Poor Writing Skills In Corporate America

The real world’s standards are constantly evolving, growing ever more demanding on the public education system, yet despite this the primary indicator used for the success of the public education system is the high school graduation rate. The high school graduation rate is a deeply flawed statistic conceived many decades ago and hasn’t changed at all, failing to encompass better and broader definitions for public education system success. However, the focus on critical writing skills at New Dorp High School had the effect of dramatically increasing the school’s graduation rate from 63 percent before the “writing revolution” to 80 percent (Tyre). At face value the increase is a tremendous success, but just because a student can graduation high school does not mean they have the technical skills to prepare them for college or the workforce. A list of the fastest growing occupations in the United States provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics mostly includes jobs from the medical field or occupations that require

“Some people say I was lucky to survive, other will say I deserved it for the choice I made. I’m here to say I was lucky, it’s never ok to say your life isn’t worth living even at your worst you can always look forward tomorrow will come and if you put your mind to it you’ll see that anything is possible.” – Stephen McGregor Professional Paralympian

Ballenger, Bruce. “The Importance of Writing Badly.” The Curious Writer. Custom Publishing. 2008. pp. 45–47.

Most elements of writing (development, organization, and style) fit task, purpose, and audience. Some identifiable mismatches.

Fortunately, writing is a skill that can be both taught and practiced to a point

Employers and educators realize the importance of good writing skills but many business employees have writing deficiencies, costing American businesses billions of dollars every year. According to a study conducted by the National Commission on Writing (NCW) in 2004, American businesses may spend close to $3.1 billion yearly on the remediation of employees’ writing deficiencies. Consequently, employers are dissatisfied with employees writing skills and even more disappointed in the skills of new college graduates.

The National Writing Project is one of the oldest teaching networks in the United States. This program uses the principles of good writing instruction as a way to encourage teacher development. In chapter 6 of Awaking the Sleeping Giant one learns that today more than ever, schools must cultivate teacher leadership. This can be accomplished through The National Writing Project by providing teachers the voice and ownership they need and therefore aids in influencing teacher leadership strategies.

Society today places so much emphasis on attending a liberal arts college in order to get a degree and succeed in life. The only problem is that liberal arts colleges do not gurantee a job after graduation. Students are going into school expecting to graduate and be able to find a job, but then they find out it is not that easy. The value on liberal arts education is too high compared to the benefits. Results of interviews showed that after getting a job, the employee then had to learn on the job how to use the proper writing style required. Future research should look towards toning down the specialization of writing programs in higher education in order to cover a broader background and better prepare students.

I chose to interview Gabby Turner, who is a graphic designer and social media strategist. She works for a non-profit organization called Ekhaya Youth Project, which provides support to families involved in the Louisiana Mental Health Services. After discussing the importance of strong writing and the function of grammar within her profession with Ms. Turner, I discovered new information about my future career path. She explained that strong writing plays an important role in her career because of the effect it has on her image. If she presents an idea through an email or presentation and her writing is not strong, then potential clients or co-workers may view her as inferior. Ms. Turner believes that although strong writing is important, in

“Potential employers also look carefully at writing ability. And once you’re employed, your writing skills contribute to your success on the job.” (Rowh !9). This quote is a good quote because it touches on the ability of writing being what employers look

Today marks the end of an era on the certified master tech blog. I traded in my 2009 Cadillac SRX for an infiniti M37x. This is not something that I wanted to do. In this post I'll explain why I felt I had no choice, but to bail out before things got ugly. At the end I'll talk a little about why I chose the Infiniti over another Cadillac. I'll also share a picture of my new car.

A blue house, red shutters, and a white picket fence with a border collie. Three kids are running around in the front lawn up on a hilltop. That is what the American dream is right? The American dream is truly in the eye of the beholder. One might think that the American dream is an apartment in downtown Los Angeles, but others might want the smell of fresh cut grass in a small suburb. It’s whatever the person who is working for it wants it to be. As we can see in the play, all of the main characters might be striving for an American dream, but none of them are striving for their same American dream.

In the article, it blatantly states that bad business writing in the cause of slowing a company down and creating a non-beneficial work environment. Issues arise from unprofessional and uneducated writing causing employees to use valuable time to read unorganized memos when they can be doing beneficial work. Entry-level employees are introduced to this poorly written phenomenon because they are not trained well when it comes to writing.

Incompetence in literature is on the rise in today’s society. “Students in two- and four-year colleges have the greatest difficulty with quantitative literacy: approximately 30 percent of students in two-year institutions and nearly 20 percent of students in 4-year institutions have only basic quantitative literacy.” (cite) In “The Shadow Scholar”, Jonathan Barkat tells the story of Ed Dante, a ghost writer who is paid significantly well for writing numerous papers for higher education students. “The Shadow Scholar” not only illustrates the ghost writing community, but also exposes serious flaws in the educational system and shows just how far students are willing to go in the quest for academic perfection.

The major concern was that students both past and present did not meet the expectations of professional writing. These complaints were expressed by both corporate executives and graduate faculty. The situation was summed up at a curriculum review meeting. They may have the greatest ideas in the world but, if they cannot express them clearly and persuasively in simple paragraph form, that is clear, concise, and grammatically correct, they are of no use to the company.