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 sign

Essay topics:

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.

The president of Humana University is recommending the university to initiate to promote online degree programs to increase enrollment and solve the issue of budget deficits. In reaching this recommendation, the president relied on several unstated assumptions that will need to be examined further to determine if the recommendation stands on solid ground.

Firstly, most of the president's arguments are backed up by statistics garnered from the nearby Omni University. While the two universities maybe in close proximity ('nearby' is not clearly defined), it does not necessarily mean that any trend observed in Omni University will be applicable to Humana University. Perhaps one is a privately funded school while the other is a public institution; or maybe one school is historical and prestigous whereas the other is only recently founded. There are numerous reasons that could differ the two universities in terms of student demographics, therefore rendering the trend of increased enrollment and reduced building-related expenditures seen in Omni University inapplicable to Humana University.

Furthermore, another assumption (stated in "most likely because the online instruction takes place via the internet") is that the significant decrease in is directly a consequence of offering of the online degree. Although both took place in the same year, it is still possible that the reduction in dormitory and classroom expenditures is a result of other decisons - perhaps Omni University decided to concentrate their classes and dormitories such that less space and maintenance is needed for the same number of students on campus? It was never mentioned whether those that enrolled in the online program would have been on campus if they hadn't enrolled, or if Omni University simply expanded their enrollment capacity to accommodate the new program. If the assumption that the offering of the online programs is responsible for the decrease in building turn out unwarranted, then the recommendation of offering online programs to address budget deficit no longer stands, as it likely won't have the positive impact on finance as the president envisioned.

Even if the above assumption is true and the outcomes of Omni University is truly predictive of those of Humana University, yet another assumption is that the reduced cost in building expenditure will be able to compensate the budget deficit Humana University is currently facing. The extent of the deficit and projected savings in building expenditures were never discussed. Potentially the deficit Humana University is facing is so large compared to any savings possible from reducing dormitories and classrooms that it is like trying to put out a forest fire with a cup of water. If that is the case, more fundamental changes should be considered to the operations of Humana University and whether to offer online programs probably won't be the most urgent on the agenda.

While the example from Omni University certainly make offering new online programs a worthwhile investment, there are many disjunctions in the recommendation for Humana University to follow suite. The assumptions along the way must be carefully examined before deciding if it's a good idea to adopt the president's recommendation.

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Average: 6.9 (3 votes)
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Comments

Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 5, column 149, Rule ID: CLOSE_SCRUTINY[1]
Message: Use simply 'proximity'.
Suggestion: proximity
...ty. While the two universities maybe in close proximity nearby is not clearly defined, it does ...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 652, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: hadn't
...ogram would have been on campus if they hadnt enrolled, or if Omni University simply ...
^^^^^
Line 17, column 274, Rule ID: IT_IS[17]
Message: Did you mean 'it's' (='it is') instead of 'its' (possessive pronoun)?
Suggestion: it's; it is
...e carefully examined before deciding if its a good idea to adopt the presidents rec...
^^^
Line 17, column 303, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'presidents'' or 'president's'?
Suggestion: presidents'; president's
...eciding if its a good idea to adopt the presidents recommendation.
^^^^^^^^^^

Transition Words or Phrases used:
first, firstly, furthermore, if, may, so, still, then, therefore, whereas, while

Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments

Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 32.0 19.6327345309 163% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 8.0 12.9520958084 62% => OK
Conjunction : 13.0 11.1786427146 116% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 23.0 28.8173652695 80% => OK
Preposition: 66.0 55.5748502994 119% => OK
Nominalization: 19.0 16.3942115768 116% => OK

Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2782.0 2260.96107784 123% => OK
No of words: 507.0 441.139720559 115% => OK
Chars per words: 5.48717948718 5.12650576532 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.74517233601 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.15369075712 2.78398813304 113% => OK
Unique words: 251.0 204.123752495 123% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.495069033531 0.468620217663 106% => OK
syllable_count: 926.1 705.55239521 131% => 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: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 3.0 1.67365269461 179% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.

Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 16.0 19.7664670659 81% => 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: 31.0 22.8473053892 136% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 61.7179825902 57.8364921388 107% => OK
Chars per sentence: 173.875 119.503703932 145% => OK
Words per sentence: 31.6875 23.324526521 136% => OK
Discourse Markers: 5.0 5.70786347227 88% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 4.0 5.25449101796 76% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 9.0 8.20758483034 110% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 6.88822355289 73% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.67664670659 43% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?

Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.334343181772 0.218282227539 153% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.109991075163 0.0743258471296 148% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0748809208271 0.0701772020484 107% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.185170734886 0.128457276422 144% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0340110998824 0.0628817314937 54% => OK

Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 20.3 14.3799401198 141% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 23.09 48.3550499002 48% => Flesch_reading_ease is low.
smog_index: 13.0 7.1628742515 181% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 17.7 12.197005988 145% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.15 12.5979740519 120% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.35 8.32208582834 112% => OK
difficult_words: 134.0 98.500998004 136% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 16.0 12.3882235529 129% => OK
gunning_fog: 14.4 11.1389221557 129% => OK
text_standard: 16.0 11.9071856287 134% => 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.

Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 16 15
No. of Words: 510 350
No. of Characters: 2725 1500
No. of Different Words: 247 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.752 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.343 4.6
Word Length SD: 3.068 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 218 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 164 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 131 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 89 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 31.875 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.16 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.875 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.351 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.597 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.069 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5