Several charitable organizations in Pleasantville provide opportunities for teenagers to engage in community service. These organizations have a great need for volunteers, but in recent years, the number of teenage volunteers has significantly declined.
The Pleasantville School Board should take measures to increase the number of volunteers. Teachers, parents, and other community members agree that it is important for young people to learn the value of community service. Requiring high school students to engage in community service would provide much-needed assistance to worthy local charities and would also help young people understand the importance of giving back to their community. For this reason, the Pleasantville School Board should institute a program requiring students of Pleasantville High School to complete 40 hours of community service prior to graduation.
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on the assumptions and what the implications are if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The author here states that the number of the volunteers, specially teenagers in the Pleasantville, are declining in the community services in the recent years. Particularly no reason has been cited for the decrease in the number of volunteers but the author wants that the Pleasantville School Board should introduce a program in the high school of the students to complete 40 hours of community service before graduation as this will help the local charities. However, such a program looks to be a forcefull implemention on the High School students. The argument has many unstated assumptions which needs to addressed so as to have a better view of the topic.
Firstly, there is no proper reason given that why student population is decreasing in serving the local community service. One reason might be that the high school students have not much time to involve in such activities on regular basis due to large amount of classroom work, more stringent timelines on the assignments and peer pressure of the difficult subjects which requires more time in understanding than the normal ones. So it difficult for the high school teenagers to spend much time for community services.
Secondly, the school board tries to implement a mandatory program for the students of the Pleasantville High School to push themselves towards a 40 hour community work. This can lead to negative results as the students will not be able to focus on either side. At one side there studies will be affected greatly and on the other side they will not be able to put there best of the efforts in the community work due to academics. Rather than looking it as a solution towards the problems of the local community service, the school board should look it as hinderance in the studies of the students.
To make the situation better the school board can make this program effective in summers for the high school students and as a routine for the primary school and middle school students as the students at these levels do not have much busy schedules and pressure of tough subjects.
So to conclude, the argument could have been more valid if it would have been supported by a stronger base. The school board cannot push such programs on the high school students unless they themselves demand for it. Finally, the arguments fails to convince its effectiveness to the readers.
Sentence: So it difficult for the high school teenagers to spend much time for community services.
Description: A pronoun, personal, nominative, 3rd person singular is not usually followed by an adjective
Suggestion: Refer to it and difficult
Sentence: At one side there studies will be affected greatly and on the other side they will not be able to put there best of the efforts in the community work due to academics.
Description: The fragment side there studies is rare
Suggestion: Possible agreement error: Replace there with adjective
Sentence: However, such a program looks to be a forcefull implemention on the High School students.
Error: implemention Suggestion: No alternate word
Error: forcefull Suggestion: forceful
Sentence: Rather than looking it as a solution towards the problems of the local community service, the school board should look it as hinderance in the studies of the students.
Error: hinderance Suggestion: hindrance
Attribute Value Ideal
Score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 2 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 3 2
No. of Sentences: 15 15
No. of Words: 400 350
No. of Characters: 1927 1500
No. of Different Words: 182 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.472 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.818 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.629 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 141 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 103 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 77 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 46 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 26.667 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 12.908 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.6 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.377 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.607 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.114 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5