📝 How real are the solutions in your essay? 📝

When I check essays that that involve coming up with solutions (e.g. questions like, "How can this be addressed? How can this problem be solved? How can the effects of this be mitigated?"), I see the same problem - the solutions are not real solutions in that it's not clear who will be implementing them and how.

Have a look at one paragraph written by a student (mildly edited by me for conciseness) and try to assess it from this point of view - are the solutions real solutions?❓

🗒 Topic: mitigating the effects of fast fashion on the environment

🗒 "There are several ways this can be achieved. Opting for better-quality garments, for example, could essentially decrease the amount of clothes that are dumped and the fashion's environmental destructiveness on the whole. Breaking the linear model and choosing a more circular one is another way out, allowing to give clothes a second life and a chance for reuse. This means that recycling technology is to be improved, on the one hand, while some fibres are to be sacrificed due to their complicated recycling process, on the other. ... "

The ideas are valid, but we don't see who will be implementing them and how. Btw, did you notice that the paragraph doesn't have a single "doer"? The "doers" in this specific essay could be consumers, fashion companies, governments.

Let's scrutinize the first sentence and try to brainstorm for more specific ideas.

🗒 "Opting for better-quality garments, for example, could essentially decrease the amount of clothes that are dumped and the fashion's environmental destructiveness on the whole."

Who will be doing that? OK, consumers. But why aren't they doing that now? Better-quality garments are more expensive. Then maybe shops/brands can give out discount coupons for old clothes brought for recycling. Or maybe consumers will want to buy more expensive items after they find out what impact fast fashion has on the environment. How will they find that out? From documentaries or social media or even classes at school - this can be implemented by journalists and schools, possibly subsidized by governments or even fashion companies themselves.

This is the thinking process that will help you find solutions that will sound specific and that can actually be implemented.

Because... if solutions like "sustainability should be pursued" or "children should be provided with good education" or "poor people should be provided with governmental support" worked, we wouldn't have any problems at all.

So make sure your solutions don't sound vague and the reader can clearly see who will be implementing them and how.