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07 Apr 2013, 07:00
The following appeared in a proposal for a high school's annual fundraising event:
"In order to earn the most money for supplemental school programs, we will have larger and more thrilling rides at this year's School Fair, including a ferry wheel that is twice as tall as last year's ferry wheel. In addition, the game vendors will award more expensive prizes and the food stalls will showcase a variety of upscale international dishes. As a result, we will be able to charge a higher entrance fee and the dollar amount we earn via our commission on the vendors' revenues will be higher than it was last year."
My Solution:
Argument says that in order to earn good amount of money for supplemental school programs there must be some changes in activities in coming School Fair. The conclusion is based on the premise that due to more interactive fair school will earn more via higher entrance fee and commission from the vendors. However, the argument misses seminal assumptions needed for the conclusion to be true.
First, argument claims to use ferry wheel twice taller than previous year’s. But it does not considered increased expenses to install taller ferry wheel. It may possible that the revenue from tickets is lesser than installation cost of such huge ferry wheel. Argument also says that this year’s fair will have larger and more thrilling rides. But age group of students studying in school is not considered. If it is a primary school with students of age group 5-12 years then students won’t go for thrilling rides and revenues will remain low.
Second, argument claims that the game vendors will award more expensive prizes and the food stalls will showcase a variety of upscale international dishes. But it does not mention the expenses for installing such games and food stalls with more expensive prizes and international dishes. Also, students may not be familiar with most of the international dishes and hence won’t buy them reducing the revenues of vendors which in turn reduce commission and funds for supplemental school programs. If games have expensive prizes then they might be complicated and small age group students may find them difficult to play. Hence games stalls’ target audience reduces, reducing the revenues and funds for school programs.
At last, argument claims to charge a higher entrance fee. If fair publicity team fails to publicize the changes effectively then there are chances of lesser audience for the fair because of higher entrance charges. Also amount of commission set from vendor is not mentioned. There are chances that this commission plus earning form tickets is lesser than the cost required to make changes for school fair.
In conclusion, argument is flawed and misses seminal assumptions. The vast changes in activities of School fair may lead to lesser funds than the previous year because of the reasons presented above. Argument can be improved by providing the age group of the students and the cost required for such changes.