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.
The author avers that with the recent developments such as an increased investment from contributors, more patronage from audiences, and rising ticket prices, the symphony can be described as completely self-supporting and will not require funding to be channeled to the symphony in next year's budget. However, this conclusion is based on three unfounded assumptions that if not substantiated, will not be persuasive.
Firstly, the author assumes without evidence that the running cost for an increased avenue will be adequately supported by the rise in support from contributors. However, this might not be the case, perhaps due to the increased attendance, new structures will need to be in place to accommodate the numbers, such will require a substantial cost either in expanding the avenue or putting more structures in place. Also, it is possible that with the rising amount of viewership, more staffs will be required for a successful run and will also require capital that the amount from contributors and ticket sales won't be able to cater for. If either of the scenarios above are true, then the author's conclusion that Grandview symphony will be self-supporting does not hold water.
Secondly, the author presumes that the increase in ticket prices announced for next year will have substantial effect on the cash flow of running Grandview symphony. Nevertheless, this won't necessarily be the case. Peradventure, such increase in prices tickets might create a low turnout from the audiences, consequently leading to the concert running at a loss due to the expected turnout. Moreover, there is no indication that the tickets being sold at a higher price net year will have a dramatic effect on the income generated from the concert. Consequently, if either case were true then Author's conclusion of the effect of an increased ticket sales is not overly persuasive.
Thirdly, it is plausible, that the increased patronage from for the concerts might have been due to the increase in advertisements mainly due to the increased contribution from Investors. And as such, the increased funding would not necessarily have an effect on other areas requiring funding; such as cleaning, toilet facilities, camping, and many more. Perhaps, what attracted more people was the improvement in the social atmosphere, such as variety of activities, food and side attractions which would have had a deep on the additional money provided by the contributors. If either case were true, then the Author's conclusion of eradicating funding from the grandview budget due to increased income from contributors is specious at best.
In conclusion, for the argument to be persuasive, the author needs to provide evidence on three fronts; The effect of an increased attendance on structure of the place, the likely turnout from ticket prices and the purposeful usage of the increased income from contributors.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 16 15
No. of Words: 463 350
No. of Characters: 2390 1500
No. of Different Words: 194 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.639 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.162 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.915 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 180 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 135 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 102 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 78 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 28.938 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.947 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 1 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.372 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.582 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.069 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 689, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
... the scenarios above are true, then the authors conclusion that Grandview symphony will...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, consequently, first, firstly, however, if, moreover, nevertheless, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, in conclusion, such as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 23.0 19.6327345309 117% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 9.0 11.1786427146 81% => OK
Relative clauses : 10.0 13.6137724551 73% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 14.0 28.8173652695 49% => OK
Preposition: 61.0 55.5748502994 110% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 16.3942115768 55% => More nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2448.0 2260.96107784 108% => OK
No of words: 461.0 441.139720559 105% => OK
Chars per words: 5.31019522777 5.12650576532 104% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.63367139033 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.02738989356 2.78398813304 109% => OK
Unique words: 208.0 204.123752495 102% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.451193058568 0.468620217663 96% => OK
syllable_count: 750.6 705.55239521 106% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
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: 28.0 22.8473053892 123% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 60.7234702874 57.8364921388 105% => OK
Chars per sentence: 153.0 119.503703932 128% => OK
Words per sentence: 28.8125 23.324526521 124% => OK
Discourse Markers: 9.0 5.70786347227 158% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 5.25449101796 19% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 1.0 6.88822355289 15% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.179789098949 0.218282227539 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0699068178112 0.0743258471296 94% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0498725380397 0.0701772020484 71% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.115752804077 0.128457276422 90% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0166458800529 0.0628817314937 26% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 18.0 14.3799401198 125% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 43.06 48.3550499002 89% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 14.2 12.197005988 116% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.11 12.5979740519 112% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.76 8.32208582834 105% => OK
difficult_words: 109.0 98.500998004 111% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.5 12.3882235529 117% => OK
gunning_fog: 13.2 11.1389221557 119% => 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.