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 enrolment 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 enrol 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.
Answer- In the above memo, the author argues that Buckingham College should extend its number of dormitories to meet the growing housing needs. The author supports his argument based on the premise that Buckingham’s enrolment is continuously growing and it will be doubled over the next 50 years. Furthermore, the author bolsters his argument based on the report that off-campus housing rent is increasing significantly and it will be very cumbersome to find suitable apartments for the students. However, before evaluating the author’s argument three unstated assumptions need to be answered.
Firstly, the author argues that since the number of enrolments is continuously rising the number of students will double over the next 50 years but does not provide any evidence regarding the predictions. Maybe most of the students over the next few years will prefer to live outside the campus. Maybe because of the poor food management most of the students want to live outside the campus. Furthermore, the author does not provide any evidence regarding the continuity of the current trends. Maybe over the next 10 years, the number of students will decline significantly. If any one of the above scenarios is true then the author’s argument holds no water. If the author is able to provide more justifiable evidence regarding a prediction about the future condition of the number of enrolment then it will be possible to evaluate the author’s argument to a certain extent.
Secondly, the author supports his argument of expanding the dormitories based on the premise of the rising cost of apartments without providing any proper evidence. There is a feasibility that most of the students of the university live within a few kilometers of the campus and they prefer to attend college from their homes. Even if this is not the case, maybe average housing rent may not be exorbitant for the students if 3-5 students decide to rent an apartment. Moreover, due to technological advancement, everything is in our hands reach then finding an apartment for rent will not be so exacting. The author has to provide more admissible evidence perhaps in the form of a statistical data chart of the student's residence and rental conditions in the city in order to rectify his claim otherwise, the author’s argument is built unreliably.
Thirdly, the author argues that delectable dormitories would make prospective students more likely to enroll at Buckingham without any necessitate evidence. Perhaps most of the prospective students will enroll at the college mainly for better curricula. Maybe most of the students prioritize the faculty members when comes to taking admission a the college. If the above scenarios are true then the author’s argument is seriously unwarranted. If the author can provide more evidence perhaps in the form of a systematic reach study about the students’ preferences for enrolling admission at a college then it will strengthen the author’s argument.
In the conclusion, the author's argument stands now is severely flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to elucidate the three unstated assumptions above and provide more evidence (perhaps in a form of a systematic research study) then it will be possible to evaluate the viability of the proposed recommendation that Buckingham College should build a number of new dormitories.
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: 23 15
No. of Words: 546 350
No. of Characters: 2804 1500
No. of Different Words: 216 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.834 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.136 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.83 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 221 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 171 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 130 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 75 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 23.739 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.275 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.565 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.384 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.521 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.152 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 4 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 576, 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.
...of students will decline significantly. If any one of the above scenarios is true ...
^^
Line 3, column 661, 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.
...n the author’s argument holds no water. If the author is able to provide more just...
^^
Line 5, column 712, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'students'' or 'student's'?
Suggestion: students'; student's
...form of a statistical data chart of the students residence and rental conditions in the ...
^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 344, Rule ID: DT_DT[1]
Message: Maybe you need to remove one determiner so that only 'a' or 'the' is left.
Suggestion: a; the
... members when comes to taking admission a the college. If the above scenarios are tru...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 359, 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.
...omes to taking admission a the college. If the above scenarios are true then the a...
^^
Line 8, column 24, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...or’s argument. In the conclusion, the authors argument stands now is severely flawed ...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, first, firstly, furthermore, however, if, may, moreover, regarding, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, as to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 20.0 19.6327345309 102% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 16.0 12.9520958084 124% => OK
Conjunction : 6.0 11.1786427146 54% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 8.0 13.6137724551 59% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 22.0 28.8173652695 76% => OK
Preposition: 80.0 55.5748502994 144% => OK
Nominalization: 29.0 16.3942115768 177% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2870.0 2260.96107784 127% => OK
No of words: 546.0 441.139720559 124% => OK
Chars per words: 5.25641025641 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.83390555256 4.56307096286 106% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.94855868339 2.78398813304 106% => OK
Unique words: 223.0 204.123752495 109% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.408424908425 0.468620217663 87% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 905.4 705.55239521 128% => 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: 11.0 8.76447105788 126% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 22.8473053892 101% => OK
Sentence length SD: 56.6045881098 57.8364921388 98% => OK
Chars per sentence: 124.782608696 119.503703932 104% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.7391304348 23.324526521 102% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.30434782609 5.70786347227 93% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => 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: 0.238364620601 0.218282227539 109% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0803313524696 0.0743258471296 108% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0742357118486 0.0701772020484 106% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.151982424426 0.128457276422 118% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0491438566308 0.0628817314937 78% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.2 14.3799401198 106% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 39.67 48.3550499002 82% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.4 12.197005988 110% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.52 12.5979740519 107% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.16 8.32208582834 98% => OK
difficult_words: 117.0 98.500998004 119% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => 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.