style guide redacted.pdf

8/18/2019 Style Guide redacted.pdf

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Style Guide

Written and Designed by

Monica Davidson and Sara MasseyFall 2015


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St. Theresa Catholic School Style Gu

Table of Contents

Introduction ................................................................................................. 1

Mission Statement ....................................................................................... 2

Statement of Philosophy ........................................................................ 2

Visual Style ....................................................................................................... 4

Name ............................................................................................................................................ 4 Logo ............................................................................................................................................. 4 Official Colors .................................................................................................................... 5

Mascot ....................................................................................................................................... 6

Fonts ........................................................................................................................................... 7

Font Size ............................................................................................................................................................ 9

Emphasis in Text ................................................................................................................... 9 Bolding .............................................................................................................................................................. 9

All Caps .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. ... 9

Italics .................................................................................................................................................................. 9

Underlining .................................................................................................................................................... 9

Abbreviations ................................................................................................11

AM/PM ....................................................................................................................................... 11 BCE/CE ...................................................................................................................................... 11 PTO.............................................................................................................................................. 12 STS ............................................................................................................................................... 12

Mechanics .......................................................................................................14

Capitalization ..................................................................................................................... 14

Grades ............................................................................................................................................................... 14

Parish ................................................................................................................................................................. 14

Religious Ceremonies .............................................................................................................................. 14

Religious Titles ........................................................................................................................................... 14

Saints ................................................................................................................................................................. 15

Sports ................................................................................................................................................................ 15

Subjects ............................................................................................................................................................. 15

Titles .................................................................................................................................................................. 15

Miscellaneous ..................................................................................................................... 16 Dates .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. .............. ...... 16

Numerals ......................................................................................................................................................... 16

Spacing .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. . 16

Punctuation ........................................................................................................................ 17

Arkansas ........................................................................................................................................................... 17

Em Dash ............................................................................................................................................................ 17

En Dash .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. . 18

Oxford Comma ............................................................................................................................................ 18

Semicolon ....................................................................................................................................................... 19


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Table of Contents (Cont.) Word Choices ..................................................................................................................... 20

Email ................................................................................................................................................................... 20

Online ............................................................................................................................................................... 20

Website .............................................................................................................................................................. 20

Paragraph Format ......................................................................................22

Paragraph Length ............................................................................................................ 22

Consistency .......................................................................................................................... 24

Tone ........................................................................................................................................... 24

Tables ..................................................................................................................26

Appendices .......................................................................................................28

Appendix A (Terms Correctly Capitalized) ........................................................ 28

Appendix B (Sample Tables) ........................................................................................... 29 4 column table .............. .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. ............. 29

3 column table .............. .............. .............. .............. .............. ............... .............. .............. .............. ............. 29

Appendix C (Sample Newsletters) ............................................................................ 30

Appendix D (Style Sheet) ................................................................................................ 32


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IntroductionThe St. Theresa Catholic School (STS) Style Guide is intended to help

writers within STS maintain a cohesive and professional style across documents by

establishing consistent standards for all communication.

The STS Style Guide contains information on the preferred choices for

capitalization, mechanics, abbreviations, and visual style choices. Abbreviations

and Mechanics are ordered alphabetically; other sections are ordered according to

relevance.

The guide is designed to be skimmed and read quickly. If you cannot find an

answer, please visit the Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Purdue

(owl.english.purdue.edu).


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Mission Statement The mission of St. Theresa Catholic School is to teach and serve in the spirit of

Jesus Christ.

Statement of Philosophy St. Theresa Catholic School serves to educate students in a faith-filled atmosphere

of academic excellence. The quality education of the whole child— spiritually,

academically, physically, and socially—is our focus. St. Theresa is a culturally

diverse community of learners working toward education in the Catholic tradition.

We promote the “Little Way” of St. Theresa in teaching our students to offer all

they do and say to God throughout each day and to serve others as Christ did. By

living this example, we promote a Catholic atmosphere where every action is

viewed as an opportunity to grow closer to God.


