Formatting gets checked fast, and in a fixed order
Somebody working through thirty papers is not auditing your citations line by line. They look at the title page, scroll to the headings, glance at one or two reference entries, and check whether what you cited in the text appears in the list. Four minutes in total, and that pass is what produces the formatting mark on your paper.
So the highest-value corrections are not the obscure ones. They are the four places anybody actually looks. Get those right and the paper reads as carefully prepared even where something further in is imperfect. Get them wrong and expectations are set before your argument has been read at all.
The student title page is the first tell
The seventh edition splits the title page in two, one version for published work and one for student papers, and the student version is shorter than what most inherited templates produce.
- The title in bold, capitalised as a title, sitting in the upper half of the page
- Your name, then your department and institution on the line below
- The course number and name, written exactly as your program writes them
- Your instructor's name, then the due date
- No running head, unless somebody has specifically asked you for one
- No author note, and no abstract unless the assignment requires it
Level three is where an old template betrays you
Heading levels changed in appearance, and the third is the one that catches people. It is now bold italic, flush to the left margin, on its own line, with your text starting underneath. Anyone still producing an indented italic heading that runs on into the paragraph is formatting to an edition that is years behind.
Two related points. Every level is now capitalised the same way, as a title, so the old business of remembering which levels used sentence case has gone. And the introduction takes no heading of its own: the paper's title is repeated at the top of the first page of text and the introduction simply follows it, because a heading reading Introduction underneath a title says nothing.
Tables and figures finally share one format
They were previously governed by separate conventions and are no longer. Both now take a number, then a bold italic title on the line beneath, then the table or the image, then any notes underneath that. One pattern, learned once, covering both.
The practical gain is that an exhibit pasted straight out of software is now obviously wrong rather than arguably wrong, because the numbered title above it will be missing. Where a paper includes several tables and figures, formatting them identically is a cheap and visible signal of care, and it is precisely the sort of thing a second reader picks up in minutes.
Your program's guide outranks the manual
Nursing schools, education faculties and business programs all publish templates of their own, and those templates sometimes contradict the manual on small points: a required running head, a mandatory abstract, a fixed heading structure for one particular assignment.
Follow the program document wherever they disagree, because that is the one your marker is holding. The manual is only the default, governing whatever your program has chosen to leave unsaid. Students lose marks defending the manual against a rubric, which is an argument nobody wins in a world where somebody else assigns the grade.
Questions people actually ask.
Does a student paper need a running head?
Not unless your instructor or program template asks for one, and most do not. It was required under the previous edition, which is why so many saved templates still include it. Deleting it takes seconds and is among the clearest signals that a paper was formatted to the current edition rather than to an inherited file.
What does a level three heading look like now?
Bold and italic, flush against the left margin, on its own line, with the text beginning underneath it. Not indented, and not running on into the paragraph. Every level is now capitalised as a title as well, so the old rule about which levels took sentence case no longer applies anywhere.
Do reference entries still need the publisher's city?
No, and it is one of the more visible sixth-edition habits. City and state were dropped entirely, so a book entry now finishes with the publisher's name. Leaving them in rarely costs much on its own, but it tells a marker immediately which edition you learned the style from.
Should I write a heading for my introduction?
No. Your paper's title is repeated at the top of the first page of text, and the introduction follows underneath it without a heading. A heading reading Introduction placed directly under the title is redundant, and it is one of the small things that appears on marked-up drafts with real regularity.
My program's template contradicts the manual. Which wins?
The program's, every time. It is the document your marker is working from, and the manual only governs where your program has said nothing. Arguing the point inside a paper you have already handed in is not a winnable position, so if the template genuinely looks wrong, raise it before the assignment rather than within it.
