363 Portfolio Cover Letter Peer Review Sheet

Cover Letter Writer: Victor Espinoza Reviewer: Jeff Leister

Please note the word requirements in parentheses at the end of each question and give the most
specific advice that you can.

1. Does the letter directly address ALL six of our student learning outcomes? (10-20 words:
Yes/No, which?).

4 out of 6 SLOs were included here

2. Does the letter support its claims about how the portfolio demonstrates the writers
achievement of our SLOs with specific evidence from actual portfolio documents?
Heres an example of specific evidence: In the third paragraph of my definition of
fracking, I define aquifer in parentheses because I know my audiencegeneral
readers of Wikipediamay not know that specialized term. On the other hand, Ive
included academic words like rhetorical in this cover letter without defining them,
because I know that my audienceDr. Bruceknows what these academic terms mean.
This shows that I have learned part of SLO 1, which says I should be able to write to a
variety of audiences. (And yes, you can refer to parts of your cover letter as Ive done
here to show youve mastered an SLO). (1 word: Yes/No/Sometimes)

SLO 3 could use a more concrete example for support. Maybe specific portion of a
document that demonstrates each SLO would help

3. Were there arguments (claims with evidence) that youd particularly like to see
improved, or that youd simply like to praise? (50-100 words)

I thought SLO 1 and 2 were claimed and supported well. They were very clear what
component supported the SLO and how. SLO 3 and 4 were a little less supported. They
could use a more specific example and maybe clarify how it applies to the criteria.

4. Is the letter organized logically and efficiently, or could you suggest ways to improve the
organization (topic sentences, transitions, P order, statement of purpose, intro/conclusion)
(40-50 words)?

Organized by SLO, which is very effective. I definitely felt the letter flowed well. It just
needs the last 2.

5. Does the cover letter use letter formatting (20-30 words)?

The formatting matches the formatting used in the example letters so this looks good.
6. Are the letters sentences effective and clear? Could the writer use our sentence
strategies (e.g., active, vigorous verbs or reducing prepositions) to be more concise? (40-
50 words)

Sentence structure seems really well done, one or two errors but nothing major. The
sentences are easy to read and understand.