMS data to assess the influence of multiple library preparation and sequencing steps on downstream analytical results. Based on read depth per position, readsynth achieved 0.79 Pearson’s correlation and 0.94 Spearman’s correlation to these benchmarks. Application of a novel estimation approach, fixed length taxonomic ratios , improved quantification accuracy of simulated human gut microbial communities when compared to estimates of mean or median coverage.

Conclusions

We investigate the possible strengths and weaknesses of applying the RMS technique to profiling microbial communities via simulations with readsynth. The choice of restriction enzymes and size selection steps in library prep are non-trivial decisions that bias downstream profiling and quantification. The simulations investigated in this study illustrate the possible limits of preparing metagenomic libraries with a reduced representation sequencing approach, but also allow for the development of strategies for producing and handling the sequence data produced by this promising application.

Peer Review reports

Since its first application, reduced metagenomic sequencing (RMS) has remained a niche approach to profiling microbial communities. First coined by Liu et al., RMS is the application of reduced-representation sequencing (RRS) to metagenomic libraries, adopting steps modified from the original ddRADseq protocol [ 1 , 2 ]. Metagenomic profiling of human samples comparing RMS and whole genome sequencing (WGS) yielded similar microbial profiles, and concerns of GC content bias weren’t detected. Three further studies have shown the potential for RMS to yield similar results or even outperform the traditional 16S and WGS approaches [ 3 , 4 , 5 ].

Although traditional approaches of amplicon and WGS can be effective for studying community structure, they exist on extreme ends of sequencing efforts and the benefits of each may exist in a middle ground. The conserved gene regions used in amplicon sequencing, often the 16S or ITS gene, can create bias towards some community members due to the primers selected and often these marker gene targets lack the resolution to consistently identify one species or strain from another [ 6 ]. WGS increases resolution but is comparatively expensive for deep sampling of rare taxa. Continuous, overlapping reads originating from closely related taxa may be computationally challenging to assign. Comparable to genotyping by sequencing (GBS), RMS reduces a genome into sampled DNA fragments by using one or more restriction enzymes [ 7 ]. These subsetted fragments represent predictable, targeted loci within a genome and function as hundreds of markers within each microbial genome allowing for species and even strain-level identification not found in amplicon sequencing alone. RRS increases per-locus sequencing depth for these fragments and allows for more samples to be analyzed in the same sequencing run, improving sequencing accuracy and lowering the per-sample cost of sequencing [ 1 , 8 , 9 ]. Unlike the original application of reduced representation sequencing for GBS, which produces fragments from the genome of an individual, RMS creates fragments from many unknown source genomes into a single pooled sequencing run.

Despite the potential benefits of RMS, the ability of this approach to accurately quantify at the species and strain level has not been tested at scale, possibly hindering adoption by metagenomics researchers. A major caveat to the RMS approach is that restriction enzyme motifs are enriched in a taxa-dependent manner [ 3 ]. Genome size, which can range over an order of magnitude in bacteria, as well as the varying degrees of sequence conservation among closely related microbes may complicate RMS quantification [ 10 ]. For example, genomic loci yielding RMS fragments may be variable even among closely related individuals, as a single base mutation altering a restriction cut site can lead to “allelic dropout” [ 11 ]. The degree to which this variation affects taxonomic identification and determination of relative abundance of community members has not been studied deeply. Every community member comprising the metagenomic sample will yield a unique distribution of fragment lengths.

Further complicating RMS profiling, sequencing effort (i.e. total read count) and size selection constraints may significantly impact the taxa included in the final sequencing library. Both PCR amplification and fragment size selection steps will affect the probability of a given DNA fragment surviving into the final sequencing reaction in a size-dependent manner with possible PCR biases dependent on template length [ 12 , 13 ]. Gel or bead mediated size selection is a critical step in RRS library design that helps to remove adapter dimers and optimize flow cell performance, and so remains an unavoidable library preparation step in most cases. An alternative RRS approach using isolength (type IIB) restriction enzymes has been proposed as a potential solution to this issue of variable fragment length [ 14 , 15 ]. Using a single enzyme that produces constant fragment lengths frequently across the genome may create detailed fingerprints of genomic communities without size selection steps, assuming adapter dimers can be reduced. Normalizing for the non-uniform read depths associated with a single organism is a task that existing metagenome profiling software aren’t designed to handle.

