Search results for 'tag:Exclamation marks tag:Universities' matching tags 'Exclamation marks' and 'Universities'

Re: Motivation letter

ferpectedit — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 17:39:24 GMT

Although this letter (which is too long to review in full) is grammatically correct (with some awkward wording) I would change the tone. In the opening sentence I would use a much stronger word than "considering": it makes you sound like you're not serious about your career. "Planning" would be a better choice. My revision would be

I am planning a career in neuropharmacology and want to enter your PhD program to build on the work I have done here at ** University.

The exclamation points in the letter should all be eliminated. Although you should include your interest in study abroad and your reassurance to the program that you will be able to learn French, you should cut those two points to a bare minimum and not use them as an introduction. Your main emphasis should be your experience in neuropharmacology and neuroscience. Good luck!

Punctuate your posts, says research

matthewg — Mon, 20 Sep 2004 19:21:03 GMT

Focus Magazine, September 04:

Correspondence is taking longer to read because of poorly punctuated email, according to optometrists at the University of Bradford. They discovered that missing fullstops and capital letters are behind the time-wasting trend.

View the full press release here.

By not punctuating your posts on the forums, you are also wasting everyone's time. It is very easy to capitalise letters on a PC keyboard, so while laziness is excusable for SMS messages, it isn't for posts. Common habits which are very annoying include:

Multiple question marks/exclamation marks, where one will do. Example here.
Converting the personal pronoun "I" to "i." Example here.
Dot overload. Example here.
No spaces after punctuation marks. Example here.
Minimalist punctuation. Example here.

Please add your own pet hates.

Need Help. Thank you.

Mister Micawber — Sun, 15 Aug 2004 14:15:05 GMT

Easy! Just write something and post it here. Someone will help you correct it. For example:

"Hello, everyone. My name is Ann. I've just graduated from university and am hunting for a job now. Someone said that my oral English is quite good, but my written English is vefy poor. I dont know how to improve my written English-- by reading books and newspapers? I hope that someone here can give me some advice! Thank you very much!"

Rule 1: Be thrifty with exclamation marks; one is always sufficient.
Rule 2: Do not write as you speak. Be more careful in grammar and sentence structure, and more formal in vocabulary.