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Visual Style


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Visual Style

Name

The correct name of the school is St. Theresa Catholic School, not St. Theresa’s

Catholic School.

It may be referred to as St. Theresa School or STS for short. STS should be used

only after the full name of the school has been referenced.

Logo

St. Theresa Catholic School official documents and images utilize one of thefollowing images in Figure 1 and 2.

Figure 1 and Figure 2: Logos. Full-size images (for higher image quality) can be

acquired from the principal.


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Official Colors The official colors of St. Theresa Catholic School are gray, maroon, and black. The

color codes for HTML and RGB are found below.

Maroon: HTML #7A182A

RGB Code: R: 122 G: 24 B: 42

Black: HTML #000000

RGB Code: R: 00 G: 00 B: 00

Gray: HTML #C0C0C0

RGB Code: R: 192 G:192 B:192


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Mascot The mascot of St. Theresa Catholic School is a cougar. St. Theresa utilizes the

following image on materials needing the mascot, as seen in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Mascot logo. Full-resolution images can be acquired from the principal.


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Fonts Fonts used in official communications should be easily readable and convey a

sense of professionalism. St. Theresa Catholic School encourages the usage of

Times New Roman for a serifed font or Arial for a sans serif font. Serifed fonts are

easily read in printed work, whereas sans serif fonts are designed for easy

readability online. Examples are shown in Figure 4.

Creative fonts may be used on a limited basis when setting a casual or

playful tone; for example, using the Papyrus font (in Microsoft Word) for the font

in a lesson about ancient Egypt.


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Times New Roman

Regular

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz

Bold



Bold Italic



Italic ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ


!"#$%

'()*%$" !+,-./0123456789:';?@AB $CDE(F)G#HI%JKLMN"OP*QRSTU

!"#$ &!'()*+,-./0123456789:; ?@A$BCDEFGH#IJ"KLMNOPQRSTU

!"#$ &'(#)* +!,-./01&23456789:;?@AB (C*$DEFG)HI#JK"LMNO'PQRSTU

!"#$%&

()*+,-./!0123456789:;?@ #A&BCDEF%GH$IJKLMNO"PQRSTU Figure 4: Examples of serifed and sans-serif fonts


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Font Size

A good rule of thumb for font sizes is to set the size of the body at a 11- or 12-

point font—any smaller is difficult to read—and headers should be 4 points bigger.

For example, if your text is in a 12-point font, make your headers a 16-point font.

Emphasis in Text

Bolding

Bolding text can be used to add emphasis. Unless it is unavoidable, do not bold

entire sentences, as large strings of words bolded can be difficult to read.

All-Caps

All-caps should be used limitedly. Understand that all-caps can be interpreted as

shouting. If all-caps is necessary for emphasis, limit to one or two keywords.

Italics

Italics should also be avoided for adding emphasis, as it can make the text difficult

to read. Use italics in combination with bolding sparingly for subtle emphasis and

easier reading.

Underlining

If possible, avoid underlining for emphasis, especially on online materials.

Underlining can be confusing as it is often associated with links online.


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Abbreviations


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Abbreviations Abbreviations are regularly used in communication, and many ways of

abbreviating are technically correct. For consistency and clarity, the following

guidelines should be followed whenever abbreviations are used.

General Abbreviation Guidelines

• Abbreviations should be in all-caps unless otherwise specified.

• No periods should be used between letters unless otherwise specified.

• Abbreviations should always be spelled out the first time they are used in a

document (exceptions being commonly used abbreviations such as AM/PM

and BCE/CE).

AM/PM AM and PM should be used to designate time. Remember to place a space after the

time but before the AM or PM.

Example: 2:45 PM

BCE/CE BCE and CE are the currently used method of designating years in history,

meaning Before the Common/Current/Christian Era and

Common/Current/Christian Era. Both terms appear after the year.