In applications such as RMS, where existing short read approaches are being used in novel ways, it may be difficult to gain traction because the features of the data are so understudied for the intended application. Spending money to develop new experimental techniques can be a highly risky endeavor, and it also requires the development of custom software tools and statistical approaches necessary to analyze this new form of data. In instances such as these, simulation can be useful to predict and overcome artifacts from library prep that could not be anticipated or otherwise measured without a ground truth. Capturing the nuances of RMS behavior under different conditions is a necessary step in understanding its application, therefore, we introduce the software readsynth as a simulation aid to researchers in considering these promising alternative approaches to sequencing metagenomes. Readsynth simulates read count constrained metagenomic sequence data based on pre-assembled genomes and user-defined community compositions along with multiple library preparation parameters.

In this study, both real and simulated RMS libraries are investigated to understand the influence of non-uniform fragment sizes and possible molecular and computational considerations that might be used to overcome these biases. Bias in fragment lengths may be occurring due to the biology of the individual community members being sampled and/or the technical library preparation. These factors prevent the total numbers of reads mapped to reference genomes from being directly used for calculating relative abundance. Our proposed solution uses the fixed length taxonomic ratio (FLTR) of read depths occurring within a non-uniform fragment length distribution. Barring the presence of strong GC bias, the ratio of two taxa should remain constant within all fragment lengths where both taxa are present. We first benchmark readsynth’s ability to faithfully capture features of mock community data. To demonstrate the utility of readsynth simulations, we then investigate this novel FLTR quantification approach that may overcome some of the challenges produced by non-uniform fragment distributions. Upon finding the library conditions that produce the best resolution, we consider the ability of these approaches when the search space includes a full database of all available reference genomes.

Implementation

Simulation software overview.

Readsynth was developed to simulate Illumina short read libraries to assess the compositional abundance of highly custom communities under multiple reduced sequencing conditions. Readsynth is a command line software package written in Python and C++ that uses commonly maintained statistical packages and consists of a digestion, size-selection, and read-writing stages (Fig.  1 ). The software was written to be highly customizable across three categories: (1) microbial community composition, defined by input genomes and their relative abundance; (2) experimental parameters, including reduced library approach, enzyme digestion rates, expected fragment length distributions, and custom adapter design, and (3) sequencing parameters, such as total read number, read length, and base quality value profiles.

Overview of readsynth inputs and flow of data. Necessary input files (shown in pink) are a collection of genome files and a corresponding abundance table for each. Output files include per fragment count estimates and the final, paired-end read fastq files

Readsynth first reads each input genome assembly individually to capture the set of possible fragments and calculate the probability of each sequence fragment surviving to the final library. Given a user input set of IUPAC restriction site motifs, overlap-tolerant regular expression (regex) searches are performed to exhaustively detect all possible cleavage sites and define fragments within the expected size-selection distribution. Fragments resulting from any combination of palindromic restriction enzyme motifs are modeled probabilistically to account for partial enzyme digestion. The probability of a fragment remaining at the end of digestion is calculated based on the probability of an enzyme cut producing the necessary forward and reverse adapter-boundary sites, adjusted accordingly for fragments harboring internal cut sites.

The per-fragment probability is a function of enzyme cleavage occurring at both ends of a sequence based on a user defined enzyme cut efficiency (c). Sequences that harbor greater numbers of internal cut sites (i) are less frequently represented as a sequenced read. The probabilities for each fragment length are then summed, approximating the expected fragments given a single genome copy for each genome in consideration.

Size selection

To simulate size selection, each fragment’s post-digestion probability is adjusted based on multiple additional factors affecting its representation. First, the expected fragment counts for each genome are scaled by their proportional abundance, as defined in the abundance table. The combined distribution of digested fragment lengths for all input genomes then undergoes size selection. The counts of the digestion distribution are used to scale a Gaussian probability density function at a given length, x, and this intersection of sample spaces defines the final size selection distribution (Fig.  2 ). This approach follows the size variability expected in gel-based size-selection equipment (e.g., SageScience BluePippin) at the narrow and broad range selection techniques while preventing artificial inflation of reads in lower abundance than produced by the Gaussian curve [ 1 ]. To simulate the hardware-imposed limitation on the composition of metagenomic fragments, the input read number (n) is divided evenly amongst the resulting size-selected distribution of the digested metagenome.

