The following is part of a memorandum from the president of Humana University.
"Last year the number of students who enrolled in online degree programs offered by nearby Omni University increased by 50 percent. During the same year, Omni showed a significant decrease from prior years in expenditures for dormitory and classroom space, most likely because online instruction takes place via the Internet. In contrast, over the past three years, enrollment at Humana University has failed to grow and the cost of maintaining buildings has increased. Thus, to increase enrollment and solve the problem of budget deficits at Humana University, we should initiate and actively promote online degree programs like those at Omni."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The president of Humana bases his/her argument on the fact that the nearby Omni university has had a 50% incerase in students seeking online degree programs, and therefore, humana too should increase online programs. He/She also reasons that the decrease in cost for building maintainence in Omni is because of more students starting to take online rather than classroom courses and therefore humana should also do so. His argument is riddled with assumptions which can be detrimental for the institution if proved unwarranted.
The first assumption he makes is that 50 percent increase in online students in Omni is a significant increase in student enrollment in Omni. This assumption, however, may not be true. For example, it could be true that Omni had a total enrollment of 15000 students last year and only 100 were online students. If there was a increase of 50 percent, then there will be 150 students, which is non even comparable to the student population of 15000. Hence, it is not guarenteed that 50 percent increase in online student guarentees a significant increase in the general student population. The president, however, assumes that 50 percent increase is a significant enough to change the population dynamics of Omni, and therefore, Humana should also strive for such increase.
Along with the possibility of 50 percent increase not being significant, it may also be true that the increase may not have to do with Omni's specific attention to online programs. One cannot write out the possibility of Omni decreasing tuition fees or hiring better professors, both of which do not have direct connection to expansion of online programs. However, in both cases, the enrollment in Omni is expected to increase. Hence, it is important to know whether the general enrollment in Omni increased by introduction of something new or just the enrollment in online programs increased. The president's argument does not negate the fact that there were no other changes and simply assumes that the increase was solely because of the expansion of online programs.
Finally, while it may be true that the expansion of online programs lead to Omni's reduced building maintainence cost, this reduction can be a result of other factors as well. For instance, if Omni had decided to use more durable materials three years ago, it is obvious that the maintainece cost for the next three years would decrease. In this case, the reduction in the cost would have nothing to do with the online program. Despite the fact that this or other similar scenarios may prove true, the presidet's argument seems to neglect this possibility. His arguement simply supposes that the decrease in maintainence cost at Humana is merely because student are favoring online classes over on-campus classes.
While the president's assumptions might turn out true and the switch Humana does following the presidents advice may turn to be profitable to Humana, it might also be that the assumption may prove to be false. In this case, there will be, rather, a huge loss to the university as there will be less seats for on-campus classes and there will be more empty seats for online classes.
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 324, Rule ID: EN_A_VS_AN
Message: Use 'an' instead of 'a' if the following word starts with a vowel sound, e.g. 'an article', 'an hour'
Suggestion: an
... 100 were online students. If there was a increase of 50 percent, then there will...
^
Line 3, column 598, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'presidents'' or 'president's'?
Suggestion: presidents'; president's
...ment in online programs increased. The presidents argument does not negate the fact that ...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 142, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...intainence cost, this reduction can be a result of other factors as well. For ins...
^^
Line 5, column 95, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'presidents'' or 'president's'?
Suggestion: presidents'; president's
...nd the switch Humana does following the presidents advice may turn to be profitable to Hum...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 293, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun seats is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...loss to the university as there will be less seats for on-campus classes and there w...
^^^^
Discourse Markers used:
['also', 'finally', 'first', 'hence', 'however', 'if', 'may', 'so', 'then', 'therefore', 'well', 'while', 'for example', 'for instance']
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance in Part of Speech:
Nouns: 0.242582897033 0.25644967241 95% => OK
Verbs: 0.144851657941 0.15541462614 93% => OK
Adjectives: 0.101221640489 0.0836205057962 121% => OK
Adverbs: 0.0610820244328 0.0520304965353 117% => OK
Pronouns: 0.0191972076789 0.0272364105082 70% => OK
Prepositions: 0.132635253054 0.125424944231 106% => OK
Participles: 0.0261780104712 0.0416121511921 63% => OK
Conjunctions: 2.73004266271 2.79052419416 98% => OK
Infinitives: 0.0279232111693 0.026700313972 105% => OK
Particles: 0.00349040139616 0.001811407834 193% => OK
Determiners: 0.0890052356021 0.113004496875 79% => OK
Modal_auxiliary: 0.0383944153578 0.0255425247493 150% => OK
WH_determiners: 0.00523560209424 0.0127820249294 41% => Some subClauses wanted starting by 'Which, Who, What, Whom, Whose.....'
Vocabulary words and sentences:
No of characters: 3167.0 2731.13054187 116% => OK
No of words: 523.0 446.07635468 117% => OK
Chars per words: 6.05544933078 6.12365571057 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.78217453174 4.57801047555 104% => OK
words length more than 5 chars: 0.380497131931 0.378187486979 101% => OK
words length more than 6 chars: 0.288718929254 0.287650121315 100% => OK
words length more than 7 chars: 0.217973231358 0.208842608468 104% => OK
words length more than 8 chars: 0.141491395793 0.135150697306 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.73004266271 2.79052419416 98% => OK
Unique words: 221.0 207.018472906 107% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.422562141491 0.469332199767 90% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
Word variations: 48.5483975896 52.1807786196 93% => OK
How many sentences: 21.0 20.039408867 105% => OK
Sentence length: 24.9047619048 23.2022227129 107% => OK
Sentence length SD: 43.5283940484 57.7814097925 75% => OK
Chars per sentence: 150.80952381 141.986410481 106% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.9047619048 23.2022227129 107% => OK
Discourse Markers: 0.666666666667 0.724660767414 92% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.14285714286 97% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 3.58251231527 140% => OK
Readability: 53.7766548302 51.9672348444 103% => OK
Elegance: 1.78294573643 1.8405768891 97% => OK
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.43299160574 0.441005458295 98% => OK
Sentence sentence coherence: 0.150705402342 0.135418324435 111% => OK
Sentence sentence coherence SD: 0.0834462221023 0.0829849096947 101% => OK
Sentence paragraph coherence: 0.562069354057 0.58762219726 96% => OK
Sentence paragraph coherence SD: 0.128738545296 0.147661913831 87% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.183605261367 0.193483328276 95% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0890914900927 0.0970749176394 92% => OK
Paragraph paragraph coherence: 0.455797062081 0.42659136922 107% => OK
Paragraph paragraph coherence SD: 0.0456377689602 0.0774707102158 59% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.296260299487 0.312017818177 95% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0844094285485 0.0698173142475 121% => OK
Task Achievement:
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.33743842365 144% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.87684729064 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.82512315271 62% => OK
Positive topic words: 11.0 6.46551724138 170% => OK
Negative topic words: 5.0 5.36822660099 93% => OK
Neutral topic words: 3.0 2.82389162562 106% => OK
Total topic words: 19.0 14.657635468 130% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6 -- The score is based on the average performance of 20,000 argument essays. This e-grader is not smart enough to check on arguments.
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Note: This is not the final score. 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.