GRE essay critique required urgently

[anonymous1290]

Hi ,

Can someone help critic this essay for the GRE issue task part ? Thanks a lot !  

Topic : The perceived greatness of any political leader has more to do with the challenges faced by the leader than with any of his or her inherent skills and abilities

Write a response in which you examine your own position on the statement.Explore to the extent to which you agree or disagree with it and support your reasoning with evidence/examples.

Answer : 

The greatness of various political leaders are measured from the performance of these leaders at their various assigned tasks in their workplace. Most political leaders are expected to have large amounts of inherent skills and abilities. But History recognizes only those leaders that have accomplished one of a kind challenges. This recognition is attributed to a number of factors. Leaders put in more effort when provided a difficult problem. More creativity flows around in such a demanding environment and allows the leaders to differentiate themselves from others.

In a workplace, people are given variety of things to be completed. People are required to understand the task, do extensive research and so on. This cycle of doing tasks such as brainstorming thus requires effort to be done from the employee’s point view. Mr Lee Kuan Yew is often considered the greatest leaders of Singapore history. He is greatly known because he faced a big challenge – conflict between Singapore & Malaysia. Lee Kuan Yew fought for the independence of Singapore and created a country with 4 different races living harmoniously. This does not mean Lee Kuan Yew did not have skills. It was known that Mr Lee pursued his law degree at the University of Cambridge and was a skilled orator. There are statues built in the name of Mr. Lee for his efforts in overcoming the big challenge of leading a multiracial country and not for graduating from Cambridge.  This case study clearly shows that the greatness of a leader is attributed to how much effort is put in for overcoming challenges.  

Secondly, inherent skills is not something that makes a leader stand out. The case study of Mr. Lee showed that he was a good speaker and attended a top notch university. But this is not what makes Mr Lee different from others as there are going to be other political leaders with tons of law degrees from good universities in their pocket. This notion is not only applicable for the ability to have a law degree but also other abilities such as being a good speaker, being able to sway the public towards their opinions. While these are abilities that make leaders stand out from the rest of the world , these on their own can be used as a scale to differentiate the political leaders among themselves .

Facing challenges allows the political leaders to do the “out of the box” thinking. Overcoming the problems with a unique and creative solution is what makes a political leader to be truly great. A great example of this point is the one and only Mahatma Gandhi. If not for his nonviolence movement , he would not have been known as the greatest leader. He was able to improvise on his solution. If before his time , there was already a great leader X who introduced the nonviolence notion .The situation is then turned into a scenario where this great leader X will have stones built in his honor while Mahatma Gandhi ‘s recognition as a great leader would certainly be diminished.

People would argue that these leaders were already famous even before time gave these leaders challenges. While it’s impossible to disprove this opinion and it might also be true that the leaders were highly skilled as otherwise they couldn’t have really been great leaders.  Inherent abilities and skills can tantamount to a political leader’s greatness but not solely. The main measure of political leaders’ greatness is their ability to overcome difficult challenges laid out for them in a ground breaking way.

[Vince Kotchian GRE Prep]

hi, 1290,

I would give this response a 3 or 3.5 Though the first body paragraph illustrates your thesis, the remaining body paragraphs (and your conclusion) do not maintain focus on your argument. I like to remind my students to periodically look back at the prompt so they remember what is being asked.

Best, Vince

[anonymous1290]

Okay sure . 

Thanks for your response . Will improve more on my writing skills.