Digestion distribution of reduced metagenome sequencing (RMS) fragment lengths (bp) A after simulated enzyme fragmentation, counts represent expected fragment frequency with 1X genome coverage; B final read counts of size-selected fragments from the intersection of a Gaussian normal (μ: 150 bp, σ: 50) and A, scaled to the count at length 100 bp from A. Bar colors indicate individual bacterial genomes present in the simulated community

Error modeling

Readsynth applies a straightforward substitution error model to every read using randomly sampled Q scores from any existing fastq file, with several publicly available profiles to select from. Phred-like error probability rates from the sampled Q scores are used to mutate each nucleotide base to a non-self modification using pseudo-random number generation. Simulated fragments that are shorter than the simulated read length resulted in expected adapter contamination in data output (Supplementary Fig.  1 ), and users may provide any number of custom-designed adapters with specific overhangs.

Software benchmarking

In order to benchmark the simulation accuracy of readsynth, we use existing RMS data as a ground truth. The loci-specific enrichment of reads as well as the similarity in taxonomic profiles between real and simulated reads are used as performance metrics. Two previously sequenced mock community data sets produced with RMS approaches were considered. These communities used standardized concentrations of each community member, making them ideal for comparison with simulated reads. The first dataset from Snipen et al. consists of a Human Microbiome Project mock community of 20 bacterial strains (BEI HM-782D) digested using the restriction enzymes EcoRI and MseI [ 5 ]. To simulate the abundance of each taxon, the input abundance table used the reciprocal of the ribosomal copy number determined from the ribosomal RNA operon copy number database [ 16 ]. The second dataset from Sun et al. used a separate community of 20 bacterial strains (ATCC MSA-1002), which was assumed to have even genomic copy number [ 14 ]. This dataset was created using the type IIB restriction enzyme BcgI which produces short fragments with no length variation.

Extracting sequencing features from real and simulated mock communities

Sequence reads from the existing mock communities were adapter trimmed using Cutadapt 4.1 [ 17 ]. Reads were then mapped against each of the community member reference genomes using BWA MEM (Burrows Wheeler Aligner 0.7.17) [ 18 ]. Samtools 1.15.1 was used to select only paired end reads with the appropriate orientation. The Samtools stats and depth commands were used to summarize the read lengths as well as the per-position depth of all aligned reads [ 19 ]. Using positional information from these reads, a custom fragment length distribution was estimated for use in simulation. The count ratio of fully digested fragments to the larger fragments immediately encompassing them (r) was used to estimate the cut efficiency (c) of enzyme digestion except for the case of complete digestion in which c = 1. In cases of incomplete digestion, following the per-fragment probability model, fragments containing internal cut sites will occur less frequently than their contained fragments such that r must be greater than 1.

Only fragment lengths in the range of 100 bp to 450 bp were used to estimate cut efficiency, as these were observed to be less constrained by size selection and therefore more reliable in preserving true read ratios (Supplementary Fig.  2 ). Aligning community mixtures of many taxa against individual reference genomes in BWA MEM returned many reads that aligned to multiple genomes (Supplementary Fig.  3 ). Further, variability between the published reference sequence and the real sequence data resulted in the rare presence of RMS fragments not reproducible in simulation. In order to make meaningful comparisons between the real and simulated data, custom Python scripts were used to extract positional information from high quality read alignments in the sam-formatted file in order to preserve the fragment size distribution while removing duplicate alignments.

Simulation was performed using fragment size distribution, enzyme cut efficiency, and Q score profile derived from the real sequence data. Although we expect these derived inputs to most closely resemble the real data, additional simulations were run to test the importance of fragment size distribution and enzyme cut efficiency. Three fragment length distributions were considered to measure the impact of size selection. The first was created using the exact fragment counts extracted as a custom.json file from the extracted sequence alignments. The second simulated size selection using the mean and standard deviation from the samtools summary statistics to define the distribution shape. The third size selection distribution used identical standard deviation values, but with the mean fragment size increased by 100 bp. BWA MEM and Samtools were again used to map simulated reads to the reference genomes and the read depth at every expected fragment position was counted. Cumulative read depth across every position in the mock community was compared between real and simulated sequences using both Pearson and Spearman correlation.

