The following appeared in a memo from the director of student housing at Buckingham College.
"To serve the housing needs of our students, Buckingham College should build a number of new dormitories. Buckingham's enrollment is growing and, based on current trends, will double over the next 50 years, thus making existing dormitory space inadequate. Moreover, the average rent for an apartment in our town has risen in recent years. Consequently, students will find it increasingly difficult to afford off-campus housing. Finally, attractive new dormitories would make prospective students more likely to enroll at Buckingham."
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.
A memo was written by the director of student housing at Buckingham College suggesting that a new dormitory should be built to accommodate an anticipated increase in student enrollment over the next 50 years. Furthermore, the author of this proposal argues that since rent off-campus rises, students will be more likely to live on campus and that the new dormitory will attract new students. Although this suggestion may sound somewhat reasonable, a lot of information and evidence needs to be taken into account before this large project goes underway.
Firstly, the fact that there is a trend doesn’t mean that it will hold over several years. The director states that more students will enroll at Buckingham College because current trends say that more students are enrolling. It can be the case that the opposite holds true since a lot changes in 50 years. For instance, currently popular majors at Buckingham College such as pharmacy may become obsolete due to increased automation and decreased field demand. If a career becomes less popular, then enrollment at universities will also decrease since it is less likely that students will find a job and pay off student debt after graduation.
In addition, the author makes a reasonable assumption that due to increased rents on off-campus housing, a dormitory will be a reasonable project to persue. However, location matters. If the dormitory was to be built too far away from the campus for students to reach their classes, then students may opt for off-campus housing instead. If the dorm was to be bilt too far away from the campus, then the proposal is weak since students will have to pay for a bus or automobile which could be more expensive than buying an apartment two blocks away. To build on the previous paragraph, it seems that rent fluctuates from time to time. If the rent increases mentioned by the director is only temporary, then what happens when rent goes down again for the next several years? There may be no definite way to tell. Given the magnitude of this proposal, it is far less likely that it will be considered due to the ambiguity of rent prices and the potentially sheer amount of competion that the new dormitory will face in the next 50 years.
Lastly, the author of this proposal assumes that new and attractive dorms will help attract new students. Well first of all, “new” is a fleeting phrase. It is true that if something is new it will be more likely to be bought/rented, but after a few years it will lose it appeal since it is no longer “new”. This would be less attractive, and therefore less students will rent out the dorms. In addition, if a dormitory becomes so attractive to prospective students, then embellishing the dormitory may make it more expensive to the point that it will become so expensive that it will not be able to compete with the rates of off-campus housing mentioned in the previous paragraph. Both “new” and “attractive” adjectives have questionable assumptions and possibly overlooked evidence that must be considered.
All in all, the proposal makes many assumptions with minimal supporting evidence to back up its claims. Though it may be a good idea, there should be several questions answered before such an endeavor takes effect and costs the university.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 70 2
No. of Sentences: 24 15
No. of Words: 558 350
No. of Characters: 2666 1500
No. of Different Words: 249 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.86 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.778 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.613 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 181 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 144 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 109 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 68 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.25 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.779 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.708 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.281 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.469 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.046 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 282, Rule ID: IT_VBZ[1]
Message: Did you mean 'appeals'?
Suggestion: appeals
..., but after a few years it will lose it appeal since it is no longer 'new'. ...
^^^^^^
Line 7, column 373, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun students is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...would be less attractive, and therefore less students will rent out the dorms. In ad...
^^^^
Line 7, column 849, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ooked evidence that must be considered. All in all, the proposal makes many assu...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, lastly, look, may, so, then, therefore, well, as to, for instance, in addition, such as, first of all, it is true
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 28.0 12.9520958084 216% => Less auxiliary verb wanted.
Conjunction : 12.0 11.1786427146 107% => OK
Relative clauses : 20.0 13.6137724551 147% => OK
Pronoun: 41.0 28.8173652695 142% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 70.0 55.5748502994 126% => OK
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2783.0 2260.96107784 123% => OK
No of words: 556.0 441.139720559 126% => OK
Chars per words: 5.00539568345 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.85588840946 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.9175406155 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 256.0 204.123752495 125% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.460431654676 0.468620217663 98% => OK
syllable_count: 859.5 705.55239521 122% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 24.0 19.7664670659 121% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 60.835145521 57.8364921388 105% => OK
Chars per sentence: 115.958333333 119.503703932 97% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.1666666667 23.324526521 99% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.91666666667 5.70786347227 121% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 5.25449101796 57% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => 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: 0.147700603955 0.218282227539 68% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0490703637773 0.0743258471296 66% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0687245992248 0.0701772020484 98% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0967014560129 0.128457276422 75% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0678686349038 0.0628817314937 108% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.8 14.3799401198 96% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 56.59 48.3550499002 117% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.07 12.5979740519 96% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.04 8.32208582834 97% => OK
difficult_words: 115.0 98.500998004 117% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 12.3882235529 113% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 11.1389221557 101% => 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.