To: Beenish Fatima, Writing Technicians Team Member
From: Brionne McWilliams, Writing Technicians Team Member
Date: February 12, 2019
Subject: Review of Your Formal Report Proposal for Senior Isolation
Thank you for submitting your formal report proposal for lesson 2:1. Please see my review of the first draft of your document below. I thoroughly enjoyed reading your outline due to your in-depth explanation of the issue of social isolation. To assist in developing your research plan, I would like to offer the following suggestions:
First Impressions:
• The organization of the proposal is excellent, allowing me to fully understand the material on my first reading. The plan was compelling and provided a realistic solution to the issue of social isolation in the senior population. While, the organization and depth of explanation about the problem and solution, there is a lack of detail about the reader. Also, there are a few grammatical mistakes that could be addressed to improve the overall flow of the document.
Overall Document Layout and Design:
• Titles and subheadings are appropriate, well composed, and bolded making the document organized and easy to read.
• References in the Works cited are correct according to MLA style rules and in alphabetical order.
• Overall, the document is complete according to the assignment requirements.
Elements of Proposal
Introduction:
• The introduction provides detailed information outlining the issue and the detrimental consequences caused by it.
• The use of an example that demonstrates an adverse cascading effect caused by social isolation was an excellent tool to illustrate the importance of the issue.
• While you mention that the reader is from the City of Vancouver, consider incorporating more details about the specific individual that would have the authority to promote community programs. I am not sure if you want your reader to be someone who works for the city of Vancouver that is in charge of giving grants or providing buildings for the senior centers? Alternatively, if you want them to be the head of a senior center? If you want your reader to increase funding, they should be someone from the city, but if you want someone to implement a specific program at a center, they should maybe be someone high up at the center that is actively involved in program development.
Statement of Problem:
• Offered valid reasons that should persuade the reader to allocate funds to support programs, which in turn, will combat the negative consequences of social isolation in seniors.
• Consider, adding more detail on how or why social isolation serves as a critical component that assists their development.
Proposed Solution:
• The proposed solution is logically outlined and attainable.
• The benefits of implementing your recommendation are clearly described, making them more persuasive to the reader.
• The excellent use of strong wording such as “critical” and “will extend significant” makes the proposal more appealing for the reader to adopt.
Scope:
• The scope of your research questions will allow for adequate investigation of the problem. However, you may want to consider, specifying which community and social programs you are going to investigate to focus your research more.
Methods:
• There is a good balance of primary and secondary data resources used to analyze this issue.
• For the reader to accept your recommendation, you may consider including secondary sources exploring current strategies that promote community engagement, to further corroborate your primary data on which successful strategy to implement.
• Besides, you might consider incorporating items on your standardized survey, comparing the efficacy of current approaches used to promote community involvement. This information may aid in developing new promotion strategies by determining beneficial methods used in existing programs.
Qualifications:
• You possess the qualifications necessary to research this topic, as you have previous experience working with your population of interest.
Conclusion:
• The conclusion was concise and professionally written. You summarize the major points of the proposal simply and cohesively while emphasizing the benefits of the proposed solution.
Grammar and Problems of Expression:
• The first sentence of the introduction “Social isolation among seniors is on the rise, and its impact can be felt by communities all over Canada.” Could be re-written without using “its” to enhance readability, “Social isolation among seniors is on the rise, and communities all over Canada can feel its impact.” Consider using the noun “social isolation” instead of it to enhance comprehension.
• The third sentence of the introduction “.. public cost and individual well-being” require a comma before the and to separate the different elements in the sentence.
• Last sentence of the first paragraph in the introduction – missing the conjunction “that” before social isolation
• The sentence “Therefore, the lack of recognition and action in response to this problem poses a great burden on government funded programs, shelters and non-profit organizations.”, government funding needs a hyphen, and you need to include a comma before “and non-profit organizations.” (paragraph 2, sentence 3)
• The last sentence of the 2nd paragraph in the introduction starts with “This” making it unclear to the reader what you are referring. Consider adding in the appropriate/more specific noun to make the document easier to read.
• In the first paragraph of the statement of the problem, consider changing the punctuation on the abbreviation, “i.e.” to “i.e.,” and adding a comma before the abbreviation “etc.” to help with coherency(paragraph 4, sentence 2).
• The first sentence of the first paraph in the scope section “.. in order to develop a comprehensive guideline ..”, the wording could be reduced by changing “in order to” to simply “to” instead to make more concise (paragraph 7, sentence 1).
• Grammar: First question in the scope section, the verb should be plural “are” instead of “is” to match the plural noun (seniors).
• Punctuation: Missing hyphens for hyphenated words such as far-reaching, senior-specific, community-based, and government-funded.
• Punctuation: Addition of commas is needed to incorporate pauses in the sentences – such as “Through this report, I will…” , or used before the word “and” to separate different elements in the sentence.
Concluding Statements:
Overall, usage of persuasive language and tone and detailed examples outlining the consequences of the current issue were effective elements that make your proposal excellent. It is recommended to include more information about your reader, to demonstrate that the person has the authority to benefit from implementing your recommendations.
• Your proposal was clear and concise. By improving the minor grammar errors and including more details about the specific reader conclusion, this will be an excellent assignment.
• Self-edit for grammatical errors
Thank you for submitting your assignment and please feel free to ask any questions, it has been a pleasure reviewing this work. Great job overall.
Enclosure: Formal Research Proposal – Beenish Fatima
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