Assessing compositional-biases using simulation

Simulations of RMS sequencing reads were informed using the mock community and two representative gut metagenomic communities based on sequencing efforts from complex microbial samples. Mock community sequences from Snipen et al. (replicates SRR10199716, SRR10199724, and SRR10199725) were again used as a baseline to quantify taxonomic abundances from a mixture of 20 bacterial taxa at known relative abundance. Taxa were assumed to be approximately equimolar in ribosomal operon count as described in the product specifications. A single human stool sample (SRR5298272) prepared with RMS using NlaIII and HpyCH4IV was used to establish a microbial community with greater richness for simulation [ 2 ]. These biological sample reads were assigned putative taxonomic labels using Kraken2 and Bracken (Standard plus protozoa, fungi & plant database ‘PlusPFP’ June 2022) and resulting taxonomic identification numbers were used to download representative genomes from each of the 691 non-host hits [ 20 , 21 ]. Finally, the OTU profile resulting from gut samples from 2,084 individuals from the Healthy Life in an Urban Setting (HELIUS) study served as a basis for simulating microbial communities with authentic taxonomic abundances [ 22 ]. Of the 744 OTUs, 610 unique RefSeq genome references from the genus and species level served as the basis for simulation. When multiple OTUs from the same genus level were encountered, multiple species from this genus were selected based on genomes with full, major releases in GenBank, which included many highly similar strains to be simulated in the same community. All simulations were performed using the software readsynth (0.1.0; commit 88d8bb1).

To assess the sensitivity of RMS to capture rare taxa, metagenomes based on HELIUS communities were simulated using a series of increasing total read counts (1 × 10 5 , 1 × 10 6 , 1 × 10 7 , and 1 × 10 8 paired end reads) and four combinations of restriction enzyme double digests. The combinations of restriction enzymes selected (EcoRI/AgeI, EcoRI/MseI, HhaI/AgeI, and HhaI/MseI) were chosen for the diversity of the cut site frequency and GC content of the recognition motifs (Table  1 ). Additionally, a type IIB enzyme “BcgI” digest was simulated to assess the application of the resulting isolength fragments.

Paired end reads from each of the real and simulated datasets were aligned to a combined reference genome concatenated from all known members in the metagenome using BWA MEM. Mapped reads with a MAPQ score of zero were removed to avoid reads that map closely to multiple reference genomes. Custom Python scripts (available at github.com/ryandkuster/readsynth_analysis) were used to recreate the original genomic fragments corresponding with each read pair based on the simulated start and end positions for each fragment produced in simulation. Only those fragments harboring no internal cut sites were kept as incomplete digests are expected to unpredictably affect quantification and assessment of existing RMS data found these fragments to be rare. The observed count and corresponding taxonomic assignment were stored for each fragment.

We also assess the performance of RMS data when the reference database is not curated to only those references in the ground truth set, as is the case in most practical applications of metagenomic profiling. Reads simulated using taxa derived from the Liu et al. RMS stool sample dataset were queried against the Kraken2 ‘PlusPFP’ database. We wanted to see if mapping and recreating fragments using an inclusive database would produce taxa count and abundance comparable with the input 691 taxa simulated at even relative abundance.

Fixed length taxonomic ratios

The frequency of fragments was analyzed individually across the range of observed fragment lengths. Within each discrete fragment length, the ratios of the observed counts between all taxa present were calculated. The ratio was calculated iteratively by dividing the individual fragment count by the average fragment count for each of the other taxa present at that length (Fig.  3 ). These taxonomic ratios were then averaged over all fragment lengths to produce an n x n matrix of all n taxa. Because many taxonomic ratios were missing, all columns in the taxonomic ratio matrix were scaled to the taxon with the greatest number of relationships to all other taxa. The row average of this scaled matrix was used to predict relative taxonomic abundance for all taxa.

