The following appeared as a recommendation by a committee planning a ten-year budget for the city of Calatrava. “The birthrate in our city is declining: in fact, last year's birthrate was only one-half that of five years ago. Thus the number of students enrolled in our public schools will soon decrease dramatically, and we can safely reduce the funds budgeted for education during the next decade. At the same time, we can reduce funding for athletic playing fields and other recreational facilities. As a result, we will have sufficient money to fund city facilities and programs used primarily by
adults, since we can expect the adult population of the city to increase."
The author cites a report of declining rate of birth as a prediction of decline in enrolling students in sooner year, and also view the equality of decreasing rate and decreasing number as the base of his or her reasoning. There are a bunch of alternative explanations challenging these arguments, and making the writer's position vulnerable in logic.
Firstly, the author begins with the statement that the decline of birthrate means the number of newborn will goes down. Here, the author fails to figure out the differences between the rate and the number. On condition that the total population of Calatrava is growing dramatically, even the rate shows little downward trend, the number of newborn is still increase. Consequently, without taking the change of total population into account, the author's argument is unsound. Also, the writer still mentions that the year's birth rate is only half that of five years ago. While we exclude the influence of total population, no data is give to prove that there were no substantially rise during the 5 years. Hence, if the statistics within that 5 years are all higher than that in the past, the writer's assumption is going to be challenged harshly. Thus, it will contain more convincing argument if the author could present more germane and precise evidence.
Secondly, an argument made by the author, the number of enrolling the public school will rapidly decrease, so they could safely shrink the funds assigned to education before. Within such argument, a number of flaws could be found. The first one is that, what is the type of school? If the school is elementary or senior school that has age limitation, the argument could be so wrong and not possible to be seen from a recent birthrate report. Because if a child want to go to an elementary school, he or she must enter 7 years old, and the birth year was 7 years ago. Thus if the author tries to work out the next year's enrolling student number, the writer need to conclude a ramification from former statistics. The same explanation could also be used on the entrance of other types of schools. Therefore, the author fails to clearly the correlation between the birthrate and the enrolling time, making the argument falling apart. Moreover, even if the number of students entering in schools next year do decline as the prediction of the author, no information of the status of funds is shown to corroborate that currently assigned funds are already enough for schools to use. If the funds are readily paltry to invest in education system, another cut on funds again exacerbates the situation. The type of school other than public-run is not mentioned in the passage. Thus, the author's argument cannot hold water not only because the assumption and reasoning is vulnerable, but also the result of the lacking of wide-range evidence.
Thirdly, the writer says that it is reasonable to reduce the athletic playing fields and some recreational facilities. Here, there are no relations between the reduction of those facilities and that of birthrate. The author's assumption is that these facilities are specially designed for children, and they should be reduced as less children were born. The main assumption from author is flawed in that these places are also popular among adults. Therefore, without conducting relative surveys, the author's assertion is easily qualified by other possibilities. Additionally, the result of the author's argument is that they should invest more in programs adults love due to the prediction of increasing adults number in the future. Such argument is paradoxical with preceding arguments. As it mentioned in the passage by the writer, the newborn is facing a dramatically downward trend, which could lead to a same paucity of young adults. So the end of argument is outright not parallel with the statements before.
In a nutshell, the argument as the author stands in the passage is flawed due to the considerable paucity of solid evidence and several pieces of wishy-washy findings that are inaccurate. So the writer should contain more tenacious evidence and facts, and do more logically reasoning before giving a result.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 10 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 6 2
No. of Sentences: 33 15
No. of Words: 691 350
No. of Characters: 3407 1500
No. of Different Words: 298 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 5.127 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.931 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.664 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 263 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 180 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 134 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 85 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.939 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.839 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.697 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.266 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.418 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.069 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 236, Rule ID: THERE_RE_MANY[3]
Message: Possible agreement error. Did you mean 'bunches'?
Suggestion: bunches
...se of his or her reasoning. There are a bunch of alternative explanations challenging...
^^^^^
Line 2, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
... writers position vulnerable in logic. Firstly, the author begins with the stat...
