The following is a memorandum from the business manager of a television station.
"Over the past year, our late-night news program has devoted increased time to national news and less time to weather and local news. During this period, most of the complaints received from viewers were concerned with our station's coverage of weather and local news. In addition, local businesses that used to advertise during our late-night news program have canceled their advertising contracts with us. Therefore, in order to attract more viewers to our news programs and to avoid losing any further advertising revenues, we should expand our coverage of weather and local news on all our news programs."
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 memorandum recommends that the television station will get more revenue if it restores time devoted to weather and local news to its former level. However, further evidence will need to check whether the advice is beneficial to the television station.
The data in the paragraph shows that customers' complaints are mainly concerned with the coverage of weather and local news. The first question is, we don't know how many complaints are. Is it 100, or merely 10. Also, it's the complaint regarding the late-time news section? Probably the television station didn't ask their customers to inform the session with which they are dissatisfied. Did the manager check the trend of the number of the audience watching TV? If the trend keeps robust, most viewers prefer to shift from local news to national news. The manager has to scrutinize the data and ask for some other compelling evidence.
Local business canceled the contract in the late-night news will be some negative impact on the liquidity of the television station. But we can't relate the cancellation to the change from local news to national news directly. We need to know whether the local company is in good shape; if their financial status is poor and can't sell out their product, it's quite reasonable that they can't afford the advertisement in the late-night session. Also, we have to check if there are new companies willing to sign the contract with us. After the shift from local news to national news, it's possible that our customers are not confined to local residents but all the people in the nation. Therefore, more advertisement will come into our late-night session.
Before the manager alters the television station's shift, he should collect more evidence to avoid the possible alternative causes mentioned above so that the television station will choose a plan maximizing its profit.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 17 15
No. of Words: 310 350
No. of Characters: 1533 1500
No. of Different Words: 162 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.196 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.945 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.575 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 108 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 84 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 59 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 38 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.235 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.099 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.647 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.331 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.331 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.109 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 150, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
...d local news. The first question is, we dont know how many complaints are. Is it 100...
^^^^
Line 2, column 216, Rule ID: IT_IS[6]
Message: Did you mean 'it's' (='it is') instead of 'its' (possessive pronoun)?
Suggestion: it's; it is
...nts are. Is it 100, or merely 10. Also, its the complaint regarding the late-time n...
^^^
Line 2, column 304, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: didn't
...ection? Probably the television station didnt ask their customers to inform the sessi...
^^^^^
Line 3, column 140, Rule ID: CANT[1]
Message: Did you mean 'can't' or 'cannot'?
Suggestion: can't; cannot
...idity of the television station. But we cant relate the cancellation to the change f...
^^^^
Line 3, column 324, Rule ID: CANT[1]
Message: Did you mean 'can't' or 'cannot'?
Suggestion: can't; cannot
...; if their financial status is poor and cant sell out their product, its quite reaso...
^^^^
Line 3, column 384, Rule ID: CANT[1]
Message: Did you mean 'can't' or 'cannot'?
Suggestion: can't; cannot
...product, its quite reasonable that they cant afford the advertisement in the late-ni...
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, regarding, so, therefore, as to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 11.0 19.6327345309 56% => More to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 12.9520958084 62% => OK
Conjunction : 7.0 11.1786427146 63% => OK
Relative clauses : 6.0 13.6137724551 44% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 25.0 28.8173652695 87% => OK
Preposition: 38.0 55.5748502994 68% => OK
Nominalization: 14.0 16.3942115768 85% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1557.0 2260.96107784 69% => OK
No of words: 308.0 441.139720559 70% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.05519480519 5.12650576532 99% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.18926351222 4.56307096286 92% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.59658063293 2.78398813304 93% => OK
Unique words: 162.0 204.123752495 79% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.525974025974 0.468620217663 112% => OK
syllable_count: 480.6 705.55239521 68% => 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: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 50.7866832667 57.8364921388 88% => OK
Chars per sentence: 91.5882352941 119.503703932 77% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.1176470588 23.324526521 78% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.64705882353 5.70786347227 64% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 5.15768463074 78% => More paragraphs wanted.
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 6.0 8.20758483034 73% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 5.0 4.67664670659 107% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.384919888719 0.218282227539 176% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.126050801972 0.0743258471296 170% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.10807605194 0.0701772020484 154% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.220672020374 0.128457276422 172% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0830464910021 0.0628817314937 132% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 11.5 14.3799401198 80% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 53.21 48.3550499002 110% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.3 12.197005988 84% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 11.77 12.5979740519 93% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.32 8.32208582834 100% => OK
difficult_words: 74.0 98.500998004 75% => More difficult words wanted.
linsear_write_formula: 7.0 12.3882235529 57% => Linsear_write_formula is low.
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.9071856287 101% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 50.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.0 Out of 6
---------------------
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.