Ashokshiva wrote:
Hi,
Pl.rate my AwA essay.
Candidate: Our city's students have suffered long enough. Over the mayor's four years in office, our district's math and science scores have hovered well below the national average, even while our average teacher's salary has increased. Our student-per-class ratio is laughable, yet he has made no progress on building a new school. He simply cannot be trusted with our children's future; if you care about education, I am the only candidate you can support.
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Most conspicuously, the candidate concludes that people caring about education should support him during the upcoming mayor election. This is based on the premise that averages scores of science and maths subjects are below national average. The candidate's line of reasoning is that the mayor does not care about education hence the average scores are low. This argument is unconvincing for the following two reasons. Really choppy sentences for an intro but nothing grammatically wrong. Also, you say following 2 reasons, but you make 3 points in essay
First, the candidate assumes that only maths math is generally singular, at least in the US. I don't think I've ever heard "maths" in proper writing and science scores reflects concern scores reflect concern is proper verb/tense/qty agreementabout education. This assumption is totally unwarranted. It is equally possible that the city's students average scores are well above national average in other subjects. It is also possible that the Mayor was concern had brought makes no sense. Mayor was concerned? Mayor had brought up?the results in other subjects and would take some more time for the results in maths and science. hence the candidate must provide further evidence to strengthen his argument.
Second, the candidate claims that inspite of having poor student ratio, no new school buildings have come up. But the candidate fails to provide data on what is a good student ratio.Sentences don't typically start with "But" Perhaps-The candidate fails to support this claim for new schools since he doesn't provide a reference to a good student ratio It is entirely possible that the current student ratio is well below national average to warrant a new building. Also it is equally possible that there is sufficient space in theexisting building to accomodate more students. Clearly, building a new building would incur costs that could well be spent on other pressing issues in education.
Finally, the author claims that teachers salaries have increased. But "But" againthe candidate provides no data to this claim and has left many questions unanswered. What if the salaries of teachers were not increased for a long time and they have gotreceived would be a more appropriate word. got isn't proper an increase only now? What if the salaries were hiked to attract highly skilled teachers to the state? Without decisive answers to this pertinent questionwhat question? You only listed hypotheticals above, one is left with an impression that candidate's claims are more of wishful thinking than substantive evidence.
In conclusion, the candidate's argument is neither compelling nor persuasive. Because the argument omits several key issues, it is thus poorly supported.If the candidate had backed up his or her claims with conclusive evidence and included items discussed above, the argument would have been more thorough and convincing.
I won't give you a number score since I don't know the scaling that well. I will say that the substance is there and you draw a decent conclusion and argument, but a lot of stuff like transitions and sentence variation are weak which hamper its effectiveness. There are lots of choppy, short sentences. This is stuff that comes easily to native speakers, not so much to others, so don't take it personally. This is however, the stuff that separates an average score from a good score so try to focus on making your writing more fluid.