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(0 votes) 9:45 am
November 17, 2011
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I disagree with the statement that universities should accept equal proportion of male and female students in each subject. My reason is that male and female genetically differ in capacity in different subjects. It is, actually, students’ potential and interest that determines what they should learn, rather than the aim to realize equality in number in every subject.
It is widely acknowledged that nature and nurture are equally important to an individual’s achievement. In order to be more effective to nurture a person, his or her natural gift should be taken into consideration. Scientific research has proved that men and women are different in being good at different tasks. Thus it is more sensible to allocate students to subjects they prefer as well as are good at, regardless of whether the number in gender is equal or not. This statement is also supported by the fact that there are more girls than boys in arts majors like language learning and the fact that males learning scientific subjects like computing evidently outnumber their female counterparts.
Other may argue that to accept equal number of girls and boys in a subject is beneficial for students’ overall development, because they can learn from the opposite sex (e.g., consideration of girls; toughness of boys). They are right in this sense, but I think this is not the most important, because learning qualities from an opposite sex can also be achieved by making friends in other majors.
To conclude, we should keep a clear perspective in mind that attending university is an opportunity for individuals to stretch their potential into full play. What is really essential when choosing a subject is the students’ interest and natural talent. Therefore, it is absurd for universities to accept equal number of male and female students in every subject.
8:18 pm
Hi Sophia and thanks for this second excellent essay!
In your introduction, I really like the first two sentences. The third one, I think, needs to be a little more equal or parallel:
It is, actually, students’ potential and interest that determines what they should learn, rather than the aim to realize equality in number in every subject.
Alternatives might be:
Our students’ potential and interest should determine their choice of study, rather than a bureaucrat's decision ruling to have equal numbers on every course.
Or perhaps better, because shorter:
Our students’ potential and passion, not some bureaucratic rule, should determine their choice of study.
Sophia, with your excellent level of writing, you don’t need to rely on stock phrases like “It is widely acknowledged that” and especially, “Scientific research has proved…” What happens if you leave them out? Your essay becomes stronger, not weaker, because you are stating your opinion. It’s an opinion essay, not a research paper: we don’t need to back our opinions up with passives or appeals to authority.
One tiny point: did you choose to use the word ‘different’ twice deliberately? In that case it could be a style decision, but with only 250 words in IELTS to demonstrate your range of vocabulary perhaps it’s better not to use related words close together.
men and women are different in being good at different tasks.
For example, it would be weak to say
“The company produces many products on its production lines.”
Finally it's worth remembering that many nouns and noun phrases can be replaced with verbs. This can give more life and energy to sentences, particularly long ones.
To conclude, we should keep a clear perspective in mind that attending university is an opportunity for individuals to stretch their potential into full play.
To conclude, we should remember that attending university allows individuals [an opportunity] to develop fully.
I'm not suggesting that the second version is better - with four fewer nouns, it just represents another approach or style decision. Something for your toolbox!
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