As a consultant that helps other students with writing, I see many strange things from people with half finished essays. The one that grabs the trophy, however, was incredibly ridiculous. At the beggining of a students work, they talked about how Abraham Lincoln and George Washington had a conversation. Not only did it have nothing to do with their central theme of Lincoln being the best president, but I gaurentee you they did not have multiple people help review their work. We did get them the help they needed, and through multiple peoples advice, it was transformed into a pretty good persuasive essay. When searching for help, whether it's with editing a school paper, or understanding concepts that are confusing for you in a difficulty subject, it's always important to look for more than one opinion. If you were to only ask a singe individual, their response could be flawed for many, many reasons. When you consult multiple people, however, the room for error decreases significantly.

For example, if you needed to write an unbiased paper on the pros and cons of making abortion legal, asking more than one person would limit the scope of the bias. If you only asked one individual, their statements could be tainted if they had a preexisting opinion on the topic. However, if you were to consult multiple people, the scope of the bias would be severely limited. The more people, the less bias you risk, so asking only one individual could end up ruining a supposedly unbiased report. Not only is bias a problem to consider when asking individuals, making sure their statements are accurate can be equally if not more important.

When asking people for advice, you must always consider whether what they're saying is actually true. Bias is incredibly important to weed out, but often fact checks can also help root out some bias too. Biased individuals are more likely to lie or include misleading statements in their advice. By discovering false or misleading statements, you can also discover hidden bias in the individual. None of us are always right, so people have mistaken opinions about many topics. When looking for help, you always run the risk of including false information from a well meaning individual, as you have nobody to fact check them against. You have no way to tell if what they're saying is true, and, if they deliver it more confidently, you may already be convinced it's a fact. Luckily, when you ask multiple people, and fact check all of their statements against one another, you can assure yourself a significantly smaller chance of obtaining false information. Although fact checking against other people can certainly help, there are other ways, including searching on Google or looking it up with a textbook, to fact check correctly. However, some statements are simply opinions and cannot be fact checked, only compared to other people's opinions.

When attempting to rephrase a sentence that sounds strange or incorrect, or when trying to add more detail and glamour to an otherwise boring sentence, there is no right or wrong answer. Certain techniques may work better or worse, but there is never a fix all type solution. So when taking advice from someone who, for example, is helping you edit your paper, some things they say you cannot fact check with Google or a textbook. If you were to only consult this individual, they would have full control, and may make suggestions that aren't the best for your paper. That's why, especially when dealing with highly opinionated topics like rephrasing sentences and adding additional detail, its crucial to consult multiple people and make sure most agree with your changes to ensure they're the best for your paper. Oftentimes in a writing help after school club I'm a part of, we have to deal with problems like these where students need more detail, but there's really no right and wrong way to phrase the sentence. That's why we consult each other to make sure every change we make is for the good of that persons writing.

Wednesdays, after school, I work as a consultant to the writing center. In the club, younger students, usually from seventh grade, come to get help with their writing from older, more experienced students. Many times, seventh graders come in with half finished essays that could barely be considered rough drafts, but as it turns out they've already turned them in and need to re-write them for a higher grade. The process can be difficult, and sometimes grueling if the seventh grader doesn't want to and cooperate, but I still love consulting. Working there is a joy, but one of the things that really makes us able to go above and beyond to help other students is the ability to cross check with other consultants and work together. Often, seventh graders are assigned only one consultant to help them with their work. However, like I've said above, one persons opinion can definitely be flawed. This is why we employ many talented consultants, so if one doesn't know what to do or accidentally makes a mistake, others can catch it and further assist them.

Asking multiple people for advice, no mater the topic, is always an important and crucial step of the writing process. By asking multiple people, you assure the least bias possible, the highest form of fact checking, the best way to phrase sentences and other similar opinionated subjects, and you ensure none of those you seek advice from made mistakes.