Is the science interesting? Is it clearly
described?
Has background information been provided?
That is, what have other researchers done in this area? What
is the broader context of scientific issue being addressed?
Can the scientific question be answered
with the observations being requested?
If you are proposing to study an individual
object (or a few individual objects), have you given quantitative
information about it (coordinates, magnitudes and/or surface
brightnesses, angular size, distance/redshift etc)?
If you are proposing to study a sample of
objects, what are the sample selection criteria? What are
characteristic properties (magnitudes, sizes,
redshifts/distance, etc)
What kind of data quality is needed? How
well do you need to measure your magnitudes, colors,
velocities, etc?
What interpretation / analysis will you do
with the results of the observations to answer you scientific
questions?
Will the proposed observing strategy
deliver the necessary data quality, given the properties of
your target(s)?
Are your objects observable from the
observatory you chose, during the time you are proposing to
use the telescope?
Writing/Presentation
Is there a succinct abstract?
Is information (concepts, models,
supporting data) appropriately cited?
Are figures used appropriately, and
explained properly in the figure captions and/or text? Are
they comprehensible?
Does the scientific presentation flow
logically and smoothly?
Is the proposal written using proper
grammar and spelling?
Does it follow the format given in the
assignment? (Remember that the assigned format and page limits
are slightly different from the format given in the example
proposals.)
Don't play games with font, spacing, or
page margins. Please us single-spaced, 12 point font with
1-inch margins. (Moderate use of bold or italics is okay.)