RUNNING

HEAD: Genre Analysis Essay

Genre Analysis Essay
Angela Esquerra
English 1312
September 17th 2014
Professor PJ Vierra

Genre Analysis Essay

Financial Aid

When analyzing two genre articles a scholarly and non-scholarly about

financial aid such as Does institutional Aid Compensate for or Comply with State
Policy from research in higher education from Research in Higher Education (August
2009) by William R. Doyle, Jennifer A. Delaney and Blake Alan Naughton (scholarly
article) and The NY Times room for debate by Lynn O Shaughnessy (September
2013) who blogs at The College Solution (non-scholarly) the main focus of what to
analyze is simple, the ethos, pathos, and logos. Credibility, emotion, and logic will all
be discussed as well as the audience each article is portraying to and if they both
convey the same purpose/message.

The scholarly article which is a research also conducted by William R. Doyle,

Jennifer A. Delaney and Blake Alan Naughton in Does institutional Aid Compensate
for or Comply with State Policy from research in higher education from Research in
Higher Education (August 2009) talks about state policies and the way the
institutions use the aid are the main factors as to whom receives what. Nevertheless
competition between need-based aid and merit-based aid also portrays a big part of
the aid awarded. The research conducted as a survey, surveyed 63,000 students
from all levels (undergraduate/graduate) from 634 different public universities
states Our results also point to the increasing responsiveness of public institutions
to students academic characteristics between the 2 NPSAS surveys indicating that
these institutions are becoming more heavily involved in competition for highly
qualified students. State policymakers may or may not be aware of the ways in

Genre Analysis Essay

which institutional leaders are using state funds to compete for students. With this
being said this scholarly articles purpose is to inform the audience that yes states
policies do affect the way institutions give aid to students. The audience is much
more selected since scholars and professors are the only audience that would look
for this type of scholarly article information. Ethos/credibility is very much backed
up because of their research and surveys conducted in order to obtain accurate
information the authors are very much passing on knowledge. The pathos/emotion
is very much being clear and neutral on the information. Logos/logic behind it all is
giving the most precise information in order to inform the audience.
The NY Times room for debate according to Lynn O Shaughnessy discusses
how colleges spend less on students who need financial help and they spend it more
on merit scholarships. OShaughnessy gives an example stating Unemployed Mike
and his wife owned home with $800,000 in home equity. Some schools penalized
the family for this equity even though their income put them below the poverty
line. The purpose of this article is to simply give her opinion on the financial aid
subject which states how colleges need to change how they spend their aid on
students however she does not give a solution to the problem. The audience of this
article is for many more people like maybe parents simply because the NY times is a
source that a lot more people are exposed too. The ethos/credibility is only that she
blogs for the college solution, nonetheless she does not pass on knowledge from
other references/sources that is why it is only her opinion. The Pathos/emotion is
based on trying to make her audience (parents) feel a bit conscious of how the
schools spend their money. Logos/logic behind this article is simply giving out an

Genre Analysis Essay

opinion on a trusted web page to many people around the world in order to
persuade the audience.

Differentiating Between Genres

Both articles have the same subject/message, which is trying to inform about
financial aid. As I mentioned before they both start differing on their audiences the
scholarly one has a more narrow audience being scholars, and the non-scholarly
article having a wider range of an audience. The ethos/credibility of both are very
different since the scholarly article passes on knowledge by having a research
conducted as well as mentioning other scholarly articles as examples through out
the article. The non-scholarly does not pass on knowledge at all; it just focuses on
the opinion using an example of a situation that happened to someone. The
pathos/emotion for both articles are very different as well, the scholarly article is
neutral in order to give the information to the audience while the non-scholarly
article uses consciousness of the audience in order to persuade on agreement to her
opinion. The logos/logic of both is different as well because the scholarly article
uses a survey while the non-scholarly does not have any logic behind it.

Opinion of both articles

Both of these articles give interesting information about financial aid, the

non-scholarly article is a bit more interesting however The scholarly article is a

better fit in all of the aspects of ethos, pathos, and logos simply because it passes on
knowledge. As a scholar it is easier for us to trust what we are reading when we

Genre Analysis Essay

know the knowledge is being passed on to us. An opinion simply is irrelevant.

Genre Analysis Essay

Resources
O Shaughnessy, Lynn. Calculations to Establish Financial Need for College Are
Flawed NY times. (6 November 2013). Retrieved on September 19 2014 from
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/11/06/who-should-get-financial-
aid/calculations-to-establish-financial-need-for-college-are-flawed

William R. Doyle, Jennifer A. Delaney, & Blake Alan Naughton. Does institutional aid
compensate for or comply with state policy? Research on Higher Education
Vol.50 No.5 (August 2009). Retrieved on September 19 2014 from http://0-
www.jstor.org.lib.utep.edu/stable/29782938?seq=20&Search=yes&searchText
=does&searchText=institutional&searchText=aid&searchText=compensate&lis
t=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Ddoes%2Binstit
utional%2Baid%2Bcompensate%2B%26amp%3Bacc%3Don%26amp%3Bwc
%3Don%26amp%3Bfc%3Doff&prevSearch=&resultsServiceName=null

Genre Analysis Essay