Amy Cornell in the excerpt titled Fiscal Independence and the College Experience makes strong persuasive arguments regarding the eminent discrepancies in law in relation to the definition of financial independence and goes ahead to describe her struggles in college to make ends meet. She narrates her ordeal from early childhood, having to put up with financial struggles given her mother was an elementary school teacher and his dad an electrician running a mini-shop in the neighborhood. From the onset, she knew that her parents could not support her through college and she had to maneuver through the odds to make something out of herself. This essay discusses the persuasive strategies that the author uses to make the reader connect with her ideas about the classification of financial “independents”.
Firstly, the author justifies her arguments using ethos. Ethos refers to the authority of the author in the specific discipline. In this case, Amy Cornell is an expert writer trained from the University of New Hampshire and acquired a bachelor’s degree. In order, to exert her authority as a competent writer she begins by noting that she uses personal appeal, supports her ideas with evidence and multiple revisions for her work; activities conducted by expert writers. This fact is supported by the first paragraph of the excerpt where she begins by narrating her childhood experiences in Southwestern New Hampshire. She paints a picture of the struggles that she went through in order to justify her plight as she entered college because her parents could not support her through college. In essence, she dexterously applies ethos through her diction and choice of vocabulary, which makes the excerpt appropriate for college level audience. Besides, her arguments are unbiased and fair. More importantly, she introduces her pedigree in the preamble using the correct language and syntax.
Besides, she extensively uses logos to strengthen her persuasions regarding the classification of financial “independents” and “non-independents”. In particular, her arguments regarding the discrepancies in the definition of financial independence is supported by facts, statistics, historical incidents and logically constructed arguments. In particular, in order to justify why it was difficult to meet the $68,000 costs of education as an in-state undergraduate, her statistical computations shows that working for $8 per hour, she needed 8500 hours of dedicated services in order to meet the cost assuming that she paid her expenses from other sources. Due to this logical explanation, it becomes clear to the reader how untenable it was to use that method to meet her undergraduate cost of education. Secondly, she constructs logical arguments to question why she was not classified as an “independent” yet she was paying all her expenses fully without external support. According to the Federal Government, one could only be classified as an independent if they are “..Older than 24years, be an orphan, be a veteran, be a graduate student, be married, have children or have extenuating circumstances (Cornell 120).” Cornell finds the definition of independence null because it excludes people like her who are already independent yet still in college and less than 24years old. In essence, she uses statistical and logical constructions to strengthen her persuasions about the subject matter.
Thirdly, the author uses a strong review of other literature to justify her arguments. In different instances, she quotes other authors and publications to justify her position. In particular, she quotes the Federal Tax System in justifying the argument that the current classification of independence was more stringent than the traditional. According to the Federal Tax System as quoted by Cornell “parents could stop claiming as a dependent on tax returns, give them less than $700.” She argues that the introduction of the new stringent definition of independence saw the cost of in-state education rising from $17,985 from $9.715. From the foregoing, she refers to a publication from Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA), which proposes that if the minimum wage in New Hampshire was not reviewed inflation in in-state costs for undergraduates would make it difficult for many students to meet tuition fees (Cornell 121).
In conclusion, Amy Cornell applies dexterously the three modes of persuasive writing in the excerpt. She uses her expertise in writing to deliver a well-crafted argumentative essay to explain the discrepancies in the classification of independence. Besides, she uses logos, which involves statistical justifications to arguments. Finally, the author reviews the literature about the subject matter to justify her arguments.
References
Cornell, Amy. Fiscal Independence and the College Experience. (n.d). Print.
