4b. E-rater: International Students

How international students should tackle the AWA and the E-rater.

     The conventions for the AWA can be summarized in a single statement: written English requires that each paragraph be developed directly away from a topic (or thesis) sentence or directly towards a topic (or thesis) sentence. The former is known as deductive development; the latter is known as inductive development. Since this is the case for all English written prose it should be obvious that writers in English have less freedom to wander from the main point of their discourse than writers in other languages. English expository prose style must be direct and to the point even though it is necessary to support each main idea with examples, explanations, and illustrations. The thesis (or topic sentence) must contain the germ of the idea that permeates the entire paragraph. Each example or illustration must be connected to that idea with transitional markers such as for example, thus, or moreover.

The E-rater speaks "American"

     Your essays should be written in "American", not "English". Phrases that are more commonly spoken in English (indeed, hence, etc..) are less common in "American." Phrases that are commonly spoken in English are unlikely to be picked up by the E-rater, which picks up phrases used among high scorers (who are overwhelmingly American).

    Students from the U.K., Hong Kong, India and other Commonwealth nations should adjust their syntax, style and language to better suit the flavor of English used in America. That is the language of the E-rater. Since the "6" essays stored in the E-rater were primarily written by Americans, you must make sure your writing style is American. Avoid any local jargon or particularly any unusual transitional phrases (e.g. "heretofore"). Got that mate? In addition, the overwhelmingly American graders will have an easier time with arguments written in American.

    The solution is to read all of our sample essays and American scholarly journals to see how American writers structure arguments.

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