Choose two topics with similarities and differences your audience of university students will find significant. Do this by brainstorming and free-writing to find your best ideas. Ask yourself what university students evaluate, what would they find of significance to compare and contrast?
The next step is to determine your purpose for writing. Do you want to inform or to persuade? If you decide to write an argument, it may help you to use a formulaic thesis statement: _____________ is a good (or 

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worse) __________________ than _______________ for these reasons: _________, ____________, and ___________. Then you can organize your essay into neat blocks of information comparing and contrasting aspects of the two topics you”ve chosen, in the order you”ve laid them out above.

If, instead, you decide to inform, your thesis statement will be a simple statement of fact such as There are interesting similarities and differences between __________ and _____________.

Notice there is not much to argue about in that statement, but you do promise to provide interesting information. Stay focused on keeping your audience involved in what they read.

Develop your paragraphs with interesting supporting material such as descriptive detail, and be sure to have both an introduction and a conclusion in your essay. Edit and revise, of course, very carefully.

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