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.
The argument in question, claims that providing free-tuition to the college aged children of Professors, would serve to boost their morale, luring new professors and retaining current professors. The authors of this suggestion, the faculty committee of the Seatown University, have cited a study conducted at nearby Oceania University, in order to support their argument. But the argument is rife with assumptions and holes, which makes it a highly unconvincing argument.
To begin with, it is important to state that correlation between two events doesn't imply causation. The authors have provided us with no details about the study conducted in Oceania University, and therefore we don't have any proof of it's authenticity or reliability. A proof that the study had been conducted by a competent group of researchers, who had explicitly concluded that faculty retention is directly related to, and can be significantly influenced by, the offer of free tuition of professors' children would have provided some of the needed support to the argument.
Furthermore, the faculty committee has assumed the group of professors surveyed at Oceania University, to be a representative sample of all the professors in both of the universities in consideration. A corollary to this assumption is that whatever results, were obtained in Oceania University will also be obtained in Seatown. They have provided no evidence, on why the outcome of such a decision would hold the same effect in Seatown University. In addition to this, we must have been provided with data on the professors who choose to leave Seatown University, their ages, their family details, their research work, etc and preferably, there must also be data on the professors who are currently working in the University. If it can be shown from the data that the majority of the professors who leave, have kids at the level of college, then the argument may hold some credibility.
Moreover, the faculty committee has failed to consider any alternate policy in place in Oceania which serves to retain the existing professors. What if the professors in Oceania choose to stay their due to the high level of intellectual stimulus the University is capable of providing, or perhaps due to the high reputation of the University? Other factors, such as the salary of professors at the university, the good quality of students, the perks in terms of housing and medical facilities, or the facilities provided by the town in which the University resides often have a tremendous role in attracting talented new professors and retaining existing ones.
To conclude, the argument provided by the faculty committee stands weak and remains highly unconvincing. In order to strengthen their arguments, the authors should have provided details on the reliability of the study conducted at Oceania, the details of the professors who have left and also of the the remaining professors, reasons as to why a certain finding at Oceania would be equally valid at Seatown, and last but not the least, a discussion of other factors which play a major role in retaining Professors. Without such detailed analysis, the argument doesn't make a cogent case.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
flaws:
also need to argue: '...for the purpose of enhancing morale among the faculty'
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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: 17 15
No. of Words: 517 350
No. of Characters: 2614 1500
No. of Different Words: 223 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.768 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.056 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.88 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 190 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 169 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 118 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 80 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 30.412 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 15.119 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.647 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.359 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.567 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.1 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 77, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...ate that correlation between two events doesnt imply causation. The authors have provi...
^^^^^^
Line 3, column 212, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: don't
...in Oceania University, and therefore we dont have any proof of its authenticity or r...
^^^^
Line 3, column 532, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
...professors children would have provided some of the needed support to the argument. Furt...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 662, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...professors and retaining existing ones. To conclude, the argument provided by th...
^^^^^
Line 9, column 297, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a word
Suggestion: the
...he professors who have left and also of the the remaining professors, reasons as to why...
^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 297, Rule ID: DT_DT[1]
Message: Maybe you need to remove one determiner so that only 'the' or 'the' is left.
Suggestion: the; the
...he professors who have left and also of the the remaining professors, reasons as to why...
^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 561, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...ut such detailed analysis, the argument doesnt make a cogent case.
^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, furthermore, if, may, moreover, so, then, therefore, as to, in addition, such as, to begin with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 15.0 19.6327345309 76% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 11.0 12.9520958084 85% => OK
Conjunction : 15.0 11.1786427146 134% => OK
Relative clauses : 15.0 13.6137724551 110% => OK
Pronoun: 24.0 28.8173652695 83% => OK
Preposition: 83.0 55.5748502994 149% => OK
Nominalization: 20.0 16.3942115768 122% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2683.0 2260.96107784 119% => OK
No of words: 514.0 441.139720559 117% => OK
Chars per words: 5.21984435798 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.76146701107 4.56307096286 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.99503303235 2.78398813304 108% => OK
Unique words: 234.0 204.123752495 115% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.455252918288 0.468620217663 97% => OK
syllable_count: 856.8 705.55239521 121% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 4.96107784431 121% => OK
Article: 16.0 8.76447105788 183% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 2.70958083832 37% => OK
Conjunction: 6.0 1.67365269461 358% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 8.0 4.22255489022 189% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 30.0 22.8473053892 131% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 89.6095336006 57.8364921388 155% => OK
Chars per sentence: 157.823529412 119.503703932 132% => OK
Words per sentence: 30.2352941176 23.324526521 130% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.23529411765 5.70786347227 109% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 7.0 5.25449101796 133% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 7.0 8.20758483034 85% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => 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: 0.29958532877 0.218282227539 137% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.102511382962 0.0743258471296 138% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.083009465794 0.0701772020484 118% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.180086157316 0.128457276422 140% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0227099105971 0.0628817314937 36% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 18.3 14.3799401198 127% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 32.57 48.3550499002 67% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 16.2 12.197005988 133% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 13.59 12.5979740519 108% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.06 8.32208582834 109% => OK
difficult_words: 128.0 98.500998004 130% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.0 12.3882235529 89% => OK
gunning_fog: 14.0 11.1389221557 126% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => 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.