EU individual paragraph

Paragraph brainstorming

Original paragraph

Each year the European Union (EU) announces a new focus for the coming year. As it is very important to choose a serious topic to focus on, the EU carefully decides what would be the most worthwhile topic to concentrate on throughout the year. The Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE), which supports the well-being of families, proposed that 2014 should be the year to improve the quality of the lives of European citizens. After receiving several positive reactions from the European Parliament and the European Commission, the COAFCE started the campaign "European Year for Reconciling Work and Family Life" for 2014. This topic is considered to be of growing importance, as inequality, social exclusion, and high levels of unemployment constitute the main issues nearly every family is facing today. The campaign will have four core themes, which aim to address and remedy these issues. All in all I consider the 2014 European Year to be truly useful because it not only plans on ensuring work family life balance and improving social integration, but also continues pursuing policy aim from the previous years.

[186 words]

Feedback summary 1

• Change the topic sentence (mention the focus in the topic sentence)
• Leave out or change second sentence

I decided to rewrite the whole paragraph because I did not like the first version after reading over it.

Second Paragraph

Each year the European Union (EU) announces a new focus and they designated 2014 to be the European Year for Reconciling Work and Family Life. As there are several matters that need addressing, it is very important to choose a serious topic to concentrate on throughout the year. Inequality, social exclusion, and high levels of unemployment constitute the main issues nearly every family is facing today. Therefore, the Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE) proposed that 2014 should be the year to improve the quality of the lives of European citizens. After receiving a number of positive reactions from the European Parliament and the European Commission, the COAFCE started the campaign for 2014. The campaign will have four core themes, which aim to address and remedy the above mentioned issues. Besides planning on ensuring work family life balance and improving social integration, the organizations also continues pursuing policy aims from the previous years. All in all the 2014 European Year is going to be truly useful as it provides a great opportunity to concentrate on work and family life balance policies at the same time.
[188 words] 

Feedback summary 2

• Leave out “and” in the topic sentence à rewrite it
• Several matters --> unclear
• Second sentence to general
• Second sentence: I found out that “need to be addressed” is used more frequently than “need addressing” (especially in academic texts).
• Rewrite the concluding sentence
• In my final paragraph I want to have the exact word count

Final paragraph

The European Union (EU) decided to designate 2014 as the European Year for Reconciling Work and Family Life. Throughout the year they are going to focus on family life balance policies and work, as inequality, social exclusion, and high levels of unemployment constitute the main issues nearly every family is facing today. Therefore, the Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE) proposed that 2014 should be the year to improve the quality of the lives of European citizens. After receiving a number of positive reactions from the European Parliament and the European Commission, the COAFCE started the campaign for 2014. The campaign will have four core themes, which aim to address and remedy the above mentioned issues. Besides planning on ensuring work family life balance and improving social integration, the organizations also continues pursuing policy aims from the previous years. All in all the 2014 European Year is going to be truly useful as it provides a great possibility to resolve the increasing conflict between family and work life with whom families all over Europe have to deal.

[180 words] 

Corrected final paragraph
The European Union (EU) decided (tense) to designate 2014 as the European Year for Reconciling Work and Family Life. Throughout the year they are going (tense) to focus on family life balance policies and work, as inequality, social exclusion, and high levels of unemployment constitute the main issues nearly every family is facing today. Therefore (ref.?), the Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE) proposed that 2014 should be the year to improve the quality of the lives of European citizens. After receiving a number of positive reactions from the European Parliament and the European Commission, the COAFCE started the campaign for 2014. The campaign will have four core themes, which aim to address and remedy the above mentioned (punct.) issues. Besides planning on ensuring work family life balance (punct.) and improving social integration, the organizations also continues pursuing policy aims from the previous years. All in all the 2014 European Year is going to be truly useful as it provides a great possibility (MNN) to resolve the increasing conflict between family and work life with whom families all over Europe have to deal.

The European Union (EU) has decided to designate 2014 as the European Year for Reconciling Work and Family Life as a way to ensure the balance on family life and work. Today families face certain obstacles such as inequality, social exclusion, and high levels of unemployment. Therefore, the Confederation of Family Organisations in the European Union (COFACE) proposed that 2014 should be the year to improve the quality of the lives of European citizens. After receiving positive feedback from the European Parliament and the European Commission, the COFACE started the campaign for 2014. The campaign will have four core themes, which aim to address and remedy the above-mentioned issues. Besides ensuring work/family life balance and improving social integration, the EU also continues pursuing policy aims from the previous years, such as to make people aware of the many ways they can take advantages of the EU. All in all the 2014 European Year is going to be truly useful as it provides a great opportunity to resolve the increasing conflict between family and work life with which families all over Europe have to deal.