The following is part of a memorandum from the president of Humana University.
"Last year the number of students who enrolled in online degree programs offered by nearby Omni University increased by 50 percent. During the same year, Omni showed a significant decrease from prior years in expenditures for dormitory and classroom space, most likely because online instruction takes place via the Internet. In contrast, over the past three years, enrollment at Humana University has failed to grow and the cost of maintaining buildings has increased. Thus, to increase enrollment and solve the problem of budget deficits at Humana University, we should initiate and actively promote online degree programs like those at Omni."
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 these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The statement made by the president of Humana University is based on several unwarranted assumptions. Therefore, if the assumptions are not valid, then the statement will fall apart, which I will discuss further.
First, the president assumes that the decrease of the expenditure in Omni University resulted from the increase of online programs, which requires less physical places. However, two results happened sequentially doesn't guarantee any causation. There might be other reasons to cause the decrease of the expenditure, such as the efficiency increase for using classroom. Furthermore, the online program may also arouse other expenses that are ignored, such as the program redesign and other logistics planning. Hence, it is problematic to claim the online course is the reason to the decrease of the expenditure directly.
Second, it is unclear the overall enrollment change in Omni University, so it is questionable to assert that the online program can serve the purpose to raise the general enrollment. It is only mentioned that the enrollment of online program has increase by 50%. However, this increase may also lead to a decrease of the normal enrollment. If that's the case, then the online program actually is harmful to the already low enrollment in Humana University. Therefore, only when we know the trend of both the normal and online enrollment, then we can decide whether the online program is truly helpful to solve Humana University's problem.
Last, the president also assumes that the target students and the program focus are the same between Humana University and Omni University, so the potential effective way in Omni University should be applied to Humana University. However, this assumption can be challenged because every university does have their own features. The more influential way to grow the enrollment and save the budget is to find the unique strength of Humana University, instead of copying the way that has been deployed by Omni University. For example, when Omni University already provided online programs, the competitive strength for Humana University may be continuing or even growing their offline programs to promote their differences and attract the students who prefer the face to face program.
In conclusion, the incorrect assumption of causation between sequential results, and the lack of overall trend of the general enrollment to show the impact of the online program, as well as assuming that the same way applied in different universities can lead to the same effect are three major fallacies that should be further examined before any concrete recommendation is made.
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Comments
e-rater score report
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: 417 350
No. of Characters: 2174 1500
No. of Different Words: 193 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.519 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.213 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.77 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 175 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 138 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 92 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 62 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 24.529 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 12.358 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.824 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.362 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.606 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.117 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 213, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: doesn't
...ever, two results happened sequentially doesnt guarantee any causation. There might be...
^^^^^^
Line 5, column 344, Rule ID: EN_CONTRACTION_SPELLING
Message: Possible spelling mistake found
Suggestion: that's
...a decrease of the normal enrollment. If thats the case, then the online program actua...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, first, furthermore, hence, however, if, may, second, so, then, therefore, well, for example, in conclusion, such as, as well as
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 20.0 19.6327345309 102% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 12.0 12.9520958084 93% => OK
Conjunction : 8.0 11.1786427146 72% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 20.0 28.8173652695 69% => OK
Preposition: 43.0 55.5748502994 77% => OK
Nominalization: 15.0 16.3942115768 91% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2231.0 2260.96107784 99% => OK
No of words: 416.0 441.139720559 94% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.36298076923 5.12650576532 105% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.51620172871 4.56307096286 99% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.86523840457 2.78398813304 103% => OK
Unique words: 199.0 204.123752495 97% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.478365384615 0.468620217663 102% => OK
syllable_count: 722.7 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 5.0 4.96107784431 101% => OK
Article: 7.0 8.76447105788 80% => OK
Subordination: 4.0 2.70958083832 148% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.67365269461 60% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 4.22255489022 47% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 17.0 19.7664670659 86% => OK
Sentence length: 24.0 22.8473053892 105% => OK
Sentence length SD: 77.513209054 57.8364921388 134% => OK
Chars per sentence: 131.235294118 119.503703932 110% => OK
Words per sentence: 24.4705882353 23.324526521 105% => OK
Discourse Markers: 8.41176470588 5.70786347227 147% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 2.0 5.25449101796 38% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 8.20758483034 97% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 7.0 6.88822355289 102% => 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: 0.316631838757 0.218282227539 145% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.102815459248 0.0743258471296 138% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0795388569147 0.0701772020484 113% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.160687774059 0.128457276422 125% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0688219673167 0.0628817314937 109% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 16.1 14.3799401198 112% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 38.66 48.3550499002 80% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 13.8 12.197005988 113% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 14.1 12.5979740519 112% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.77 8.32208582834 105% => OK
difficult_words: 104.0 98.500998004 106% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.5 12.3882235529 69% => OK
gunning_fog: 11.6 11.1389221557 104% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
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.