Visual representation of read depths originating from hypothetical taxa x, y, and z present in a 1:2:1 ratio. The left distribution shows fragments resulting from reduced sequencing under size selection or PCR fragment length biases. The differences in relative abundance estimates produced using mean and median read depths is compared with the taxonomic ratio approach (FLTR) introduced here. The ratio table on the right displays the averaged pairwise read depth ratios calculated individually within each fragment length. Even assuming no bias within each fragment length, the mean and median read depth estimates produce relative abundances that don’t account for variance in the size distribution, which is often not normal or uniform

Performance of software

A hypothetical gut microbiome was established to assess the computational performance of readsynth on larger metagenomic communities. Reference genomes derived from human gut samples (Liu et al. [ 2 ]) were downloaded and simulated under various input settings using a single core on a AMD EPYC 7F72 24-Core Processor (x86_64, 3028.149 MHz) (Supplementary Table  1 ). The cumulative size of the metagenome reference sequences influenced the time to simulate, but choice of enzymes had the largest impact on time and performance. Frequent, 4-base cutters produced many potential fragments to process, and use of less frequent motifs performed more efficiently. The most time consuming task tested, two 4-base cutters against 691 microbial genomes and the human genome, took 204 min; all other tasks took less than two hours.

Benchmarking of simulation accuracy

Spearman correlation captured a monotonic relationship between real and simulated read depths across the length of all 20 reference genomes in the mock community, and therefore was sensitive to differences in fragment presence or absence. The reads simulated using 100 percent enzyme cut efficiency corresponded closely with the real data (Fig.  4 group E; r = 0.92 to 0.94), comparable to the covariance measured between replicates of the real data. Simulation with a lower enzyme cut efficiency of 80 percent produced lower correlation with the real data, possibly resulting from increased novel loci surviving the fragmentation process (Fig.  4 group D, r = 0.66 to 0.68).

Spearman correlation coefficient of metagenome-wide, position-specific read depth for each of three replicates of real and simulated mock community sequencing. Real1-3 are the depth correlations of the real sequencing data replicates. Mapped read depth correlations from readsynth simulations are shown in A – E : A custom (.json) dictionary of fragment lengths derived from real sequence data and cut efficiency derived from real sequence data; B normal distribution of fragment lengths and cut efficiency derived from real sequence data; C normal distribution of fragment lengths with fragment mean increased by 100 bp and cut efficiency derived from real sequence data; D normal distribution of fragment lengths and cut efficiency reduced to 0.8; E normal distribution of fragment lengths and cut efficiency increased to 1

Pearson correlation was sensitive for comparing fragment read depths and was affected by noise in the data, as can be seen by variation within the replicates of the real sequencing datasets. The simulation that produced the highest read depth correlation coefficients between 0.76 to 0.79 used exact fragment size distributions informed by the real dataset (Supplementary Fig.  4 , group A). Using a normal distribution produced coefficients between 0.71 and 0.76 (groups B, D, E), suggesting the real data was approximated by applying readsynth’s normal distribution approach. The distribution with mean fragment lengths shifted only 100 bp longer affected read depth considerably with coefficients of 0.67 to 0.7 across replications (Supplementary Fig.  4 , group C). Simulations of the isolength dataset produced lower Pearson correlation (r = 0.56) but higher Spearman correlation (r = 0.97). The use of type IIB enzymes avoids variability in fragment length and while simulations with readsynth aligned closely with sequence presence-absence, simulation did not capture variability in the per-fragment depth.

Comparing Kraken2/Bracken profiles of real and simulated mock communities

The adapter-trimmed reads from the previously described mock community sequencing efforts were profiled using custom databases with Kraken2 (2.1.2) and Bracken (2.7). Raw reads mapping to each species-level identification was used as a metric of performance between the real and simulated reads. Generally, simulations captured trends in the distribution of real sequence data accurately (Fig.  5 ). The simulations with increased fragment size selection and decreased cut efficiency (Fig.  5 , groups C and D) caused larger shifts in predicted distributions. These changes are largely due to taxa-specific patterns of fragmentation where some community members, such as Phocaeicola vulgatus and Staphylococcus epidermidis , contain disproportionate read counts originating from either long or short fragments (Supplementary Fig.  5 ).

