The letter to the president of the Seatown University takes issue of the higher faculty retention at the nearby Oceania University due to free tuition provided to their college-aged children at the university. Though the argument may have merit, it rests on unproven premises, questionable assumptions and lacks any substantive evidentiary proof.
The primary flaw in the argument is the lack of substantiated evidence. To validate the idea, the author refers to a study conducted at nearby Oceania university, where faculty retention was higher when professors where financial aid was provided for their college aged children. Not only does this claim lack quantification, it does not provide the particulars of the study that this has been drawn from. Parameters to be looked out for are: integrity of the conducting body, details about the population sample, time period during which it was held, eligibility criteria for waived tuition fee at the university. If the probe consisted of only professors only in the Arts department, whose kids are also interested to pursue career in Arts, and there happens to be a shortage of Arts students, it would have been convenient for the Oceania University to waive their fees off. Furthermore, was this conducted on a period of 5 years, 2 years, or the previous month. If it was shorter, it is likely that less professors left the University, and hence a larger faculty retention. The exact faculty retention has to be examined too - was it 50%, 20% or 3%. The cost of free tuition for professor's progeny has to be weighed against their economic value as well, before making any further conclusions.
Not only the lack of supporting information, but also the flimsy assumptions weaken the writer's stance. There is no mention of any obvious similarity or correlation between both the Universities. It would not be surprising to note that a University with a large funding can afford their professor's children free tuition at the same University. The salaries paid matter as well. Everyone is in a search for better financial and growth opportunities. If the Oceania University pays a good deal to their professors, again, it would not be startling to find what the stud suggested.
It is not to say that the argument is completely flawed. To bolster his thesis, the author should provide verifiable substantiation and quantification of the data, so that a more comprehensive analysis can be done. Also, there argument rests on plenty of questionable premises. Clearly explicating these vague ideas will also help to provide a more persuasive argument.
In sum, the author's illogical argument suffers from numerous flaws. To convince the reader, he must largely rephrase the argument, offer evidentiary support, fix his logical flaws and explicate his assumptions as to why the faculty retention at Oceania University is higher. Otherwise, the tepid argument is likely to convince few readers.
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Essay evaluation report
flaws：
also need to argue this:
...for the purpose of enhancing morale among the faculty...
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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: 24 15
No. of Words: 475 350
No. of Characters: 2403 1500
No. of Different Words: 243 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.668 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.059 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.905 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 176 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 140 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 102 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 69 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.792 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 9.657 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.5 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.261 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.462 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.046 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 1004, Rule ID: FEWER_LESS[2]
Message: Did you mean 'fewer'? The noun professors is countable.
Suggestion: fewer
...h. If it was shorter, it is likely that less professors left the University, and hen...
^^^^
Line 5, column 89, Rule ID: POSSESIVE_APOSTROPHE[2]
Message: Possible typo: apostrophe is missing. Did you mean 'writers'' or 'writer's'?
Suggestion: writers'; writer's
... also the flimsy assumptions weaken the writers stance. There is no mention of any obvi...
^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, furthermore, hence, if, look, may, so, well, as to
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 25.0 19.6327345309 127% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 9.0 12.9520958084 69% => OK
Conjunction : 10.0 11.1786427146 89% => OK
Relative clauses : 10.0 13.6137724551 73% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 57.0 55.5748502994 103% => OK
Nominalization: 26.0 16.3942115768 159% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2473.0 2260.96107784 109% => OK
No of words: 475.0 441.139720559 108% => OK
Chars per words: 5.20631578947 5.12650576532 102% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.66845742379 4.56307096286 102% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.97769866219 2.78398813304 107% => OK
Unique words: 251.0 204.123752495 123% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.528421052632 0.468620217663 113% => OK
syllable_count: 786.6 705.55239521 111% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 9.0 8.76447105788 103% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 4.0 1.67365269461 239% => Less conjunction wanted as sentence beginning.
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 24.0 19.7664670659 121% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 22.8473053892 83% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 59.4222034587 57.8364921388 103% => OK
Chars per sentence: 103.041666667 119.503703932 86% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.7916666667 23.324526521 85% => OK
Discourse Markers: 2.54166666667 5.70786347227 45% => More transition words/phrases wanted.
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 : 9.0 6.88822355289 131% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.67664670659 64% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.353524812193 0.218282227539 162% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0796137407608 0.0743258471296 107% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.116499999798 0.0701772020484 166% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.190979060836 0.128457276422 149% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.125333576269 0.0628817314937 199% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.0 14.3799401198 90% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 43.73 48.3550499002 90% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.9 12.197005988 98% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.94 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.47 8.32208582834 102% => OK
difficult_words: 117.0 98.500998004 119% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 11.5 12.3882235529 93% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 11.1389221557 86% => OK
text_standard: 13.0 11.9071856287 109% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 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.