Summary of the Paper
The ‘Municipal Housekeeping: The Impact of Women’s Suffrage on Public Education’ by Celeste Carruthers and Marianne Wanamaker is an informative paper that provides details on the extent to which women’s suffrage influences public education. From the paper, it is well evident that the reduction in the black-white gap has contributed substantially to the improved quality of black schools. The paper proposes that all these changes are as a result of major contributions by women. Today, as opposed to the past, more women exercise their voting rights thereby increasing the pivotal voter’s preferences for public education. The paper has developed the discussion from the notion that women’s rights have a major impact on human capital accumulation. As such, their rights has a major influence on human capital accumulation.
Main Comments and Suggestions
Going by the growth of the US economy, the increased quality of education, democracy and suffrage, the assessment of various variables in the education sector, voter power, difference-in-difference identification and interracial prediction are of great importance as far assessing the impact of women’s suffrage on public education is concerned. The authors have as well expounded on the gap between the blacks and the whites and its impact on the quality of education in public schools. Over the years, the gap between the whites and the blacks have reduced, and its reduction is closely associated with increased quality of education especially in public schools. The adoption of women suffrage in the United States is, therefore, seen as an important factor in shaping the relationship between women’s rights and human capital accumulation. As much as the paper cannot be said to be unsatisfactory, the authors should have maintained their focus on issues revolving around this topic to avoid going beyond the scope.
Theoretical Background
The theoretical background of any paper is expected to provide a relevant flow of ideas related to the propositions of the author. These may include theories and other models solely related to what the author intends to prove in their paper. Therefore, the content of the theoretical background should not possess anything beyond the scope of the topic by far. As much as the authors have attempted to maintain the discussion on the theoretical background within the scope of the paper, there is an ideological mix-up. Going by the fact that the topic is ‘the impact of the women suffrage on public education’, the theoretical background should provide previous or current ideas by other authors relating to women’s voting rights and public education without going too far to other issues that are less likely to affect the subject. The authors mix-up the ideas. The ideas have not been placed in a ‘one-after-the-other’ method of presentation, but they have been mixed-up. An idea appearing in the first few sentences re-appears and the middle of the session and at the end as well. The authors ended up with a theoretical background that is not easily comprehensible. A theoretical background with all manners of ideas ranging from racial inequality, quality of schools, education expenditures, women/ men spending rates on consumer goods as well as on education matters, women’s voting rights, the role of expanded electorate and the extent to which women are politically active amongst others. The section also fails to provide sufficient external ideas. It focuses on just a few of them and those of the author.
History
The historical foundation of a paper of this type should be flawless, chronologically presented and in details. Ideas should flow from the earliest in time through to the latest with no historical mix-up, misplacement or irrelevance. The history provided in this paper has several flaws. One of these problems includes its misplacement. Part of the detailing relating to history was done in the introductory part. There is nothing wrong with having historical hints in the introduction but there is something wrong with having excessive historical details in the introduction. The introduction section is expected to be a brief part that captures the attention of the reader and one that creates suspicion hence suspense. An excessively detailed introduction leads to absolute loss of the reader’s attention and they no longer continue reading the article as the flow can easily be lost at this juncture. Further, the historical details provided go beyond the scope of the topic of discussion. The authors are only seen to provide the relevant history at the conclusive sections. Some of the information provided relating to the past is irrelevant and may not influence the flow of the discussion. Not all history but only relevant history should be provided. By providing irrelevant history, the authors increase the quantity of the content but not the quality. For instance, racial inequality is an indirect factor affecting the topic of discussion. Being an indirect factor, history relating to racial inequality should not be provided with excessive details; it should be hinted. The authors should have focused on providing excessive historical details of the suffrage movement and public education, not the indirect factors affecting them.