Example: 1990 CE

5 BCE


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PTO PTO is used to abbreviate the Parent-Teacher Organization.

STS STS is used to abbreviate the name of St. Theresa Catholic School.


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Mechanics


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Mechanics The following are some basic guidelines for mechanics such as capitalization and

punctuation. If a question is not answered by this guide, please consult a source

such as the Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Purdue (owl.english.purdue.edu).

Examples of correctly capitalized terms can be found in Appendix A.

Capitalization

Grades

Grades do not need to be capitalized unless beginning a sentence.

Example: kindergarten, not Kindergarten

5th grade will perform the play.

Parish

Capitalize as part of the formal name. Lowercase the term when it stands alone.

Example: Our school is in the Parish of St. Theresa Catholic School.

The parish is downtown.

Religious Ceremonies

Religious occurrences such as Mass should be capitalized.

Example: Mass, not mass

Religious Titles

Capitalize titles only directly before a name. Lowercase the term when it stands

alone.

Example: Bishop Rodney visited the school.

The bishop blessed the sweaters.


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Saints

The saints’ names and the honorific should be capitalized. References to saints in

general do not need to be capitalized.

Example: St. Theresa is our namesake.

This week, we will be studying several different saints.

Sports

General references to athletics are not capitalized unless beginning a sentence or

part of a proper title.

Example: volleyball, not Volleyball

Smith Family Basketball Tournament

Subjects

School subjects, with the exception of subjects that are proper nouns, should not be

capitalized unless at the beginning of a sentence.

Example: religion, not Religion

Science class takes place in the science lab.

Spanish (proper noun)

Titles

The first letter in the title should be capitalized. Also, the first letter in a word

should be capitalized with the exception of articles (a, the, etc.), prepositions (for,

with, in, etc.), or coordinating conjunctions (and, but, etc.).

Example: Box Tops for Education, not Box Tops For Education

Tag Day

Parent-Teacher Organization


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Miscellaneous

Dates

When referring to a day, do not use the suffix after the number.

Example: August 17, 2015, not August 17th

, 2015

Numerals

Spell out numbers up to and including ten, but use numerals above ten.

Example: We needed ten players, but we has only eight.

There were 15 people on the bus.

Spacing

Use one space after punctuation including end punctuation.

Example: Today, we will go to the park. Tomorrow, we’ll go the library.


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Punctuation

Arkansas

The official way to make Arkansas possessive is “Arkansas’s.”

Example: Arkansas’s capital is Little Rock.

Em Dash

Em dashes can take the place of commas, parentheses, or colons.

An em dash can replace a comma but note that it relays more emphasis than

commas

Example: When her package was delivered—nearly a month after it was

expected—she no longer needed the book.

An em dash can also take the place of parenthesis. Doing so draws more attention

to the items within. Only a single em dash is needed when the emphasized part

ends the sentence.

Example: She graded all of the papers—all 60 of them—in one evening.

An em dash can be used in place of colons. This use is less formal than a colon.

Example: The verdict was handed down—guilty.

Em dashes can be achieved in word processors using easy shortcuts. Em dashes

can also be found under special characters.

For Google Docs (on a PC): Hold down the alt key and type 0151 on the num-pad,

then release. An em dash will appear.


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For Microsoft Word (on a PC): Hold down control, alt, num lock, and the minus

key on the num-pad and release.

En Dash An en dash is slightly smaller than an em dash (about the width of a typed “n”) and

is used between a range of numbers, dates, or pages, and scores. Do not use an en

dash when the span is following “between” or “from.”

Example: Read pages 11–18 by tomorrow.

STS won 3–0.

She was principal in the 2010–2011 school year.

She taught from 1999 to 2004.

An en dash can be achieved using easy shortcuts. They can also be found under

special characters.

For Google Docs (on a PC): Hold down the alt key and press 0150 on the num-pad,

then release. An en dash will appear.