Kraken2/Bracken percent abundance profiles based on read assignments of real and simulated mock community sequencing. Real1-3 are the relative abundances of mapped reads per species produced from the real sequencing data. Mapped read depth correlations from readsynth simulations are shown in A – E : A custom (.json) dictionary of fragment lengths; B normal distribution and cut rate; C normal distribution and cut rate with fragment mean increased by 100 bp; D normal distribution and cut rate with cut rate reduced to 0.8; E normal distribution and cut rate with cut rate increased to 1. All fragment distributions and cut rates estimated from real sequence data unless specified

Impact of simulation parameters and quantification method

The FLTR approach is an alternative to read median or mean depth for profiling that measures the average relationships in read depth ratios between the taxa present at a given length. To test the FLTR approach, we first compared it to mean depth and median depth using the Snipen et al. 2021 mock community samples. Across the three replicates, using ratios produced relative abundance estimates similar to those produced using either the median or mean read depths, with Pearson correlation to the ground truth relative abundances ranging between 0.809 and 0.852 (Supplementary Fig.  6 ). Estimates of relative abundance across the three replicates show consistent, taxa-specific patterns of over- and underabundance in several of the 20 mock community members (Supplementary Fig.  7 ). These differences may be the result of sequence-specific amplification biases or slight deviations from the reported proportions expected from the mock community standard.

Data simulated from the 610 HELIUS gut microbial taxa were used to assess differences in profiling performance for the new FLTR approach versus previously published methods under varying library preparation conditions. Across all simulated HELIUS datasets, FLTR estimates of relative abundance outperformed the mean and median read depth in every instance (Supplementary Table  2 ). In some extreme cases, relying on the mean and median depths fall far from the target relative abundances (Fig.  6 ). Reads simulated from the HELIUS data captured several general trends not captured with the mock community analyses. Most notably, we see a strong interaction between the characteristics of restriction enzymes selected and the signal of the taxa simulated. Use of two frequent restriction enzymes, HhaI and MseI, each with 4 bp recognition motifs, required 100 million reads in order to detect > 90% of the input taxa. Interestingly, the use of two infrequent restriction enzymes, EcoRI and AgeI, was able to identify a higher percentage of taxa at lower sequencing efforts relative to the other treatments considered (Fig.  7 ). At 10 million reads, the combination of EcoRI and MseI captured 96.1% of taxa. The majority of simulated datasets performed moderately well at 10 million reads, and this was used as the basis for additional simulations. Lowering the mean fragment size for the EcoRI/MseI simulations by 100 bp reduced the number of identifiable taxa to 89%, and an increase by 100 bp marginally improved detection to 96.7%. Simulating the isolength, BcgI fragmentation of the HELIUS data returned only 56.1% of the 610 taxa, compared with the 66.7% of taxa identified by HhaI/MseI at the same sequencing effort (Supplementary Fig.  8 ). Across all simulations at 10 million reads, between 16 and 20% of reads were discarded per simulation due to the multi-mapping criterion described in the methods.

Comparisons of ground truth relative abundance (black) vs. results obtained using taxonomic ratio approach (green), mean depth (blue), and median depth (red) for 567 taxa returned using HELIUS simulated reads digested with HhaI and AgeI using 1 × 10 8 total reads

The relationship between the input simulated reads target and the percent of taxa identified across 4 combinations of restriction enzyme double digests. Of the expected 610 unique taxa, many are not captured at lower levels of coverage. Combination of rare cutters (EcoRI and AgeI) performed better at these lower levels of coverage

In order to compare the profiling performance of RMS reads when mapping to a known set of reference genomes and a fully inclusive database, 691 taxa based on the Liu et al. dataset were simulated using even abundance. Using even relative abundance allows qualitative assessment of profiling quantification efforts independent from taxonomic assignment, which expectedly contain naming and identification discrepancies between the input reference genome naming and the resulting assignments. Unlike the HELIUS results, aligning these reads to the known set of references was able to uniquely identify every input genome (Supplementary Fig.  9 ). The same simulated reads were then assigned to the species level of the ‘PlusPFP’ Kraken2 database using Bracken, which includes the target genomes and an additional 28,763 non-target genomes at the species level or lower. The resulting number of taxonomic hits was inflated from 691 to 1534 total taxa. To explore the basis of these false positive taxonomic assignments and potential methods of reduction, the reference genomes from these preliminary hits were then used for BWA MEM alignment and fragment recreation in place of the curated, known reference approach described above. Upon selecting reads whose source fragments aligned to the expected cut positions and removing multi mapped reads, 93.8% were able to map precisely to fragments expected in 749 of the 1,534 taxa from the Kraken2/Bracken profile, greatly reducing the false positives. Visual inspection of the recreated fragment length distribution captured the expected profile (Supplementary Fig.  10 ). Applying the FLTR approach to these reads yielded broadly even estimates of relative abundance matching the expected community composition. Some of the estimates have much lower than even representation, but comparatively these results further support the fallibility of using mean and median read depths to estimate abundances using RMS (Fig.  8 ).

