How to Write an Editorial Essay

Writing an Editorial Essay for a Newspaper

There are different types of essays that you may receive as your homework. And while most of them are not as hard to understand and write, like narrative, descriptive, persuasive essays, there is one type of essay that students encounter a lot of problems with - an editorial one. For students who have to write an editorial essay but have no idea what it means, we have assembled a list of tips to help you with your task.

However, before we go on to advice, I think it would be good to answer an important question, “What is an editorial essay?” If defined simply, the editorial is a newspaper article where the author expresses and explains his ideas. The topic may be anything you might think of, though usually, it deals with social issues. Think of it as of another one of those research papers where you have to give credible evidence in support of your opinion.

Just like with a research paper, to write an editorial, you must conduct detailed research prior to all the writing. Once you find a problem and determine your point of view, you should also devise a possible solution to the problem. For example, if one is writing about teen obesity, the aim of the article shouldn’t be just pointing out that the problem itself exists, but giving advice on dealing with this problem as well. Ideally, this article should address both people who suffer from this and medical professionals who can help them.

Writing an editorial for a newspaper author tries to talk to people, local governments, and everyone who has the power to influence the problem raised in the article. As you may see, it is not that different from writing your usual research paper, so if you were good at creating those you should not encounter too many difficulties making an interesting editorial.

Types of Editorial Essay

Like most of the other essays, editorials are classified into several types. However, instead of classification by their nature, editorials are divided by their purpose. When preparing for creating an editorial essay, you must choose from one of the following:

• Explaining the desired topic. Describe how a newspaper article covers the problem you’ve chosen.
• Criticizing the topic. This is the most suitable type of editorial for writing about some major problem. Apply your critical thinking and make readers worry about the problem as much as you are.
• Making the readers accept the truth of editorial’s main argument. Contrary to the previous type where you mostly just reveal the problem, this one focuses on the solution suitable for everyone.
• Praise. Appreciation of anyone worthy.

Advice on Writing an Editorial

• Choose your newspaper wisely. Big newspapers tend to cover more relevant topics and use up-to-date facts and solutions to current problems.
• Don’t be afraid of controversial topics. Everything that might strike out a debate or a discussion is good for engaging your reader. Try using it if you are not afraid to defend your views on a problem.
• Pick a side. As a writer, you must choose one of the sides of a problem.
• Give people some choice. One of the most important things for you as a writer is reader’s reaction, so presenting a solution to the problem, it is better to leave him a choice.

Follow this advice and you will write the best editorial ever!