For Microsoft Word (on a PC): Hold down control, num lock, and the minus key

on the num-pad and release.

Oxford Comma

Oxford (or serial) commas are used before the “and” and final item in a list of

three or more items. STS utilizes Oxford commas within its documents.

Example: I bought eggs, bread, and milk.

The Oxford comma comes before the “and”.


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Semicolon

Semicolons separate two independent clauses that are not separated by a

conjunction (e.g., and, but, for, so…).

Example: I read the book aloud; the students followed along.

Semicolons also can be used as a super-comma, dividing items with commas, such

as locations, dates, or descriptions.

Example: I studied in Little Rock, Arkansas; Seattle, Washington; and Austin,

Texas.


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Word Choices

Email

Email is written as one word with no hyphen.

Example: I sent out an email to all the teachers.

Online

Online is written as one word.

Example: We watched the movie online.

Website

Website is written as one word.

Example: The lunch menu can be found on the school website.


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ParagraphFormat


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Paragraph Format

Paragraph Length

According to the Handbook of Technical Writing , “A paragraph performs three

functions:

(1) It develops the unit of thought stated in the topic sentence;

(2) it provides a logical break in the material; and

(3) it creates a visual break on the page, which signals a new topic” (Alred,

Brusaw, and Oliu, 385).

Paragraphs should be long enough to explain the subject of the topic sentence butnot to so long as to lose the reader. Writing short, concise sentences or paragraphs

is preferred. An example is found on the following page.


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Example:

Original: No school on Friday. Parent/teacher conferences. I am looking forward

to talking with each of you about your child’s progress.

The bulletin board for November was done by Kindergarten.

Next spelling test will be Nov 6th. The words are: gas, sad, Cass, sod, Sal. First

spelling test was good. Most of the students did very good, some need to study

more.

Next PTO meeting is November 12th at 6:00 and 6:45. The 8th and K classes will

sing at this meeting. Come to the Parish Center at 5:45.These short one- and two-sentence paragraphs are choppy and difficult to follow.

The information needs to be connected to promote readability.

Revised: There will be no school on Friday due to parent/teacher conferences. I

am looking forward to talking with each of you about your child’s progress. Our

next spelling test will be on November 6, 2015. The words are: gas, sad, Cass, sod,

and Sal. Most of the students did very well; some, however, need more study time.

The next PTO meeting is scheduled for November 12. The 8th grade and

kindergarten classes will sing at this meeting. Please be at the Parish Center by

5:45 PM.

In other news, we are happy to report the kindergarten class created the bulletin

board for November.

This revised version is friendly and easy to read.


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Consistency

It is important to maintain a sense of consistency throughout a document. For

example, if you start with abbreviating the names of the months, continuethroughout the entire document. If you spell out the names of the months of the

year, continue to do so throughout the entire document.

Tone

Tone is the feeling the reader gets from the document. The tone can be formal or

informal, friendly, or authoritative. The tone depends on the author of the

document and the subject matter. Short sentences can be interpreted by a reader as

curt or unfriendly. Avoid by adding a comma and joining two short sentences

together, which promotes a more friendly tone.

Examples:

Original: Be on time. (This command is short and may come across as being curt.)

Revised: Please, be on time. (This request conveys a friendly tone.)

Original: Return the field trip note now. (This command may come across as

being curt.)

Revised: Return the field trip note by October 23, 2015. (This statement is friendly

and gives a definite date.)

Original: Turn your clocks back one hour Saturday. (This statement communicates

“common knowledge”; some readers may view it as an insult to their intelligence.)

Revised: Don’t forget to turn your clocks back one hour on Saturday. (Most people

will appreciate a friendly reminder.)


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Tables


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Tables A table is a way to organize information such as a recurring sporting event in an

easy to read format. The information is added to each cell; the horizontal lines

create breaks signaling that the next cell has different information. Tables also save

space in documents, allowing for a large amount of information to be displayed on

a single page.

