The following appeared in a letter from the faculty committee to the president of Seatown University:
A study conducted at nearby Oceania University showed that faculty retention is higher when professors are offered free tuition at the university for their own college-aged children. Therefore, Seatown should institute a free-tuition policy for its professors for the purpose of enhancing morale among the faculty and luring new professors.
Write a response in which you discuss what specific evidence is needed to evaluate the argument and explain how the evidence would weaken or strengthen the argument.
In the given letter, the faculty committee has recommended the president of Seatown University to consider instituting a fre-tuituin policy for its professor. The recommendation is based on the premise that a similar policy at nearby Oceania University reulted in higher faculty retention and such meaure to enhance the morale agong the faculty and luring new professors. The conclusion drawn by the committee might hold water, however, it rests on several unfounded assumptions that, if not substantiated, dramatically weakens the persuasiveness of the argument. Before we could evaluate the argument, the following peices of evidence must be collected and analyzed.
First, the committee compares the Seatown University to the Oceania University. Are they both even comparable? The author fails to furnish data to bolster his/her claim. There are plethora of parameters governing the status of a university. Data regarding rankings, student intake, funding, geographical locations, degrees and courses offered must be collected and analyzed. It is highly likely that these universities are not comparable if any of the above stated parameters are disparate. Unless the author provides this data, we cannot affirm that both these universities are comparable and there might be attributed to one, dosen't necessarily have to be true for latter. If either of the above has merit, then the conclusion drawn in the origianl argument does not hold water.
Furthermore, the committee expects that instituting such policy would invigorate morale among the faculty. However, fails to provide any evidence to prove the same. It is probable that there is not analogy between the morale and tuition fee waiver. We must be provided statistical data regarding what percentage of faculty have offsprings and more necessarily are enrolled in the same university. Also, it is mentioned that such measure would lure new professors. But it is not provided whether new prospective professors are needed in the university. We must be provided with the recent job openings to get a sense whether there are jobs to be taken up by new professor. It is highly likely that new professors are more concerned regarding their paychecks and the prospects of research in their field of interest rather than such lucrative policies. If the above is true, then the argument is weakend.
Finally, is Seatown University financially able to institute the free-tuituin policy? We need statistical data regarding the student intake, average tuition fee, funding from organizations, taxes leived and student-faculty ration to understant the economical status of both the universities. It is possible that the Oceania University is highly reputed private university attracting plenty of funding from the federal government, unlike Seatown University. Unless we are able to get access to such data, we cannot comment on whether such policy is feasible in Seatown university.
In conclusion, the argument as it stands now, is considerably flawed due to its relaince on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to address the peices of evidence demanded above then we can evaluate the viability of the recommendation.
Comments
e-rater score report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 3.5 out of 6
Category: Satisfactory Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 27 15
No. of Words: 497 350
No. of Characters: 2637 1500
No. of Different Words: 227 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.722 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.306 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.957 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 213 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 166 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 116 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 85 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 18.407 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 7.269 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.593 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.273 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.453 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.096 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 7, column 249, Rule ID: ECONOMICAL_ECONOMIC[1]
Message: Did you mean 'economic' (=connected with economy)?
Suggestion: economic
...tudent-faculty ration to understant the economical status of both the universities. It is ...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 126, 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.
...nce on several unwarranted assumptions. If the author is able to address the peice...
^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, finally, first, furthermore, however, if, regarding, so, then, in conclusion
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 32.0 19.6327345309 163% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 11.0 11.1786427146 98% => OK
Relative clauses : 9.0 13.6137724551 66% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 35.0 28.8173652695 121% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 61.0 55.5748502994 110% => OK
Nominalization: 16.0 16.3942115768 98% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2709.0 2260.96107784 120% => OK
No of words: 495.0 441.139720559 112% => OK
Chars per words: 5.47272727273 5.12650576532 107% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.71684168287 4.56307096286 103% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.05165808699 2.78398813304 110% => OK
Unique words: 233.0 204.123752495 114% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.470707070707 0.468620217663 100% => OK
syllable_count: 897.3 705.55239521 127% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.8 1.59920159681 113% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 11.0 4.96107784431 222% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 8.0 8.76447105788 91% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 27.0 19.7664670659 137% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 48.8277395355 57.8364921388 84% => OK
Chars per sentence: 100.333333333 119.503703932 84% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.3333333333 23.324526521 79% => OK
Discourse Markers: 3.22222222222 5.70786347227 56% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 14.0 4.67664670659 299% => Less facts, knowledge or examples wanted.
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.245245113567 0.218282227539 112% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0622042645072 0.0743258471296 84% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.090252764162 0.0701772020484 129% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.135994744246 0.128457276422 106% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.113512546534 0.0628817314937 181% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.5 14.3799401198 94% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 36.28 48.3550499002 75% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 12.7 12.197005988 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.45 12.5979740519 115% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.22 8.32208582834 111% => OK
difficult_words: 147.0 98.500998004 149% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 15.0 12.3882235529 121% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 58.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 3.5 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.