Review of other student's work
Shannon Hollender
Reviewing
Shannon Davis’ paper
Due: 3/7/06
Review
Shannon,
My general impression of you essay is that you know a decent amount about your topic but that you need to work on the transition and flow of it as well as soiurcing, and elaborating on the information and controversies you did find. It lacks a comprehensive expanse of information. I outlined the questions asked below and how they apply to your paper:
Does the writer clearly id her purpose for writing?
Yes, though it could be more clearly stated and it could be elaborated upon more in the first few paragraphs. After a grammar edit it will only need slight elaboration, so it is good.
Does the Writer adequately summarize the key attributes of the controversy?
It seems that the topic is not very conducive to such concise summarization, though as far as I can tell the controversy is: Homosexual marriage in Va. vs. heterosexual marriage in Va. And the main points are that the dictionary defines marriage differently (a point I had to read the paper three times to understand clearly and see the relevance of) that love is universal, that The governor opposes it, as do protestors, that congress tried to brush it under the carpet, and that we as people are exposed to the notion of heterosexual love only from a very early age on. Students and adults seem to be taking an active stand (on both sides?) and the only argument against it is a flimsy one based on the slippery slope theory.
You need to go more into who holds these two sides’ opinions and why. You also need to flesh out the complexities of the argument, I found none.
Does the writer seem to have a thorough understanding of the controversy?
Thorough? No. But your comprehension shows a sincere effort towards learning something new. Keep researching this hot button debate as of recent. You are bound to find more arguments and better ones at that. You outline political moves to suppress same-sex marriages and you show that there is current involvement by activists on this issue, but you could show more and elaborate better. You could also be a bit less biased – the argument seemed unfair.
The community though outlined, seemed lacking and vague. I would like to see how you are a member of this community and how these two sides are characterized, and perhaps how they are defined by this issue. I didn’t learn anything at all about this debate but I’m at an unfair advantage, I just competed with the Debate team and this was one of the topics to be discussed.
The topic sentences seem short. Too short, too concise and to not flow from idea to idea smoothly. The impression I got was that this was because this is the Rough Draft and requires an edit first. The paragraphs may follow these sentences, but it is difficult to know considering it is difficult to follow the flow of ideas. The last paragraph is better than the rest because it has a lot of information, is very concise and it allows the reader to follow the concept in a relatively smooth manner; the rest, unfortunately seemed like space killers – they needed more information in them.
Source materials need to be listed in near-full at their first mention and only given a quick summary thereafter. One letter citations are useless and ill advised. Appropriate support for most all items is evident in the paper, but more evidence, research and support is necessary to turn this good paper into a stellar one. I as a reader felt less than swayed to either opinion, I walked away feeling as indifferent as I had felt prior to reading it.
Reviewing
Shannon Davis’ paper
Due: 3/7/06
Review
Shannon,
My general impression of you essay is that you know a decent amount about your topic but that you need to work on the transition and flow of it as well as soiurcing, and elaborating on the information and controversies you did find. It lacks a comprehensive expanse of information. I outlined the questions asked below and how they apply to your paper:
Does the writer clearly id her purpose for writing?
Yes, though it could be more clearly stated and it could be elaborated upon more in the first few paragraphs. After a grammar edit it will only need slight elaboration, so it is good.
Does the Writer adequately summarize the key attributes of the controversy?
It seems that the topic is not very conducive to such concise summarization, though as far as I can tell the controversy is: Homosexual marriage in Va. vs. heterosexual marriage in Va. And the main points are that the dictionary defines marriage differently (a point I had to read the paper three times to understand clearly and see the relevance of) that love is universal, that The governor opposes it, as do protestors, that congress tried to brush it under the carpet, and that we as people are exposed to the notion of heterosexual love only from a very early age on. Students and adults seem to be taking an active stand (on both sides?) and the only argument against it is a flimsy one based on the slippery slope theory.
You need to go more into who holds these two sides’ opinions and why. You also need to flesh out the complexities of the argument, I found none.
Does the writer seem to have a thorough understanding of the controversy?
Thorough? No. But your comprehension shows a sincere effort towards learning something new. Keep researching this hot button debate as of recent. You are bound to find more arguments and better ones at that. You outline political moves to suppress same-sex marriages and you show that there is current involvement by activists on this issue, but you could show more and elaborate better. You could also be a bit less biased – the argument seemed unfair.
The community though outlined, seemed lacking and vague. I would like to see how you are a member of this community and how these two sides are characterized, and perhaps how they are defined by this issue. I didn’t learn anything at all about this debate but I’m at an unfair advantage, I just competed with the Debate team and this was one of the topics to be discussed.
The topic sentences seem short. Too short, too concise and to not flow from idea to idea smoothly. The impression I got was that this was because this is the Rough Draft and requires an edit first. The paragraphs may follow these sentences, but it is difficult to know considering it is difficult to follow the flow of ideas. The last paragraph is better than the rest because it has a lot of information, is very concise and it allows the reader to follow the concept in a relatively smooth manner; the rest, unfortunately seemed like space killers – they needed more information in them.
Source materials need to be listed in near-full at their first mention and only given a quick summary thereafter. One letter citations are useless and ill advised. Appropriate support for most all items is evident in the paper, but more evidence, research and support is necessary to turn this good paper into a stellar one. I as a reader felt less than swayed to either opinion, I walked away feeling as indifferent as I had felt prior to reading it.
posted by Shannon Hollender @ 11:29 PM
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