The following is part of a memorandum from the president of Humana University.
"Last year the number of students who enrolled in online degree programs offered by nearby Omni University increased by 50 percent. During the same year, Omni showed a significant decrease from prior years in expenditures for dormitory and classroom space, most likely because instruction in the online programs takes place via the Internet. In contrast, over the past three years, enrollment at Humana University has failed to grow, and the cost of maintaining buildings has increased along with our budget deficit. To address these problems, Humana University will begin immediately to create and actively promote online degree programs like those at Omni. We predict that instituting these online degree programs will help Humana both increase its total enrollment and solve its budget problems."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the prediction and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the prediction.
In the memorandum from the president of Humana university, it was stated that over the past three years, the rate of acquiring students has failed to increase and the there has been increment in the cost of maintain buildings-dormitory and classroom space-, to solve this problem, the president has come to the conclusion that Humana university would immediately commence online degree programs like those in Omni university, as this would increase the general enrollment rate, and likewise depreciate the budget problem since there has been increase in the rate of enrollment in online degree program at the Omni university, and there has been tremendous decrease in the expenses for maintaining buildings in the university. In order for these predictions to be deemed logical, three questions have to be addressed.
To start with, are there any underlying factors responsible for the stagnation of the rate enrollment of students at Humana University? There might be some reasons why prospective students have failed to enroll for the degrees offered at the university. For instance, the quality of the education provided at the university might be low which would most likely discourage students from enrolling. Also, the degree offered at the Humana university might not be of interest to the prospective candidate. Therefore, this question needs to be address before the prediction can be seen as logical.
In addition, is online degree program of interest to prospective candidates at Humana University just as it is for candidate at Omni University? The predilection of the prospective students at Omni University cannot be used as a determinant for the student of Humana University, because they might not be interested in pursuing an online degree for reasons such as lack of provision of quality internet connection in the university environment which would preclude candidate from applying, the lack of skill and knowledge required to effectively use the internet for online programs.
Lastly, is the reduction in the expenditure for dormitory and classroom space a result of the incorporation of online degree programs at Omni University? The university might have intentionally refused to allocate revenue to the maintenance of buildings despite its usage, as the students might still have to use these buildings even though the degree programs are online, and also the cost of maintaining the buildings might have come from external sources such as private donations. This question has to be answered for this prediction to be seen as reasonable.
In conclusion, the prediction has it stands now, is not deemed logical due to several unanswered questions. If the president at Humana University should consider conducting a systematic study in order to answer these questions, then it would be possible to determine whether the incorporation of online degree programs solve the enrollment and reduce the budget problems at the university.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 4 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 3 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 464 350
No. of Characters: 2450 1500
No. of Different Words: 186 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.641 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.28 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.977 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 192 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 151 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 124 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 86 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 30.933 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 19.557 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.733 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.387 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.387 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.109 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 1 5
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, if, lastly, likewise, so, still, then, therefore, as to, for instance, in addition, in conclusion, such as, to start with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 22.0 19.6327345309 112% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 15.0 12.9520958084 116% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 4.0 13.6137724551 29% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 17.0 28.8173652695 59% => OK
Preposition: 74.0 55.5748502994 133% => OK
Nominalization: 22.0 16.3942115768 134% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2494.0 2260.96107784 110% => OK
No of words: 464.0 441.139720559 105% => OK
Chars per words: 5.375 5.12650576532 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.64119157421 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.05482746943 2.78398813304 110% => OK
Unique words: 192.0 204.123752495 94% => More unique words wanted.
Unique words percentage: 0.413793103448 0.468620217663 88% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 815.4 705.55239521 116% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.8 1.59920159681 113% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 4.96107784431 60% => OK
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 6.0 4.22255489022 142% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 14.0 19.7664670659 71% => Need more sentences. Double check the format of sentences, make sure there is a space between two sentences, or have enough periods. And also check the lengths of sentences, maybe they are too long.
Sentence length: 33.0 22.8473053892 144% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 175.503241438 57.8364921388 303% => The lengths of sentences changed so frequently.
Chars per sentence: 178.142857143 119.503703932 149% => OK
Words per sentence: 33.1428571429 23.324526521 142% => OK
Discourse Markers: 9.07142857143 5.70786347227 159% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 0.0 5.25449101796 0% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 2.0 8.20758483034 24% => More positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => 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: 0.254762545601 0.218282227539 117% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.105505042443 0.0743258471296 142% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0794974668691 0.0701772020484 113% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.166199173342 0.128457276422 129% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0407915297617 0.0628817314937 65% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 20.5 14.3799401198 143% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 21.06 48.3550499002 44% => Flesch_reading_ease is low.
smog_index: 11.2 7.1628742515 156% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 18.5 12.197005988 152% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.52 12.5979740519 115% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.02 8.32208582834 108% => OK
difficult_words: 110.0 98.500998004 112% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 58.0 12.3882235529 468% => Linsear_write_formula is high.
gunning_fog: 15.2 11.1389221557 136% => OK
text_standard: 15.0 11.9071856287 126% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 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.