Introductory Controversy
The preliminary section assumed to be the introduction, has gone beyond what a typical paper of this type should provide. The introductory section is more of a historical background. Ideally, the introduction should provide ideas flowing from issues of the past to issues intended to be addressed by the paper. All these should not be provided in details as detailing them ends up complicating the reader’s ability to comprehend the content. The history provided relating to the subject of discussion has been provided in a complicated chronology that mixes it up with irrelevant issues. Further, the author provided excessive details in this section that requires briefing as opposed to detailing. It is in the introductory part of the paper where the author provides a detailed history of public education, detailed history and history development and minimization of racial discrimination.
Further, it is in the introductory part of the paper where we have historical revelations of women’s participation and concern on issues relating to consumption of public goods. There is nothing wrong with having these issues relayed on the paper but there is something wrong with having them placed in the introductory part of the paper. The introduction should aim at capturing the attention of the reader and creating suspicion so that the reader gets an enough reason to continue reading. Any flow-oriented interferences, complications and discussions that are not introductory should be avoided to avoid a cumbersome introduction. In conclusion, having a detailed introduction is not entirely wrong. It becomes wrong if it hampers the readers ability to read and understand the introduction of the paper.
Dominating Theory over Presentation
Professional papers should strike a balance between the theoretical section of the paper and the presentation section. Presentations should not dominate over the theory neither should the theory dominate over the presentations. In the paper, the authors used more theory than the presentations to a large extent. In fact, the whole content runs through without any presentations. There are no diagrams or graphs. This is unfortunate considering that the nature of the topic of discussion has so many variables that ought to be discussed. The only presentations that appear are at the end of the paper in the appendix section of the paper. In the content development, there are no presentations for calibrations for real data. The failure to interpret the data using presentation places the reader in a, rather, rough and poor position to comprehend the content especially when such readers are interested in integrated wholesome views.
The idea to include all manner of presentations at the appendix is not entirely wrong, but the reader’s ability to comprehend a paper is higher when such data is summarized with a presentation immediately after the content rather than later in the paper. Further, presentations relating to the direct ideas of the author should not be placed in the appendix but immediately after such ideas have been developed. It is, therefore, recommended that the authors adopt several presentation methods and incorporate them into the work for the benefit of the reader, their work, and other interested persons. The work becomes comprehensive and relevant even to laymen who would otherwise not bother what the work is all about. Besides, it is easy for scholars to source conclusive data from presentations than in theory.
Minor Comments and Suggestions
The abstract fails to satisfy the requirements of a typical abstract in a professional paper like this one. Besides, its content fails to provide summative information for the whole content as a result of its brief nature. A typical abstract is expected to provide, briefly, the research focus, data sources, data reconstruction methods, results and findings and the main conclusions and recommendations of the paper.
The paper has excessively used vocabularies that make it hard for readers, especially laymen, to comprehend. Vocabularies run throughout the whole paper from the introduction, through the body to the conclusion. Research papers should be developed upholding simplicity; using simple English as they are meant to be informative. Failure to use simple English leads to failure to achieve the main purpose of the paper.
On page 34, the last paragraph sentence 2 reads: ‘the annual treatment effect on black expenditures increases more slowly after 1921 and tapers off more quickly in the 1930s (Panel C)’ (Carruther & Marianne, 34) This sentence has a grammatical error where it uses a comparative word ‘more’ without ensuring that such words are followed by ‘than’. The sentence, therefore, portrays incomplete comparison.
On page 18 the second paragraph, the first sentence reads: ‘the possibility that black spending increased at all following the enfranchisement of predominantly white women evokes Myrdal’s (1944) paradox: given widespread disenfranchisement of blacks in the South, why were they provided any public services?’ (Carruther & Marianne, 18). It is not clear what the authors intended to mean when composing this sentence and amending it would be an important step towards improving its quality.
Work Cited
Carruthers, Celleste, and Marianne Wanamaker. Municipal Housekeeping': The Impact of Women' Suffrage on Public Education. 1st ed. Cambridge, MA 02138: Cambridge University, 2015. Print.
