KapTeacherEli wrote:
Nice job on this essay--I give it a 5!
Strengths: You are well organized and well written, with clear opening and closing ideas supported by three clear paragraphs. Your reasoning is spot-on in terms of the flaws you identify; customers, competition, and more effective solutions to the employee knowledge problems are all missing from the prompt.
Opportunities: I didn't quite understand the distinction between the first two flaws you identified; they felt very similar. It's okay to have two points whose differences are only subtle, but you must make clear to the reader why you are making that distinction. Also, avoid language like "awful" in your opening paragraph. You are critiquing the author's argument, but you should be businesslike and dispassionate, not judgmental.
Overall, this is great work--good luck Saturday!
Rate my AWA as well plzz...
“To reverse the deterioration of the postal service, the government should raise the price of postage stamps. This solution will no doubt prove effective, since the price increase will generate larger revenues and will also reduce the volume of mail, thereby eliminating the strain on the existing system and contributing to improved morale.”
Postal service has been a hot topic in the US as of late. Many people debate that deterioration of postal services is because of external system, many affirm it. Many assert that internal policy change will not affect the current standings of postal services and many believe that making changes in internal system such as changes in price of postage stamps will definitely bring in the desired change in postal services.
In the preceding statement author claims that to reverse the deterioration of the postal service, the government should raise the price of postage stamps. Author also claims that this solution will no doubt prove effective, since the price increase will generate larger revenues and will also reduce the volume of mail, thereby eliminating the strain on the existing system and contributing to improved morale.
Although his claim may well have merits, author poorly reasoned argument is based on questionable premises and assumptions, and based solely on the evidence author offers. We cannot accept his conclusion valid.
The primary issue in author reasoning lies in his unsubstantiated premises. Author says that government should raise the prices of postage stamps in order to reverse the deterioration of postal services, but what if the people who are presently using the postal services are using this services because it is cheaper. Also, what if the price increase in stamps will further decrease the number of people currently using postal services. This will certainly not increase the revenue, which in turn will neither eliminate the strain nor will contribute in the improvement of the morale. The argument premise, the base of the argument lack many legitimate evident supports that render this conclusion unacceptable.
In addition, author weakens his argument by making several assumptions which are never proven. Author assumes that many people who are currently using the services will not stop using the services even if the prices of the stamps are increased. Which further means that strain on the existing service system will not change. Thus author fails to provide the explication between the increase in the prices of postage stamps and increase in the revenue which he assumes exists.
Although the poorly reasoned argument have several flaws and the conclusion is not consistent with the premises, it is not to say that the complete argument is without base. Author should have provided the support which can prove that price increase will definitely increase the revenue of the postal services. Also, author could have provided the relation between the reduction in the volume of mail and strain reduction. With more research and clarification author could improve his argument significantly.
In sum, the author presents a poorly reasoned argument based on unsubstantiated premises, questionable assumptions and based on the unsupported evidence that render his conclusion invalid.
If author truly hopes to change the readers mind, he would have to largely restructure his argument, fix the flaws in his logic, provide the explication between the links, and provide more evident support, without which few will likely to convince.