Professors are normally found in university classrooms, offices, and libraries doing
research and lecturing to their students. More and more, however, they also appear as
guests on television news programs, giving expert commentary on the latest events in
the world. These television appearances are of great benefit to the professors themselves
as well as to their universities and the general public.
Professors benefit from appearing on television because by doing so they acquire
reputations as authorities in their academic fields among a much wider audience than
they have on campus. If a professor publishes views in an academic journal, only other
scholars will learn about and appreciate those views. But when a professor appears on
TV, thousands of people outside the narrow academic community become aware of the
professor’s ideas. So when professors share their ideas with a television audience, the
professors’ importance as scholars is enhanced.
Universities also benefit from such appearances. The universities receive positive
publicity when their professors appear on TV. When people see a knowledgeable faculty member of a university on television, they think more highly of that university. That
then leads to an improved reputation for the university. And that improved reputation
in turn leads to more donations for the university and more applications from potential
students.
Finally, the public gains from professors’ appearing on television. Most television
viewers normally have no contact with university professors. When professors appear
on television, viewers have a chance to learn from experts and to be exposed to views
they might otherwise never hear about. Television is generally a medium for commentary that tends to be superficial, not deep or thoughtful. From professors on television,
by contrast, viewers get a taste of real expertise and insight.
Lately, we’ve been seeing some professors on television. Though it’s sometimes claimed to
be a good thing, we should question whether anybody really benefits from it. First of all,
it’s not good for the professors themselves—not from a professional standpoint. Rightly or
wrongly, a professor who appears on TV tends to get the reputation among fellow professors of being someone who is not a serious scholar—someone who chooses to entertain
rather than to educate. And for that reason, TV professors may not be invited to important
conferences—important meetings to discuss their academic work. They may even have difficulty getting money to do research. So for professors, being a TV celebrity has important
disadvantages.
A second point is that being on TV can take a lot of a professor’s time—not just the
time on TV but also time figuring out what to present and time spent rehearsing, travel
time, even time getting made up to look good for the cameras. And all this time comes out
of the time the professor can spend doing research, meeting with students, and attending
to university business. So you can certainly see there are problems for the university and its
students when professors are in the TV studio and not on campus.
So who does benefit? The public? Umm . . . that’s not so clear either. Look, professors
do have a lot of knowledge to offer, but TV networks don’t want really serious, in-depth
academic lectures for after-dinner viewing. What the networks want is the academic title,
not the intellectual substance. The material that professors usually present on TV—such as
background on current events, or some brief historical introduction to a new movie version
of a great literary work—this material is not much different from what viewers would get
from a TV reporter who had done a little homework.
The article introduces the topic of appearance of professors in television programs. More specifically, it highlights on the advantages of appearance of scholars in such programs to different entity. The lecture, however, opposes this viewpoint and points out serious flaws underlying on each of the claims made by writer.
To begin with, the author states the professor himself gains reputation and importance if he appears on television programs. The lecturer firmly disapproves this statement by asserting that scholars are scrutinize by other professor and labelled as not serious or entertainer when they participate in such programs. Furthermore, the speaker elaborates how such professor is wasting their time which could be used for research, educating students and conducting university affairs. He adds on to say such scholars are minimizing their probability of research donation.
Secondly, the writer holds that with such television programs, the general public who are unable to meet the academicians can learn from experts and get real expertise and insight. Not surprisingly, the lecturer objects this claim by contending that the television network are more interested on academic titles than academic substance. He suggests that presentation of scholars on such programs are not more worthy than reports made by well-prepared tv reporter on that subject matter.
Lastly, the excerpt mentions one of the gainer is university of the professor whose donation and applicants increases with such program .The view of speaker on whether the university gains or not from such program is not clear as it has not been explicitly specified.
To sum up, the writer and the lecturer have different views on the subject matter and it will be hard for them to find a common ground.
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 2, column 203, Rule ID: BEEN_PART_AGREEMENT[1]
Message: Consider using a past participle here: 'scrutinized'.
Suggestion: scrutinized
...tatement by asserting that scholars are scrutinize by other professor and labelled as not ...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 68, Rule ID: GENERAL_XX[1]
Message: Use simply 'public'.
Suggestion: public
...that with such television programs, the general public who are unable to meet the academicians...
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 4, column 416, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ars on such programs are not more worthy than reports made by well-prepared tv re...
^^
Line 6, column 136, Rule ID: COMMA_PARENTHESIS_WHITESPACE
Message: Don't put a space before the full stop
Suggestion: .
...d applicants increases with such program .The view of speaker on whether the unive...
^^
Line 6, column 138, Rule ID: SENTENCE_WHITESPACE
Message: Add a space between sentences
Suggestion: The
...applicants increases with such program .The view of speaker on whether the universi...
^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
furthermore, however, if, lastly, second, secondly, so, well, to begin with, to sum up
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 11.0 10.4613686534 105% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 3.0 5.04856512141 59% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 7.30242825607 151% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 12.0772626932 75% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 19.0 22.412803532 85% => OK
Preposition: 40.0 30.3222958057 132% => OK
Nominalization: 9.0 5.01324503311 180% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1518.0 1373.03311258 111% => OK
No of words: 280.0 270.72406181 103% => OK
Chars per words: 5.42142857143 5.08290768461 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.09062348924 4.04702891845 101% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.94766424306 2.5805825403 114% => OK
Unique words: 160.0 145.348785872 110% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.571428571429 0.540411800872 106% => OK
syllable_count: 461.7 419.366225166 110% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 3.0 3.25607064018 92% => OK
Article: 11.0 8.23620309051 134% => OK
Subordination: 0.0 1.25165562914 0% => More adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 2.5761589404 78% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 12.0 13.0662251656 92% => OK
Sentence length: 23.0 21.2450331126 108% => OK
Sentence length SD: 48.1083124026 49.2860985944 98% => OK
Chars per sentence: 126.5 110.228320801 115% => OK
Words per sentence: 23.3333333333 21.698381199 108% => OK
Discourse Markers: 7.16666666667 7.06452816374 101% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.09492273731 122% => OK
Language errors: 5.0 4.19205298013 119% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 4.0 4.33554083885 92% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 5.0 4.45695364238 112% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.27373068433 70% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.205687076214 0.272083759551 76% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0769530887429 0.0996497079465 77% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0390520697738 0.0662205650399 59% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.103970181107 0.162205337803 64% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0456867641473 0.0443174109184 103% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 15.8 13.3589403974 118% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 48.13 53.8541721854 89% => OK
smog_index: 11.2 5.55761589404 202% => Smog_index is high.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.3 11.0289183223 112% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.45 12.2367328918 118% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.35 8.42419426049 111% => OK
difficult_words: 81.0 63.6247240618 127% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 9.0 10.7273730684 84% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.2 10.498013245 107% => OK
text_standard: 12.0 11.2008830022 107% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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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.