The next morning, Professor Gomez began her pile of 60 papers. She had a rubric: 5 points for content, structure, and argument. And 5 points for presentation, which included the portada de trabajo . For her, the cover page was not vanity; it was . It showed the student understood that a paper is a professional communication, not a private diary. It included the university’s name, the course code, the professor’s title, the student’s ID, and the date—all arranged in the standard format.

The Cover That Saved the Grade

Mateo’s paper had none of that. The first page of his document was page one of the introduction. No title. No name. No date.