GMAT Verbal & Essays

question 1: issue writting
Claim: The emergence of the online “blogosphere” and social media has significantly weakened the quality of political discourse in the United States.
Reason: When anyone can publish political opinions easily, standards for covering news and political topics will inevitably decline.
Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the claim and the reason on which that claim is based.

answer:
Social media is acessible to everyone in today's world. It includes major platforms where an invividual can post their view or images in order to commuincate or keep up with the trends of today. These social media sites also include blogpost which are published online by a group or an individual person to share their views on a topic or just to write as a hobby.
These blogs have a effect on the person reading it and may influence their decision making. If the person is reading the blog about a certain political incident or a political party the language used in the blog or the perspective on which the blog is constructed have the tendency of influencing the person. Moreover, this can have positive or negative impact on the person. For instancee, if there is a conflict involving a political body and the blog potrays it from a different perspective this can have a contradicting effect on the political party's reputation. Which can affect thr voter base of the party.
As this practice of blogs is growing very rapidly the standards for covering the news and poltical topics is declining at an alarming rate. Since everyone has the freedom to publish anything online this is proving to be fatal for the industry. For example, in earlier years the standard, the tone, quality of vocabulary was better than what we see now on these blogs and posts published by people. Use of inflated language has increased leading to wanning the quality of news.
Since the common public can comment on these blogs and express their views without any control on their language or vocabularly, this is taking the whole blog post comments to be filled with curse words and hate comments.
In conclusion,I agrre with the issue that blogsphere and social media has significantly affected the news covering and will inevitably decline the standards of the news and political topics. I would like to add that even though everyone has the right to free speech we should know whenit is affecting the people around them and should ue that right carefully. This can be controlled by putting in place a algorithm that can detect hate comments and delete them while notifying the user why there opinion was deleted and if the user persists in engaging with hate comments a strick action should be taken against them. Because one's right to free speech cannot be justified with posting hate comments on social media.

question 2: argument essay
Several charitable organizations in Pleasantville provide opportunities for teenagers to engage in community service. These organizations have a great need for volunteers, but in recent years, the number of teenage volunteers has significantly declined.
The Pleasantville School Board should take measures to increase the number of volunteers. Teachers, parents, and other community members agree that it is important for young people to learn the value of community service. Requiring high school students to engage in community service would provide much-needed assistance to worthy local charities and would also help young people understand the importance of giving back to their community. For this reason, the Pleasantville School Board should institute a program requiring students of Pleasantville High School to complete 40 hours of community service prior to graduation.
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 the assumptions and what the implications are if the assumptions prove unwarranted.

answer:
The author pust forward an arguement which states that the Pleasantville School Board should make a program which requires students of Pleasantville High School to complete 40 hours of community service prior to graduation. Since several charitable organitazions are ready to provide opportunities to teenagers but are facing a shortage because the number of teenagers has significantly dropped.
Author's request is for a novel cause and should be thought upon as it is a good thing to teach students and teenagers the value of community service and importance of giving back to the commuinty. Insipte of the good cause the author has made several assumptions which can enervate the provided argument.
Firstly, the author assumes the students would not be willing to do community service on their own. This statement can be countered by stating that there was a significant decline in the teenagers volunteering in the recent charities. The reason can be the recent charities were conducted while the students had their mid term examinations. Hence the students were studying rather than volunteering in charity events.
Secondly, the author assumes that making a 40 hour community service as a requiremnt before graduation will increase the teenagers participation in charitable organizations. It can have contradicting effect as students who were initially coming forward to volunteer on their own whould likely see this as task and hence won't turn up with helping mentality which will defeat the foundations of the whole argument.
Thirdly, the author assumes that students have 40 hours on time or can take out 40 hours of time in order for the community service. But if the student id not free as they may have different classes to attend or activites they are involvd in then the student may not be able to find the 40 hours in their busy schedule.
In conclusion, the cause for the decline in the volunteers is not specified hence we don't know what is the reason for the decline in teenagers participating in the community service. The authors has made a great attempt for a good cause but we should keep in mind the above mentioned assumptions and then take the decision on the 40 hours community service before graduation. Because if the student is forced to do something it may only push them away from community service if they are not doing it with their whole heart. Even the 40 hour constrsaint can be lowered to a reasonable amount of time which can be calculated for every student based on how much time they have in hand and then asking them to use some portion of their free time to volunteer in the charitable organizations. Another approcah can be the high school can provide some extra credits to students who complete a set amount of community service this will not only increase the feeling of competition but also increase the number of volunteers.