The following appeared in a letter from the faculty committee to the president of Seatown University:
A study conducted at nearby Oceania University showed that faculty retention is higher when professors are offered free tuition at the university for their own college-aged children. Therefore, Seatown should institute a free-tuition policy for its professors for the purpose of enhancing morale among the faculty and luring new professors.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
The prompt represents a letter from a faculty member of Seatown University to the president of the university demanding that a free-tuition policy should be introduced to keep the professors in the varsity. The author has reached the conclusion based on evidence from a nearby university. However, the following assumptions need to be checked for this to be a valid demand.
First of all, the author is presuming that the Seatown University and the Ocenia Varsity is roughly comparable. The author did not provide any information on this matter. What if Ocenia University is a big university and has the funding to take such a measure and Seatown University is not? So, if this is true, then the Seatown University fails at the beginning to implement this policy.
Secondly, The author presumes that all professors will be likely to stay if their students are offered free tuition here. How do we know that all the professors have college-going children? For instance, if there is a professor who do not have a child that goes into the college, then this method will simply bear no fruit for him. And if there is a majority of such professors, then this policy wears thin. Because, it will keep paying some of the teachers but the majority will see no benefit in it for them.
Again, for argument's sake, let's say all the professors do have college-going children. The author is very ready to assume that they would want to study here. What are the odds? Maybe many of them do not want to study in this particular university, or maybe the university do not offer the subjects that they would like to get into. So, in this case, despite having college-going children, the professors can not rip-off any advantages from this policy.
Then, the author is assuming that if this policy is introduced, it will increase the morale among the faculty. Well, how? There are cases like suitability and eagerness, First, the professor has to fit the appropriateness of this policy (should have a child who want to go to this college) and then personal opinion of the professor. What if some of them are not interested in the policy? What if, despite giving this benefit, they want to leave? So if this were true, it certainly did not increase morale and the argument could not hold water.
Lastly, the author argues that if this policy is implemented, it would lure new professors. Well, this policy could be appealing to some extent, but a not-quite-significant policy like this will hardly effect anyone's choice for choosing this varsity over other ones. The questions from paragraph two and three are also applicable here.
In conclusion, The author's reasoning stands, at this point, inherently flawed. There were lot of unwarranted assumptions. So, if the author can clarify these doubts or questions and present a logically coherent argument with relevant merits and demerits of this plan, that might be a valid judgement.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 29 15
No. of Words: 495 350
No. of Characters: 2355 1500
No. of Different Words: 216 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.717 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.758 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.717 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 159 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 112 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 83 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 59 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 17.069 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.337 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.69 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.265 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.507 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.084 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 7 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 438, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...ears thin. Because, it will keep paying some of the teachers but the majority will see no b...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 298, Rule ID: PERSONAL_OPINION_FRIENDSHIP[1]
Message: Use simply 'opinion'.
Suggestion: opinion
...who want to go to this college and then personal opinion of the professor. What if some of them ...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 11, column 203, Rule ID: AFFECT_EFFECT[7]
Message: Did you mean 'affect'?
Suggestion: affect
...ignificant policy like this will hardly effect anyones choice for choosing this varsit...
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, lastly, may, second, secondly, so, then, well, as to, for instance, in conclusion, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 19.6327345309 122% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 17.0 12.9520958084 131% => OK
Conjunction : 14.0 11.1786427146 125% => OK
Relative clauses : 12.0 13.6137724551 88% => OK
Pronoun: 45.0 28.8173652695 156% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 52.0 55.5748502994 94% => 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: 2436.0 2260.96107784 108% => OK
No of words: 495.0 441.139720559 112% => OK
Chars per words: 4.92121212121 5.12650576532 96% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.71684168287 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.78342199757 2.78398813304 100% => OK
Unique words: 231.0 204.123752495 113% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.466666666667 0.468620217663 100% => OK
syllable_count: 768.6 705.55239521 109% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 7.0 4.96107784431 141% => OK
Article: 13.0 8.76447105788 148% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 28.0 19.7664670659 142% => OK
Sentence length: 17.0 22.8473053892 74% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 49.0022203384 57.8364921388 85% => OK
Chars per sentence: 87.0 119.503703932 73% => OK
Words per sentence: 17.6785714286 23.324526521 76% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.5 5.70786347227 79% => OK
Paragraphs: 7.0 5.15768463074 136% => Less paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 9.0 4.67664670659 192% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.180059224469 0.218282227539 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0501262615683 0.0743258471296 67% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0686272886118 0.0701772020484 98% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.103148793406 0.128457276422 80% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0916613266544 0.0628817314937 146% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 10.6 14.3799401198 74% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 54.22 48.3550499002 112% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.9 12.197005988 81% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.96 12.5979740519 87% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.89 8.32208582834 95% => OK
difficult_words: 107.0 98.500998004 109% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 9.0 12.3882235529 73% => OK
gunning_fog: 8.8 11.1389221557 79% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Maximum six paragraphs wanted.
Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 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.