Source-based essay

This thirty-minute essay is called the Informative/Explanatory essay in ETS’s official materials. It tests your ability to draw information from two sources, identify the most important concerns they raise about an issue, and explain why those concerns are important. Like the argumentative essay, it is scored on a six-point rubric. No single essay is passed or failed: your two essay scores and your multiple-choice answers combine into one scaled score, which your state compares with its passing score.

This chapter is based on a sample prompt about public libraries that stop charging late fines. You may never have followed that debate, but everything you need to write a strong essay about it is on the page in front of you. That is true of every prompt for the source-based essay.

Let’s walk through it.

Getting started

The prompts for the source-based essay look intimidating because each one includes two sets of directions, an “assignment” on an “issue,” and two “sources.” It looks like a lot, so we’ll take it step by step.

The directions always say the same thing:

Directions

In the following section you will have 30 minutes to read two short passages on a topic and then plan and write an essay on that topic. The essay will be an informative essay based on the two sources that are provided. Read the topic and sources carefully. You will probably find it best to spend a little time considering the topic and organizing your thoughts before you begin writing.

In other words, the assignment and sources are about “an issue” or controversy on which reasonable people may disagree. Your job is to identify the most important concerns the passages raise about the issue and to explain why those concerns are important, drawing on both sources. ETS calls this an informative essay: you aren’t asked to pick a side, although you can say which concern matters most and why. A short essay of four or five paragraphs is plenty.

Your essay must:

• Identify the most important concerns about the issue, with a clear focus or thesis.
• Explain why those concerns are important.
• Use information from both sources.
• Cite both sources whenever you quote or paraphrase.

Sample assignment

Assignment

For decades, public libraries have charged small fines for books and other materials returned after their due dates. In recent years, many library systems have stopped charging these fines, arguing that the fines keep people from using the library without bringing materials back any sooner. Critics contend that fines remind borrowers that library materials are shared and that libraries without them lose both revenue and timely returns.

Read the two passages carefully and then write an essay in which you identify the most important concerns regarding eliminating library fines and explain why they are important. Your essay must draw on information from BOTH of the sources. In addition, you may draw on your own experiences, observations, or reading. Be sure to CITE the sources whether you are paraphrasing or directly quoting.

As you can see, the second paragraph of the assignment is a set of directions. It tells you to:

• Identify the most important concerns regarding the issue.
• Explain why they are important.
• Draw on information from both sources (required).
• Optionally, draw on your own experiences, observations, or reading.
• Cite the sources whether you paraphrase or quote.

Once you know what this paragraph says, you’re free to focus your attention on the first paragraph, which tells you about the topic. In general, the opening sentences introduce the topic, and the last sentence of the paragraph tells you what the sources disagree about.

Jot down a quick summary.

Writer’s notes

• Many libraries have stopped charging late fines.
• Supporters say fines keep people away; critics say that without fines, libraries lose money and books come back later.

Now you’re ready to look at the sources. As you read each source, summarize its main point and its relationship to the issue of library fines.

The two sources below were written for this course: their authors, publications, libraries, and figures are fictional. On the test, each source is headed “Adapted from:” and a citation of the publication it comes from, as in the sample prompt in ETS’s Study Companion.

Source 1

Ashdown, Marguerite. “A Year Without Late Fines at Wrenfield Public Library.” Circulation Desk Review, vol. 7, no. 2, 2024, pp. 18–21.

When Wrenfield Public Library stopped charging late fines in 2022, some staff members expected books to disappear from the shelves. Instead, within a year, 2,400 cardholders whose accounts had been blocked over unpaid fines began borrowing again, many of them families with young children. The fines had brought in about $38,000 a year, less than one percent of the library’s budget, and staff spent hours every week collecting them and settling disputes at the front desk. Most overdue books still came back, usually within a few weeks of their due dates, and borrowers who never return an item are still billed for its replacement. The fines were never what brought the books back. What they did, mostly, was keep people away.

Writer’s notes

• Source 1 says dropping fines brought blocked borrowers back without costing the library its books.
• Clearly positive in tone.
• “Most” overdue books came back, usually within a few weeks: late, but not lost.

Source 2

Varga, Desmond. Due Back: The Case for Keeping Library Fines. Larchmont & Pell, 2023, pp. 61–62.

A late fine is a small charge with a large purpose: it reminds every borrower that a library book belongs to the next reader, too. When the Brennan County Library System dropped its fines, the share of items returned on time fell from 81 percent to 64 percent, and the wait for a new bestseller grew from three weeks to seven. The fines had also raised about $90,000 a year, which paid for the county’s summer reading program; the program now depends on a grant that must be renewed every year. Supporters of fine-free policies like to count the borrowers who come back. They rarely count the borrowers still waiting on the hold list.

Writer’s notes

• Source 2 says dropping fines slowed returns, lengthened waits, and took away the money that paid for a program.
• Critical in tone.
• Counts the borrowers who are waiting, which Source 1 never does.

Now it’s time to pull your thoughts together.

Your outline might look something like this:

Writer’s notes

Main idea (thesis): The central concern is who pays for late books: fines shut out borrowers who cannot pay them (Source 1), and dropping fines makes other borrowers wait longer (Source 2).

