Frank Bruni has been a White House correspondent and a chief
restaurant critic. He has written for the New York Times about a variety of
topics and is the author of two New York Times best sellers. Clearly an
experienced writer, his essay How to
Measure a College’s Value sends a powerful message to parents and students
about the importance (or unimportance) of selecting a prestigious college. Frank
Bruni analyzes the findings of the Gallup-Purdue Index surveys and explains
that the survey measures the success of college graduates through asking about
“their relationships, their physical health, their community, their economic
situation and their sense of purpose” (Bruni). He then employs logos when he
lists the statistical results that show that the “percentage of graduates who described themselves
as thriving in all five of those areas varied little based on the kind of
school they’d attended” (Bruni). He continually shares survey results that reveal
his argument and stress the message that “what college gives you hinges almost
entirely on what you give it.” (Bruni).
Bruni begins his essay by
ranting about a common topic in modern-day news: the most highly-ranked
colleges. He utilizes rhetorical questions in order to show that his purpose is
to establish the answers to the questions he poses. One of these questions is:
“But what do we know, in the end, about the relationship between a student’s
college experience and his or her actual satisfaction with it down the road?”
(Bruni). He then successfully answers this question throughout his article,
simultaneously accomplishing his purpose, with the logistical help of the results
of the Gallup-Purdue Index Survey. Bruni’s use of logos and the way he hooked
the reader in the beginning of the essay are both rhetorical strategies that
contribute to his successful argument that basically restates the phenomenon
that you get out what you put in. Translated into this context, your college
experience is what you make of it, no
matter what college you attend. This message is obviously directed at
parents and students who are overly-concerned and stressing over the college
search process. By acknowledging that “The news media swoons over and trumpets
[which colleges are hardest to get into]” (Bruni), Bruni utilizes pathos by
sympathizing with those who are searching for the right college in the midst of
the modern-day hype. In summary, Bruni’s message has been received and is
currently being processed by this reader.
No comments:
Post a Comment