The following appeared in a letter to the editor of the Balmer Island Gazette.
"On Balmer Island, where mopeds serve as a popular form of transportation, the population increases to 100,000 during the summer months. To reduce the number of accidents involving mopeds and pedestrians, the town council of Balmer Island should limit the number of mopeds rented by the island's moped rental companies from 50 per day to 25 per day during the summer season. By limiting the number of rentals, the town council will attain the 50 percent annual reduction in moped accidents that was achieved last year on the neighboring island of Seaville, when Seaville's town council enforced similar limits on moped rentals."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
The writer of this letter noted that there is a population surge to 100,000 during summer months and there is an increase in accidents involving pedestrians and mopeds. Also, he/she concluded that by limiting the number of mopeds rented during the next summer to half of the previous summer, there would be a reduction in the number of moped accidents by half. This conclusion is contingent upon three questions that must be answered by the writer to evaluate the validity of the author’s recommendation.
First of all, what is the link between the population surge in the summer months to the number of mopeds and pedestrian accidents on Balmer Island? The author needs to state if the number of accidents involving the mopeds and pedestrians is directly connected. Perhaps the increase in accidents is due to other reasons such as collisions between other means of transportation. Moped as a popular means of transportation doesn’t necessarily means that the visitors or tourists coming to Balmer Island during summer months make use of mopeds. They could have used bicycles, tricycles, cars or even buses to transport themselves around the Island. In addition, the routes being followed by the pedestrians and mopeds could be bad and mopeds users now plying the pedestrian routes as an alternative to their routes. Providing a valid response to this question would be of great booster to support the author’s recommendation.
Second of all, what evidence does the writer have to back the claim that limiting the daily rentals to half the previous year, would directly translate to reducing the incidence of accidents by fifty percent? The author failed to consider the state of the mopeds being rented out before making this suggestion. Are the mopeds ‘road worthy’? Perhaps the mopeds used by the Islanders have been the same over the years with little to no mechanical maintenance done and a possible increase in mechanical faults. By ensuring the mopeds are in a good state, there is a possibility of a decline in the number of accidents. Also, the mopeds’ operators might not be efficient users considering that they are probably visitors to the Island. Failure to give a clear response to this question and eliminate all other possibilities, the author’s recommendation stands severely undermined.
Finally, is the population demographics in Seaville comparable to Balmer Island? The author predicated on a positive outcome of similar measure in Seaville however he/she should provide evidence that Seaville is similar to Balmer Island. Possibly, the road network in Seaville is different or the summer population surge is the same. There is the possibility of having a good emergency response or incentives to moped users. Also, the author needs to provide evidence that the number of moped users in both cities are comparable. Without strong evidence of similarities between the two towns, the prediction of similar outcomes in Balmer Island as seen in Seaville Town by the author is merely a mirage.
The recommendation in this letter to the editor seems logical and has the interest of the people of Balmer Island at heart, however, the recommendation and prediction are drawn from debatable reasonings which needs to be addressed before the implementation of this recommendation. For the author to improve the persuasiveness of his/her recommendation, the stated questions above need to be adequately answered.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 10 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 3 2
No. of Sentences: 25 15
No. of Words: 556 350
No. of Characters: 2818 1500
No. of Different Words: 230 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.856 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.068 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.879 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 227 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 146 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 118 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 72 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.24 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.096 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.44 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.303 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.493 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.107 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, finally, first, however, if, second, so, in addition, such as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 14.0 11.1786427146 125% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 25.0 28.8173652695 87% => OK
Preposition: 96.0 55.5748502994 173% => OK
Nominalization: 27.0 16.3942115768 165% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2900.0 2260.96107784 128% => OK
No of words: 552.0 441.139720559 125% => OK
Chars per words: 5.25362318841 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.84713113593 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.97545400015 2.78398813304 107% => OK
Unique words: 238.0 204.123752495 117% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.43115942029 0.468620217663 92% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 910.8 705.55239521 129% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 0.0 2.70958083832 0% => More adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 48.3478065687 57.8364921388 84% => OK
Chars per sentence: 116.0 119.503703932 97% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.08 23.324526521 95% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.24 5.70786347227 57% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 10.0 6.88822355289 145% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 6.0 4.67664670659 128% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.335166170829 0.218282227539 154% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0960376224774 0.0743258471296 129% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0875314870697 0.0701772020484 125% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.184309667698 0.128457276422 143% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0790624588814 0.0628817314937 126% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.3 14.3799401198 99% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 49.15 48.3550499002 102% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 12.197005988 98% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.17 12.5979740519 105% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.25 8.32208582834 99% => OK
difficult_words: 123.0 98.500998004 125% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.