The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been

Question

The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been initiated on the part of suppliers of public education have been insufficient. Therefore, reforms must be demanded by consumers. Parents should be given government vouchers with which to pay for their children’s education and should be allowed to choose the schools at which the vouchers will be spent. To attract students, academically underachieving schools will be forced to improve their academic offerings.

The argument assumes that

(A) in selecting schools parents would tend to prefer a reasonable level of academic quality to greater sports opportunities or more convenient location.

(B) improvement in the academic offerings of schools will be enforced by the discipline of the job market in which graduating students compete.

(C) there is a single best way to educate students.

(D) children are able to recognize which schools are better and would influence their parents’ decisions.

(E) schools would each improve all of their academic offerings and would not tend to specialize in one particular field to the exclusion of others.

Source: LSAT

samwui94 · Answer

I really want the answer to be D. I don't know how or in what way this passage had anything to do with sports. The whole conclusion and the premise revolve around allowing schools to compete to better their ACADEMIC standing relative to other schools. WHY A???????

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

Simplify the argument first -

Concern
 Reforms on part of suppliers are insufficient --> Reforms must be demanded by consumers.

Suggestion made -
 Parents will be given vouchers to pay fees + they will be allowed to choose the schools at which vouchers will be spent --> Underachieving schools will be forced to improve academic offerings --> Improves quality of public education

Let us look at the answer options -

Option A - Correct Answer.
Negate this.
"parents would not tend to prefer a reasonable level of academic quality to greater sports opportunities or more convenient location." - this then affects the suggestion made. This means that even if the academic quality is poor, parents might still prefer those scores because of greater sports opportunities or convenience of location.
Then, underachieving schools will have no incentive to improve education quality.

Option B - Incorrect.
It is not necessary that "job market" has to enforce improvement in academic offerings. The argument is that empowering parents to choose schools enforces improvement in academic offerings.

Option C - Incorrect.
No such assumption is required. There can be multiple ways.

Option D - Incorrect.
Negate this. 
"children are not able to recognize which schools are better and would influence their parents’ decisions." - but if parents are able to recognize that, the argument will not be weakened. Negating this does not weaken the argument. Incorrect.

Option E - Incorrect.
"schools would each improve all of their academic offerings ..." - not necessary. Even improvement of some offerings will still be an improvement.

bobnil · Answer

I need the e-GMAT 3-steps process to pre-think this assumption question.

auradediligodo · Answer

The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been initiated on the part of suppliers of public education have been insufficient. Therefore, reforms must be demanded by consumers. Parents should be given government vouchers with which to pay for their children’s education and should be allowed to choose the schools at which the vouchers will be spent. To attract students, academically underachieving schools will be forced to improve their academic offerings.

The argument assumes that
 
  Assumption question

Pre-thinking

Our task here is to find a  MUST BE TRUE STATEMENT  .

Falsification scenario:   What if a significant number of parents prefer to put their children in academically non demanding schools? For example they might acknowledge that their children are not geniuses and feel more comfortable in putting them in more relaxed environments... In such case the improvement in quality won't occur.. and the argument breaks.

Assumption:   significant number of parents would put their children in academically achieving schools

POE:

(A)   in selecting schools parents would tend to prefer a reasonable level of academic quality to greater sports opportunities or more convenient location.
 In line with pre-thinking

(B) improvement in the academic offerings of schools will be enforced by the discipline of the job market in which graduating students compete.
 still we don't know about the preference of the parents..

(C) there is a single best way to educate students.
 too extreme and out of scope

(D) children are able to recognize which schools are better and would influence their parents’ decisions.
 better in terms of.... academic subjects or sports...?

(E) schools would each improve all of their academic offerings and would not tend to specialize in one particular field to the exclusion of others.
  irrelevant

rohanrale · Answer

The argument type is Conclusion - Premise.

Conclusion is - The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been initiated on the part of suppliers of public education have been insufficient.  Therefore, reforms must be demanded by consumers. .

The argument says that to improve the quality of education, parents should be in charge of the reform process

Now use the negation method.

If option A is negated, the conclusion does not hold.
Therefore A is the answer.

Try to negate other options and check whether conclusion holds or not.

unraveled · Answer

The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been initiated on the part of suppliers of public education have been insufficient. Therefore, reforms must be demanded by consumers. Parents should be given government vouchers with which to pay for their children’s education and should be allowed to choose the schools at which the vouchers will be spent. To attract students, academically underachieving schools will be forced to improve their academic offerings.

The argument assumes that

(A) in selecting schools parents would  tend to prefer a reasonable level of academic quality to  greater sports opportunities or more convenient location. - CORRECT. If not then there is problem. Academic offerings by academically underachieving schools would be captured by parents and holds the passage well.

(B) improvement in the academic offerings of schools  will be enforced by the discipline of the job market  in which graduating students compete. - WRONG. Irrelevant.

(C) there is a  single best way to educate students . - WRONG. Extreme claim.

(D)  children  are able to recognize which schools are better and would influence their parents’ decisions. - WRONG. Intriguing but children is not in the scope of the passage. They may influence but for that we need to assume further that children is part of the discussion which is not the case here.

(E) schools  would each improve all of their academic offerings  and  would not tend to specialize  in one particular field to the exclusion of others. - WRONG.  Falters with the red text. Irrelevant second part.

Answer A.

The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been

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The reforms to improve the quality of public education that have been

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615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

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