1. Open a Word document; right-click insert in the toolbar.

2. To create the table, choose how many vertical (up and down) columns that are

needed.

3. Add column headings in 16-point font, bold.

4. To add more rows, right click inside the cell; a menu will appear with options in

the menu to add rows above or below where the cursor is located. Select to add

rows as needed. Additional adjustments can be made to cell width by dragging the

lines left or right. Hover over the line until the icon that looks like 2 lines with

arrows pointing left and right appear, then drag the line in the needed direction.

Sample Table for 5th

Grade Volleyball

Date Gym Time Game

Sept 8 Tues NLCA 6:00 NLRCA

Sept 10 Thurs ST 6:00 ST vs. SJ

Sept 15 Tues ST No Game Concession

Duty Only

Examples of 3- and 4-column tables can be found in Appendix B.


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Appendices


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Appendices

Appendix A (Terms Correctly Capitalized)

All-Saints Week

Autumnfest

book fair

Box Tops for Education

Catholic Schools Week

Cougar Courier

Fridays

Friday Letter(s)

parent/teacher conferences Parent-Teacher Organization

Parish Center

Parish of St. Theresa Catholic School

readers

Red Ribbon Week

River Market

Roses from Heaven

Scholastic Book Fair

servers

St. Theresa

St. Theresa Catholic School

St. Theresa School

Tag Day


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Appendix B (Sample Tables)

4-column table

3-column table


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Appendix C (Sample Newsletters)

Updates and reminders here. Test dates and upcomingevents here

Additional information such as spelling words


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October 30, 2015

This is a guideline of a newsletter for when more text

is needed than in the columned style, such as for

higher grades. An image, either for the school, or the

class mascot can be placed in the corner to the right

for personalization.


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Appendix D (Style Sheet)

AB

-All-caps: Use all-

caps very limitedly.-Box Tops for

Education (capitalize

first letter of wordsexcept “for”)

-alphabet letters in

quotation marks

-Arkansas’s-Arial (font)

-AM

-alt key

-BCE

CD

-no capitalization of subjects (i.e.

religion, not Religion), with theexception of subjects such as

Spanish (special nouns)

-no capitalization of grades (i.e.kindergarten, not Kindergarten)

-Catholic Schools Week

-Cougar Courier (student-run

newsletter)-Capitalize first letter after colon

-CE

-Cracked

EF

-Fonts: Creative fonts

may be used on a limited basis when setting a

casual or

playful tone. Forexample, using the

Broadway

font for the title in a

flier for a school play.-Typically used fonts:

Arial, Times New

Roman, Calibri

-Friday Letters-em dashes

-en dashes

GH

-gray (not gray)

IJK

-Indent first

line.

LM-Mass (capitalized

when referring toreligious ceremony)

-”Little Way” of St.

Theresa

NO-Use Oxford comma.

-Spell out numbers up to ten.-Use numerals for numbers 11

and up

-online

-num-pad-num lock

-Online Writing Lab (OWL)

PQR-PTO (Parent-Teacher

Organization)-River Market (two

words)

-readers (in Mass)

-Purdue-PM

-Parish Center

-Parish of St. Theresa

Catholic School

ST-“Tag Day” (not TAG

DAY)-Space between time

and “AM” or “PM”

-Semicolons (proper

usage)-semicolon

-Titles: capitalize only

when before a name,

i.e. Bishop Smith, but“I am going to see the

bishop.”

-servers (in Mass)-Spaces after

punctuation: Use 1

space.

-St. Theresa CatholicSchool

-Times New Roman

-Trajan Pro

-sans serif-serifed

-STS’ (possessive)

UV

WXYZ-website

Formatting-Blank line between end of

section and new heading

-Blank line between heading and body text

-Paragraphs indented

-Examples are flush left withhanging indent-No blank line between text and

example

-H1 centered

-H2 flush left-H3 flush left

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