^^^
Line 3, column 110, Rule ID: DID_BASEFORM[1]
Message: The verb 'will' requires the base form of the verb: 'go'
Suggestion: go
...thrate means the number of newborn will goes down. Here, the author fails to figure ...
^^^^
Line 3, column 358, Rule ID: BEEN_PART_AGREEMENT[2]
Message: Consider using a past participle here: 'increased'.
Suggestion: increased
...d trend, the number of newborn is still increase. Consequently, without taking the chang...
^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 446, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...e of total population into account, the authors argument is unsound. Also, the writer s...
^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 792, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'writers'' or 'writer's'?
Suggestion: writers'; writer's
...e all higher than that in the past, the writers assumption is going to be challenged ha...
^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...nt more germane and precise evidence. Secondly, an argument made by the author...
^^^
Line 5, column 569, Rule ID: SENT_START_CONJUNCTIVE_LINKING_ADVERB_COMMA[1]
Message: Did you forget a comma after a conjunctive/linking adverb?
Suggestion: Thus,
...ld, and the birth year was 7 years ago. Thus if the author tries to work out the nex...
^^^^
Line 5, column 1380, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...not mentioned in the passage. Thus, the authors argument cannot hold water not only be...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 1423, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...hors argument cannot hold water not only because the assumption and reasoning is ...
^^
Line 6, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...of the lacking of wide-range evidence. Thirdly, the writer says that it is reas...
^^^
Line 7, column 218, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...e facilities and that of birthrate. The authors assumption is that these facilities are...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 329, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun children is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...children, and they should be reduced as less children were born. The main assumption...
^^^^
Line 7, column 500, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...ithout conducting relative surveys, the authors assertion is easily qualified by other ...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 594, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[1]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'authors'' or 'author's'?
Suggestion: authors'; author's
...lities. Additionally, the result of the authors argument is that they should invest mor...
^^^^^^^
Line 8, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
... parallel with the statements before. In a nutshell, the argument as the autho...
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, consequently, first, firstly, hence, if, moreover, second, secondly, so, still, therefore, third, thirdly, thus, while
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 38.0 19.6327345309 194% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 15.0 12.9520958084 116% => OK
Conjunction : 19.0 11.1786427146 170% => OK
Relative clauses : 17.0 13.6137724551 125% => OK
Pronoun: 31.0 28.8173652695 108% => OK
Preposition: 92.0 55.5748502994 166% => OK
Nominalization: 40.0 16.3942115768 244% => Less nominalizations (nouns with a suffix like: tion ment ence ance) wanted.
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3486.0 2260.96107784 154% => OK
No of words: 691.0 441.139720559 157% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.04486251809 5.12650576532 98% => OK
Fourth root words length: 5.12707312764 4.56307096286 112% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.74182758431 2.78398813304 98% => OK
Unique words: 314.0 204.123752495 154% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.454413892909 0.468620217663 97% => OK
syllable_count: 1089.0 705.55239521 154% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 24.0 8.76447105788 274% => Less articles wanted as sentence beginning.
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 6.0 1.67365269461 358% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 33.0 19.7664670659 167% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 22.8473053892 88% => OK
Sentence length SD: 44.6615267796 57.8364921388 77% => OK
Chars per sentence: 105.636363636 119.503703932 88% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.9393939394 23.324526521 90% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.90909090909 5.70786347227 68% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 16.0 5.25449101796 305% => Less language errors wanted.
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 15.0 6.88822355289 218% => Less negative sentences wanted.
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: 0.17943531596 0.218282227539 82% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0440994629303 0.0743258471296 59% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0670479765519 0.0701772020484 96% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0947007296849 0.128457276422 74% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0749217634585 0.0628817314937 119% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.8 14.3799401198 89% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 51.18 48.3550499002 106% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.1 12.197005988 91% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.95 12.5979740519 95% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.26 8.32208582834 99% => OK
difficult_words: 159.0 98.500998004 161% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 12.3882235529 93% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.1389221557 90% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Write the essay in 30 minutes.
Rates: 54.17 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.25 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.