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pneel · Fri Sep 28, 2007 12:49 pm

Please rate my essay -- This is my first essay and need your input to improve my writing skills.

Analysis of an argument :

The following appeared in the editorial section of a local newspaper. "This past winter, 200 students from Waymarsh State College traveled to the state capitol building to protest against proposed cuts in funding for various state college programs. The other 12,000 Waymarsh students evidently weren't so concerned about their education: they either stayed on campus or left for winter break. Since the group who did not protest is far more numerous, it is more representative of the state's college students than are the protesters. Therefore the state legislature need not heed the appeals of the protesting students."

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The authors point that the students that did not participate in the protest are not concerned about their education is not logical. The author has not given any reason for his assumptions.

The protestors from Waymarsh State college were trying to get the funds back for the state college programs but the state legislature didn not heed the appeals because of the less number of prtoesting students. The author has not mentioned as to how popular those college programs were and how many students enrolled every year in those programs.

If we assume that some of the college programs were popular and also prepared students for real world jobs then why did so few students participate in the protest. The students who didn't participate in the protest are either peace loving people or they don't believe in protests.

The students know the management at the college and the politicians are not going to react to their protests and hence decided to stay away from it.

The author has also not made it clear whether the protest was advertised in the state college. Did they announce it several days before the winter break? If it was a last minute plan then sure the turn out of protestors was going to be low as students must have already made plans to go home for the winter break.

Since several of the critical pieces are missing from the editorial section of the local newspaper, i think the author should give a detail report about the protest and explain the importance of the state programs that are not funded anymore.
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Thank you in advance.
pneel

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Guest · Tue Oct 09, 2007 4:44 pm

hi pneel:

i think that this essay deserves a 3.0-4.0 rating. i think your prose style is fairly clear and concise, which is great. however, the structure of the essay needs work.

(1) make your introduction paragraph a little stronger by setting up your following arguments. "i think this argument is problematic for three reasons..."

(2) this second piece of advice is HUGE - be sure to suggest ways to improve the argument at the end of your essay. this is something that the raters are looking for particularly with analysis of argument essays.

hope this helps.

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pneel · Fri Oct 12, 2007 6:32 am

Thank you for your suggestions. It will definitely help me to improve my AWA score.

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