The following appeared in a letter from the faculty committee to the president of Seatown University:
A study conducted at nearby Oceania University showed that faculty retention is higher when professors are offered free tuition at the university for their own college-aged children. Therefore, Seatown should institute a free-tuition policy for its professors for the purpose of enhancing morale among the faculty and luring new professors.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The argument presents for a case that the Seatown university must include a free-tuition policy for the children of its faculty members, based on a study conducted in a nearby university. The given argument provides an analysis which may appear right at the first glance but is not so when we delve into is intricacies.
Firstly, the suggestion to provide free tutions is possibly based on a single study conducted in Oceania university, which indicates the likelihood of such study to be biased, given that there is no mention of the similar study being conducted elsewhere. In face of this, more compelling evidence in form of study conducted across multiple universities would be considered relevant before going ahead with implementing such a suggestion. Additionally, given that the statistical significance of study is generally proportional to the sample size, instituting a larger study performed across regions with different academic and cultural environment, economic conditions and living conditions could provide for a more substantial evidence.
Secondly, the claim indicates that the faculty exhibits higher retention when provided with free education for their own college-ages children. However, the argument fails to take into consideration whether such is the case with only Oceania university or with any other university. What this implies is the failure of the argument to consider the ranking of Oceania university compared to Seatown university. There might be a possibility that Oceania university sees higher retention because the university in general is better ranked and provides a better academic environment compared to Seatown university. This would certainly translate into a grater preference by the Oceania faculty to get their children educated at the university where they are employed, and which may not be the case for Seatown university. Thus, a much wiser move before implementing such decision would be for the Seatown university to evaluate its academic standing before making hasty decisions to offer free education. More so, it may bleed the university of the funds it already has; those funds which could be used to improve the academic infrastructure, thereby doing away with the need to lure professors. In any case, if a university is of good reputation, the need to lure professors doesn't arise.
Thirdly, the argument doesn't elucidate upon the relation between free education and morale of its professors. There can always be a case that despite providing free education for the faculty's children, the very faculty may not be happy or motivated to perform competently, which may arise on account of any university's regressive policies. There is always a likelihod that faculty is Oceania university is retained not because of the free-tuition policy but probably because the work environment is really conducive for the faculty and they enjoy working there. Again, this calls for the Seatown University to assess how well it fares in terms of employee friendly policies as compared to Oceania university.
Thus, the argument is marred by several logical challeneges which need to be addressed by adopting several strategies in an attempt to evaluate its standing compared to other universities. From conducting broader surveys to evalauating its employee performance model to assesing its quality of education, a lot many reasons needs to be taken into account before it goes forward to implement the free tuition policy for its faculty. Once we have an understanding of other factors including the weather of the region or where the university is located, or its proximity to basic amenities like hospitals, we may be in a better position to implement such suggestion.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
flaws:
also need to argue: '... and luring new professors.'
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Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 20 15
No. of Words: 587 350
No. of Characters: 3089 1500
No. of Different Words: 261 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.922 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.262 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.9 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 238 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 206 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 145 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 94 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 29.35 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.545 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.75 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.347 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.557 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.138 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 1273, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...reputation, the need to lure professors doesnt arise. Thirdly, the argument doesnt ...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 23, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
... doesnt arise. Thirdly, the argument doesnt elucidate upon the relation between fre...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, firstly, however, if, may, really, second, secondly, so, third, thirdly, thus, well, in general, in any case
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 12.0 11.1786427146 107% => OK
Relative clauses : 17.0 13.6137724551 125% => OK
Pronoun: 31.0 28.8173652695 108% => OK
Preposition: 79.0 55.5748502994 142% => OK
Nominalization: 34.0 16.3942115768 207% => Less nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3150.0 2260.96107784 139% => OK
No of words: 585.0 441.139720559 133% => OK
Chars per words: 5.38461538462 5.12650576532 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.9180050066 4.56307096286 108% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.97389032559 2.78398813304 107% => OK
Unique words: 272.0 204.123752495 133% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.464957264957 0.468620217663 99% => OK
syllable_count: 1052.1 705.55239521 149% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.8 1.59920159681 113% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 29.0 22.8473053892 127% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 51.5783627115 57.8364921388 89% => OK
Chars per sentence: 157.5 119.503703932 132% => OK
Words per sentence: 29.25 23.324526521 125% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.0 5.70786347227 105% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 13.0 8.20758483034 158% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 1.0 4.67664670659 21% => More facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.345783943084 0.218282227539 158% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.116050081784 0.0743258471296 156% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0746741341061 0.0701772020484 106% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.208008048216 0.128457276422 162% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0953388795749 0.0628817314937 152% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 18.5 14.3799401198 129% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 25.12 48.3550499002 52% => Flesch_reading_ease is low.
smog_index: 13.0 7.1628742515 181% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 17.0 12.197005988 139% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.52 12.5979740519 115% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.96 8.32208582834 108% => OK
difficult_words: 144.0 98.500998004 146% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.5 12.3882235529 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 13.6 11.1389221557 122% => OK
text_standard: 15.0 11.9071856287 126% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.