Hi all! Time for another collection of appalling aberrations as seen in the grammar wasteland!

1. “By preventing new teachers like El Mashoubi to work in public schools, Chatila fears that the lack of workforce will only grow.”
2. “The project includes nine strategic directions, one being to better the environment and…”
3. Ad on Instagram for hearing aids: “Discrete. Modern. Invisible.”

The corrections:

1. The Grammar Cop is “preventing me to love” this sentence, because it is awful! First, one is never prevented “to do” something. Rather, one is prevented from doing something. Second, it is incorrect to say that a “lack” of something will “grow.”* A lack doesn’t “grow”; it gets worse, deteriorates, deepens, diminishes, but does not “grow.” This sentence can be improved as follows: By preventing new teachers like El Mashoubi from working in public schools, Chatila fears that the lack of workforce will only get worse. Simplicity itself!
2. Here we have another annoying grammar mistake, often seen in millennials’ college essays. What’s that you say? This was in an article in The Concordian student newspaper! I rest my case. 😄 Okay! Compare the rotten sentence in #2 above, with this correction: The project includes nine strategic directions, one of which is to better the environment and…
3. “Discrete”? Nope. The word intended in this context was surely discreet, meaning tucked away, not easily visible. (The word “discrete” means separate. Well, see here: https://www.thefreedictionary.com/discrete.)

How can we remember all this? Well it helps to have a photographic memory like the Grammar Cop. 😜

*If you’re still in doubt about the lack/grow thing, take a look at this: “I didn’t plant a garden this year. My lack of vegetables really grew!” Doesn’t work, see?