Comparisons of ground truth vs. results obtained using taxonomic ratio approach, mean depth, and median depths by mapping simulated reads naively to a fully inclusive, pre-made Kraken2 database (‘PlusPFP’) before fragment recreation. A total of 749 taxa were returned using this approach. Reads from 691 taxa were simulated based on the metagenomic taxa from Liu et al. [ 2 ] sequence SRR5298272 using even representation and 1/749 was used as ground truth to reflect the assumption of equal abundance. In silico reference genomes were digested with NlaIII and HpyCH4IV producing ~ 3.3 × 10 6 total reads

Simulation is a meaningful way to measure the behavior of bioinformatics approaches, but its utility hinges on its ability to faithfully capture features found in real sequencing data. The applications of short reads are highly variable. Often the impacts of library prep are overlooked in the production of bioinformatics tools, and more tools need to be considerate of these possible nuances. Readsynth simulations of RMS mock communities produced realistic taxonomic distributions of genomic fragments and the output sequence profiles corresponded closely to those found in the limited RMS mock community sequences that exist. Each taxon present in the simulated RMS mock community produces a unique digest profile at varying relative abundance, and readsynth simulations faithfully captured these influential patterns in read depth across all combined loci in the metagenome. These simulations also demonstrate the influence that library preparation can have on profiling efforts. The fragment origin and read depth were sensitive to even minor differences in simulated library parameters, particularly size selection and enzyme efficiency.

Restriction enzyme digests of metagenomic communities produce irregular fragment length distributions that cannot be readily modeled assuming features of an underlying distribution. Therefore, calculating relative proportions in the context of a mixture of individuals prepared this way is a challenge that has not been properly addressed to account for the influences of library preparation. The FLTR methodology proposed here may benefit efforts in metagenomic quantification when fragment or target length differs between organisms. It may also have useful applications outside of metagenomics where fragment size bias affects abundance estimates using read depth, such as genotyping approaches using reduced representation sequencing. We found that using the FLTR approach appears to be a more stable metric than either mean or median depth, often because RMS fragments are not unimodally distributed within an individual genome. Removal of multi-mapped reads may compound this effect by leaving only a small number of reads representing a genome, and these reads may exist in regions of the fragment length distribution that are influenced by size-selection and PCR length biases. For RMS approaches to overcome the confounding influence of variable fragment lengths, it is a necessary prerequisite to first recreate fragments in order to know fragment lengths. Fortunately, if a reference genome assembly is reliable enough to produce a strong hit to RMS reads, it should be able to provide a framework for simulating the expected fragments so long as the cut sites are preserved. Conversely, reads that remain unassigned or ambiguous cannot be interpreted as proportional due to the uneven contribution of community members, the removal of which may result in inflated estimates of relative abundance. It may be possible to retain multi-mapped reads using estimated abundances of uniquely aligned kmers, such as the KrakenUniq approach to assignment. Such approaches have not been tested in this study.

Simulated assessments of RMS’s capability to capture rare taxa suggest that it may be possible but is highly dependent on the library preparation methods. Given a finite set of sequence reads, the restriction enzymes selected and size sampling protocols will determine which taxa produce enough signal to be detected. Fragmenting a set of highly diverse genomes with a frequent cutting enzyme may produce hundreds of thousands or even millions of potential fragments, but when these reads are distributed between taxa whose relative abundances differ by orders of magnitude, the signal for rare taxa may be lost. It is likely that enzyme digests that produce shorter fragments will create more multi-mapping collisions, as the shorter read lengths reduce mapping confidence. Here we found that digests using HhaI/MseI or the BcgI isolength enzyme produced the greatest number of potential fragments, but based on the sensitivity of the profiling approach employed, few were actually informative because the short fragments they produce often lack resolution against a highly inclusive database. This mapping-based phenomenon may also explain the success of infrequent cutters, which captured a greater percent of the taxa present using a fraction of the overall fragments as the frequent cutters. Increasing sequencing effort may allow for greater resolution when many fragments are produced; however, using upwards of 100 million reads per sample to capture rare taxa may reduce the cost benefits of RRS. Therefore, it is recommended to consider each community’s complexity when considering the necessary read coverage, as has been similarly proposed for WGS profiling [ 23 ].

