The following recommendation was made by the president and administrative staff of Grove College, a private institution, to the college's governing committee.
"Recently, there have been discussions about ending Grove College's century-old tradition of all-female education by admitting male students into our programs. At a recent faculty meeting, a majority of faculty members voted in favor of co-education, arguing that it would encourage more students to apply to Grove. However, Grove students, both past and present, are against the idea of coeducation. Eighty percent of the students responding to a survey conducted by the student government wanted the school to remain all female, and over half of the alumnae who answered a separate survey also opposed coeducation. Therefore, we recommend maintaining Grove College's tradition of all-female education. We predict that keeping the college all-female will improve morale among students and convince alumnae to keep supporting the college financially."
Write a response in which you discuss what questions would need to be answered in order to decide whether the recommendation is likely to have the predicted result. Be sure to explain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate the recommendation.
In the above recommendation, the author argues that Grove College should remain an all-female college despite most of the faculty members' votes in favor of co-education. The author bolsters his argument based upon the premise that maintaining an all-female education policy will improve morale among students and more alumnae will support the college financially. However, before evaluating the author’s argument three questions need to be answered.
Firstly, the author strengthens his argument for co-education based on the report that a majority of faculty members are in favor of co-education without providing any admissible evidence. One may raise a question about the authenticity of the report. In other words was the sample size representative? There is a possibility that on the day of the survey more than half faculties were absent then one can not argue that the report was legitimate. In that case, providing a conclusion based on very small sample size is seriously fictitious. If the author is able to provide more evidence perhaps in the form of a statistical data chart about all the faculties’ opinions about the co-education then it will be possible to evaluate the author’s argument to a certain extent.
Secondly, the author argues against the decision of admitting male students based on the premise that 80 percent of the students are against the decision without providing any necessitate evidence. One may ask a question about the legitimacy of using a percentage. A percentage is a tricky situation. Without the absolute number being given one can not conclude anything based only on the percentage. Perhaps only 100 students responded to the survey and only 80 students were against the decision. If the above scenario is true then the author’s argument is built unreliably. The author has to provide more concrete evidence about how many people responded to the survey to rectify his claim.
Thirdly, the author argues that maintaining the all-female education system will improve the morale among students, and because of it financial support will be proliferated in the near future without any evidence. Will maintaining all-female students be enough reason behind the improving donation? There is a possibility that in the future the amount of donation will not be enough for financial support. In that case, if they admit male students then the number of students will increase and the total amount of donations will be dilated in the future. Moreover, the author does not provide any evidence regarding the prediction of improving donations. Maybe most of the students will not continue to support the college. Then the author’s argument holds no water. If the author is able to provide more veritable evidence perhaps in a form of a systematic research study about the financial condition of the college and the previous donations then the author’s argument will be strengthened.
In the conclusion, the author’s argument stands now is seriously unwarranted due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author can answer the three questions above and offer 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 Prove College should remain an all-female college.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.0 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 2 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 5 2
No. of Sentences: 26 15
No. of Words: 529 350
No. of Characters: 2741 1500
No. of Different Words: 203 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.796 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.181 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.796 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 221 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 174 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 129 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 68 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 20.346 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 10.243 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.577 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.322 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.375 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.091 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 2 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 542, 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.
...ll sample size is seriously fictitious. If the author is able to provide more evid...
^^
Line 3, column 500, 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.
... 80 students were against the decision. If the above scenario is true then the aut...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
first, firstly, however, if, may, moreover, regarding, second, secondly, so, then, third, thirdly, as to, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 19.6327345309 122% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 20.0 12.9520958084 154% => OK
Conjunction : 6.0 11.1786427146 54% => More conjunction wanted.
Relative clauses : 11.0 13.6137724551 81% => OK
Pronoun: 19.0 28.8173652695 66% => OK
Preposition: 75.0 55.5748502994 135% => OK
Nominalization: 32.0 16.3942115768 195% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2802.0 2260.96107784 124% => OK
No of words: 529.0 441.139720559 120% => OK
Chars per words: 5.29678638941 5.12650576532 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.79583152331 4.56307096286 105% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.92313347575 2.78398813304 105% => OK
Unique words: 207.0 204.123752495 101% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.391304347826 0.468620217663 84% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 906.3 705.55239521 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: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 7.0 4.22255489022 166% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 26.0 19.7664670659 132% => OK
Sentence length: 20.0 22.8473053892 88% => OK
Sentence length SD: 63.6647213578 57.8364921388 110% => OK
Chars per sentence: 107.769230769 119.503703932 90% => OK
Words per sentence: 20.3461538462 23.324526521 87% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.61538461538 5.70786347227 81% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 12.0 8.20758483034 146% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => 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: 0.0824448855778 0.218282227539 38% => The similarity between the topic and the content is low.
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0259232014428 0.0743258471296 35% => Sentence topic similarity is low.
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0429901232625 0.0701772020484 61% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0624701661924 0.128457276422 49% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0467850748002 0.0628817314937 74% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.7 14.3799401198 95% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 42.72 48.3550499002 88% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 12.197005988 101% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.46 12.5979740519 107% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.88 8.32208582834 95% => OK
difficult_words: 109.0 98.500998004 111% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 12.5 12.3882235529 101% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.0 11.1389221557 90% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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It is not exactly right on the topic in the view of e-grader. Maybe there is a wrong essay topic.
Rates: 16.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 1.0 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.