The following appeared in an article in the Grandview Beacon.
"For many years the city of Grandview has provided annual funding for the Grandview Symphony. Last year, however, private contributions to the symphony increased by 200 percent and attendance at the symphony's concerts-in-the-park series doubled. The symphony has also announced an increase in ticket prices for next year. Given such developments, some city commissioners argue that the symphony can now be fully self-supporting, and they recommend that funding for the symphony be eliminated from next year's budget."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
While author's recommendation, published in Grandview Beacon, that funding for the symphony be diminished from next year's budget seems apt, logical and promising based on the premise that symphony is now self-reliant, a closer scrutiny will reveal numerous logical flaws and will demand answers to various questions which can make the recommendation more concrete and substantial.
First and foremost, the author has readily assumed that private contributions to the symphony which were increased 200 percent last year is a consistent phenomenon. It is highly likely that this sudden inflow of funds has helped the symphony management team to organize an excellent concert-in-the-park series, thus attracting more visitors which resulted in more revenue for Grandview Symphony. The author has failed to provide any proof or assurance that the private contribution will keep coming in at the same and even higher rate so that city commissioners don't have to allocate any funds for the symphony in next year's budget. Corroborating evidence of this sort could have underscored the argument.
Secondly, the author has safely assumed that an increase in the ticket price for next year's events will generate more revenue for Grandview Symphony. Will the revised ticket price offset the cost incurred to arrange those events? In case of an affirmative answer, symphony organizers will run out funds as the ticket collection from the events will balance out the expenses. Moreover, this is very much dependent on the number of people going to attend next year's events. In case, the overall attendance goes down, the symphony is bound to face cash flow problems. Failure to cover this aspect is seriously weakening the author's recommendation.
Lastly, even if the symphony would be self-supporting, funding for the symphony from next year's budget should not be removed. Unless, a similar rule or practice is followed for other departments or organizations, only then symphony should be given the same treatment. An example or reference to a closely related scenario will definitely help the reader get convinced that funds should be stopped from next year.
To recapitulate, answers to the above-mentioned questions will make the recommendation more persuasive and substantial. Otherwise, for readers, it will rife with holes and open to debate.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 16 15
No. of Words: 367 350
No. of Characters: 1939 1500
No. of Different Words: 204 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.377 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.283 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.861 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 154 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 109 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 80 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 46 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.938 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 12.075 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.5 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.33 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.574 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.056 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 563, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
... higher rate so that city commissioners dont have to allocate any funds for the symp...
^^^^
Line 5, column 622, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
... this aspect is seriously weakening the authors recommendation. Lastly, even if the ...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, if, lastly, moreover, second, secondly, so, then, thus, while
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 13.0 19.6327345309 66% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 11.1786427146 98% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 15.0 28.8173652695 52% => OK
Preposition: 37.0 55.5748502994 67% => OK
Nominalization: 14.0 16.3942115768 85% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1983.0 2260.96107784 88% => OK
No of words: 365.0 441.139720559 83% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.43287671233 5.12650576532 106% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.37092360658 4.56307096286 96% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.00991792742 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 203.0 204.123752495 99% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.556164383562 0.468620217663 119% => OK
syllable_count: 612.9 705.55239521 87% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 2.0 2.70958083832 74% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 16.0 19.7664670659 81% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 77.8889433745 57.8364921388 135% => OK
Chars per sentence: 123.9375 119.503703932 104% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.8125 23.324526521 98% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.5625 5.70786347227 80% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.353870666863 0.218282227539 162% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.106156587199 0.0743258471296 143% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0848937193364 0.0701772020484 121% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.185482896431 0.128457276422 144% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0950450036559 0.0628817314937 151% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.6 14.3799401198 108% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 40.69 48.3550499002 84% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.1 12.197005988 107% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.51 12.5979740519 115% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.49 8.32208582834 114% => OK
difficult_words: 110.0 98.500998004 112% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 19.0 12.3882235529 153% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => 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.