When two closely related taxa exist within a community, simulations indicate that it may become difficult to estimate the relative abundance of each using the RMS approach. This is because most fragments originating from both organisms will be identical and only a small fraction of loci will be uniquely informative to a taxon. In instances when only a small number of fragments may be used for quantification, abundance estimates using read depths may become highly sensitive to per-fragment biases originating from size-selection or PCR. The development of ddRADseq protocols for GBS were based around comparing conserved regions of the genome between closely related species. With RMS, conservation between these fragments may be counterproductive when trying to parse the individual members of a complex community. The taxonomic ratio methodology described here does not rely on normalization, but it is also not designed to handle redundancies in multi-mapping fragments, as evidenced by the set of unidentified taxa in the simulated HELIUS community. Eliminating fragments based on similarity may ultimately eliminate all useful, identifying markers if multiple, nearly identical strains are present. Retaining these fragments requires a means of identifying distinct taxa when aligning against a fully inclusive database of potential matches, and the results may be highly dependent on the database as well as the behavior of the aligning tool used [ 24 ]. We also recommend future investigations into profiling software choice and handling ambiguously assigned reads.

While simulation cannot be expected to capture all the nuances of real sequencing data, it can help find the edge cases where existing tools might fail to perform as intended. Using a set of largely pre-existing bioinformatics tools, our assessments here of simulated RMS data may be successful in some instances and very underpowered in others. While RMS offers promising applications, profiling benchmarks have not been widely tested on mixed samples including viral, protist, or non-fungal eukaryotic members and instead focus largely on prokaryotic and fungal taxa. Simulation could be a useful means in determining whether such mixed communities contain enzyme site biases preventing meaningful profiling accuracy. RMS may provide a fast and affordable profiling technique for communities that are relatively simple in structure. It may also be fast and economical in instances where detecting rare taxa is not critical. One of the largest obstacles preventing community use of RMS is the lack of bioinformatic tools developed to handle the data it produces, and applying existing profiling tools will not work out of the box. Both developers and users of new tools should be cognizant of the intersection between sample preparation and downstream analytical tools selected.

Availability and requirements

Project name: Readsynth

Project home page: github.com/ryandkuster/readsynth

Operating system(s): Linux/MacOS,

Programming language: Python3, C++ 

Other requirements: Python packages: numpy, pandas, and seaborn

License: Apache-2.0

Any restrictions to use by non-academics: none.

Availability of data and materials

The code and parameters used in all simulation and analytical steps used in this study are available on GitHub at https://github.com/ryandkuster/readsynth_analysis and raw data are stored at https://doi.org/ https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.nzs7h44zk . The freely available package readsynth can be downloaded at https://github.com/ryandkuster/readsynth . The mock RMS and isolength sequencing datasets analyzed for this study can be found in the NCBI BioProject PRJNA574678 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA574678 and figshare https://doi.org/ https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12272360.v8 . The RMS gut metagenome data is available in NCBI BioProject PRJNA377403 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/bioproject/PRJNA377403 . The Kraken2/Bracken PlusPFP database (6/7/2022) and indices used in this study were downloaded from https://benlangmead.github.io/aws-indexes/k2 .

Abbreviations

Reduced metagenomic sequencing

Reduced representation sequencing

Double-digest restriction-site associated DNA sequencing

Genotyping by sequencing

Polymerase chain reaction

Operational taxonomic unit

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge Bode Olukolu for the initiation of research into genotyping by sequencing for microbiome exploration. We would like to thank Aaron Onufrak for software testing and the Hadziabdic lab for guidance on amplicon sequencing methodology.

Financial support was provided by the Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology, University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture and the Scholarly and Research Incentive Funds from the Graduate School, University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

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Ryan Kuster & Margaret Staton

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RK designed the research and carried out the experiments. MS supervised the project, provided software guidance, and contributed to the manuscript. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

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Kuster, R., Staton, M. Readsynth: short-read simulation for consideration of composition-biases in reduced metagenome sequencing approaches. BMC Bioinformatics 25 , 191 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12859-024-05809-3

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Received : 09 January 2024

Accepted : 10 May 2024

Published : 15 May 2024

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12859-024-05809-3

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