• Concern 1, getting books to readers: 2,400 blocked cardholders came back at Wrenfield (Source 1), while at Brennan County on-time returns fell from 81 to 64 percent and the wait for a bestseller grew from three weeks to seven (Source 2). Link: Source 2 counts on-time returns, not lost books, and Source 1 says most late books still came back, so the cost both describe is time.
• Concern 2, money: Wrenfield’s fines were under one percent of its budget and took staff time to collect (Source 1), but Brennan County’s $90,000 paid for its summer reading program (Source 2). Link: what a library gives up depends on what the money paid for.
• Why it matters: neither source settles the question alone, because each counts only one group of readers. Dropping fines moves the cost of late books from the borrowers kept away to the borrowers kept waiting (my explanation).

Drafting your essay

Now that you’ve figured out what you want to say, it’s time to write.

The simplest structure that scores well is organized by concern, not by source:

• Short thesis paragraph that names the central concern
• One body paragraph per concern, each drawing on both sources
• Short conclusion that explains why the concern matters

Organizing by concern puts the sources side by side, and that is what ETS’s descriptors for a 5 and a 6 reward: “clear links” and “effective links between the two sources.” An essay that summarizes one source per paragraph can still score well, but it leaves the comparison to the reader.

For example, you might write:

When a library stops charging late fines, the debate tends to sound like a contest between generosity and responsibility. The two sources point to a more practical question. Marguerite Ashdown describes a library that welcomed back thousands of borrowers after it dropped its fines, while Desmond Varga describes a library system where books came back later and a summer reading program lost the money that paid for it. Read together, the sources show that the central concern is not whether fines are fair but who pays for late books: the borrowers whom fines shut out, or the borrowers who wait while others return books late.

The first concern is whether readers can get the books they want, and the sources measure it in different ways. Ashdown counts borrowers: within a year of dropping fines, Wrenfield Public Library saw 2,400 cardholders whose accounts had been blocked over unpaid fines begin borrowing again, many of them families with young children. Varga counts books: after the Brennan County Library System dropped its fines, the share of items returned on time fell from 81 percent to 64 percent, and the wait for a new bestseller grew from three weeks to seven. These findings do not cancel each other out. Varga reports how many books came back on time, not how many never came back, and Ashdown notes that most overdue books at Wrenfield still came back, usually within a few weeks. Taken together, the sources suggest that the price of dropping fines is time rather than lost books. That distinction matters because the two costs fall on different people. A blocked account keeps a family out of the library entirely, while a late return makes someone who already uses the library wait longer.

The second concern is money, and here, too, the sources are less opposed than they seem. At Wrenfield, fines raised about $38,000 a year, less than one percent of the budget, and collecting them took hours of staff time every week (Ashdown). At Brennan County, the $90,000 that fines raised each year paid for the summer reading program, which now depends on a grant that must be renewed annually (Varga). Neither figure settles the question for every library. Together, they show that what a library gives up by dropping fines depends less on the amount than on what the money paid for: for Wrenfield, the fines were a small sum that took effort to collect, while for Brennan County they were the budget for a program.

Each source counts what supports its own conclusion. Ashdown counts the borrowers who return; Varga counts the books that are late and the borrowers on the hold list. Because each leaves out what the other counts, neither can show on its own whether dropping fines helps or hurts a library’s readers. That is why the central concern matters. Dropping fines does not erase the cost of late books; it moves that cost from the borrowers who cannot pay to the borrowers who must wait. Whether that trade is worth making depends on which group is larger in a particular community.

This essay would likely earn a 6. ETS’s descriptors for a 6 ask for an essay that “insightfully explains why the concerns are important, supporting the explanation with effective links between the two sources and well-chosen reasons, examples, or details.” Here is where this one does that:

• The thesis names the central concern. The writer doesn’t spend the opening explaining what library fines are, since the assignment already did. The first paragraph sets the two sources against each other and names the concern: who pays for late books.
• Each body paragraph links the sources. Paragraph 2 sets Wrenfield’s returning borrowers beside Brennan County’s slower returns, and Paragraph 3 sets the two libraries’ fine revenue side by side. Each paragraph then says what the pair shows that neither source shows alone.
• The explanation is insightful, not only clear. The writer notices what each source measures and what it leaves out: Source 2 reports on-time returns, not lost books, and Source 1 says most late books came back. That observation turns two opposed sources into one explanation: dropping fines moves the cost of late books from one group of readers to another.
• The sentences vary. Short sentences (“These findings do not cancel each other out.”) set up longer ones, which is what ETS means by “effective sentence variety.”
• It stays informative. The conclusion explains why the concern matters and what a library would need to know. It doesn’t tell libraries what to do, which would turn the essay into an argument.

An essay with the same figures and the same organization, but without that observation, would more likely earn a 5. It would link the sources clearly (“Source 1 shows a benefit, and Source 2 shows a cost”) without explaining how the two fit together. The difference is often a sentence or two per paragraph: the ones that say what the sources show together.

You can cite by author name, as this essay does (“Ashdown counts borrowers,” “(Varga)”), or by source label, as in “(Source 1)”. ETS’s own sample essays cite by author name, and either satisfies the requirement to cite the sources when you paraphrase or quote.

Keep practicing

You’ve got the tools—now it’s time to build the muscle. Head over to the practice exam page for multiple full-length practice prompts, complete with their own directions, so you can rehearse the real exam experience from start to finish. Write your response, submit it, and get automatic grading with detailed feedback showing exactly where you’re strong and what to work on before test day.