The following appeared as a letter to the editor from a Central Plaza store owner.
"Over the past two years, the number of shoppers in Central Plaza has been steadily decreasing while the popularity of skateboarding has increased dramatically. Many Central Plaza store owners believe that the decrease in their business is due to the number of skateboard users in the plaza. There has also been a dramatic increase in the amount of litter and vandalism throughout the plaza. Thus, we recommend that the city prohibit skateboarding in Central Plaza. If skateboarding is prohibited here, we predict that business in Central Plaza will return to its previously high levels."
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.
In the above letter, the author suggests that city should prohibit skateboarding in the central plaza to burgeon the business of the plazas. The author supports his argument on the basis of the premise that the increasing popularity of skateboarders causes a decrease in the number of shoppers at the plazas. However, before the author’s recommendation is evaluated three questions must be answered.
Firstly, is skateboarding the only cause for the decreasing popularity of the shoppers at the plazas? In other words, is it accurate to blame a single aspect to justify some problems? The increasing popularity of skateboarding may not be the single foremost factor for the subsiding of the businesses in plazas. Maybe the food quality of the plazas is worsened over time. There is a possibility that after introducing a new kind of food people may not have the propensity for the food at the central plazas. Even if it is not the case, skateboarding may not be the only cause for their decrease in business. Maybe people who skateboard there, are also the customers of the plazas. Then, the increasing population of skateboarders can not be imputed to the decreasing number of customers. If, any one of the above scenarios is true then the author’s recommendation holds no water.
Secondly, is skateboarding the only aspect of indicting the dramatic increase in littering? Maybe skateboarding is not the only reason for the proliferation of littering throughout the plazas. For the increasing vandalism, there is a possibility of the city’s poor infrastructure or the listlessness of the workers at the plazas are to be blamed. There is a possibility that people who take their food into their cars, leave the leftovers in the parking lot. If, the above scenario is true then the author’s prediction is seriously unwarranted.
Thirdly, will prohibit skateboarding help to rejuvenate the plaza’s population? Maybe there are other factors that should be analyzed before making decisions about forestalling skateboarding in the plazas. Maybe the food prices are exorbitant in those plazas relative to the other food counters in the city. Perhaps people don’t want to consume the type of foods that the plazas make. In those cases, probably introducing a new r food may help regain their customers. If, the above scenario is true, then, the author's recommendation is seriously unwarranted.
In the conclusion, the argument as it stands now is considerably flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to answer the three questions above and offer more evidence(perhaps in the form of a systematic research study), then it will be possible to fully evaluate the viability of the proposed recommendation that restricting skateboarding will help to regain their customers.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 4 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 10 2
No. of Sentences: 25 15
No. of Words: 454 350
No. of Characters: 2304 1500
No. of Different Words: 188 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.616 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.075 4.6
Word Length SD: 3.107 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 163 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 121 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 104 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 69 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.16 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.347 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.6 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.321 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.485 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.068 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 318, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...mber of shoppers at the plazas. However, before the author’s recommendation is ev...
^^
Line 1, column 402, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...uated three questions must be answered. Firstly, is skateboarding the only cause...
^^^^^
Line 3, column 789, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
... to the decreasing number of customers. If any one of the above scenarios is true ...
^^
Line 5, column 460, Rule ID: SENTENCE_FRAGMENT[1]
Message: “If” at the beginning of a sentence requires a 2nd clause. Maybe a comma, question or exclamation mark is missing, or the sentence is incomplete and should be joined with the following sentence.
...leave the leftovers in the parking lot. If the above scenario is true then the aut...
^^
Line 7, column 15, Rule ID: DID_BASEFORM[1]
Message: The verb 'will' requires the base form of the verb: 'prohibit'
Suggestion: prohibit
...eriously unwarranted. Thirdly, will prohibiting skateboarding help to rejuvenate the pl...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 514, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...f the above scenario is true, then, the authors recommendation is seriously unwarranted...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, first, firstly, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, kind of, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 28.0 19.6327345309 143% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 2.0 11.1786427146 18% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 64.0 55.5748502994 115% => OK
Nominalization: 11.0 16.3942115768 67% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2376.0 2260.96107784 105% => OK
No of words: 453.0 441.139720559 103% => OK
Chars per words: 5.24503311258 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.61343653406 4.56307096286 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.19114297954 2.78398813304 115% => OK
Unique words: 194.0 204.123752495 95% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.42825607064 0.468620217663 91% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 751.5 705.55239521 107% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 0.0 4.96107784431 0% => OK
Article: 6.0 8.76447105788 68% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 44.2656345261 57.8364921388 77% => OK
Chars per sentence: 95.04 119.503703932 80% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.12 23.324526521 78% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.28 5.70786347227 75% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 6.88822355289 73% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 8.0 4.67664670659 171% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.179435797438 0.218282227539 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.058453758148 0.0743258471296 79% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0601204888672 0.0701772020484 86% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.109183423109 0.128457276422 85% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0690396403243 0.0628817314937 110% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.4 14.3799401198 86% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 44.75 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.87 12.5979740519 102% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.15 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 104.0 98.500998004 106% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 9.0 12.3882235529 73% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 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.