V11-23

Question

Vclass is planning to introduce their new product Virtual Classroom in the educational market, targeted exclusively at the large schools and colleges with high budgets for expenses in innovative teaching methods. In addition to online live sessions, Virtual Classroom provides interactive learning tools supporting active learning. During free trials for the product in such large schools and colleges, teachers commented that they can, as in a traditional classroom, take advantage of relative cues to make points and to verify that the points have been understood, while students loved to use various learning tools to control their learning pace. Therefore Vclass has a promising future with its current marketing plan.
 
Which of the following choices is a required assumption in drawing the above conclusion appropriately?

A. The initial cost of investment in developing Virtual Classroom is not significantly high.
B. Vclass will not have problems hiring adequately skilled personnel to develop the system software.
C. On a lecture video the students cannot notice the teachers’ gestures as well as they can in a traditional classroom. 
D. Private tutorials are not the only institutions who are allowed to spend on innovative teaching methods that do not require physical attendance in classrooms.
E. Other companies who developed similar products like Virtual Classroom have made profits soon after they launched the product.

Bunuel · Accepted Answer

Official Solution:

Vclass is planning to introduce their new product Virtual Classroom in the educational market, targeted exclusively at the large schools and colleges with high budgets for expenses in innovative teaching methods. In addition to online live sessions, Virtual Classroom provides interactive learning tools supporting active learning. During free trials for the product in such large schools and colleges, teachers commented that they can, as in a traditional classroom, take advantage of relative cues to make points and to verify that the points have been understood, while students loved to use various learning tools to control their learning pace. Therefore Vclass has a promising future with its current marketing plan.
 
Which of the following choices is a required assumption in drawing the above conclusion appropriately?

A. The initial cost of investment in developing Virtual Classroom is not significantly high.
B. Vclass will not have problems hiring adequately skilled personnel to develop the system software.
C. On a lecture video the students cannot notice the teachers’ gestures as well as they can in a traditional classroom. 
D. Private tutorials are not the only institutions who are allowed to spend on innovative teaching methods that do not require physical attendance in classrooms.
E. Other companies who developed similar products like Virtual Classroom have made profits soon after they launched the product.

A. This statement is not a “required” assumption. Even though the initial cost of investment is high, the company may have a promising future.
 
B. This statement is not a “required” assumption. The companies do not require to develop the system software themselves, but may sublet the software development to other companies.
 
C. This statement weakens the argument.
 
 D. CORRECT.  The argument assumes that the success of Vclass depends on the usage of its product in schools and colleges (ref. the wording “targeted exclusively at the large schools and colleges). In other words, these schools and colleges are allowed to and will spend on the product. If private tutorials are the ONLY institutions (hence NOT the schools and colleges) that can spend on this product , then Vclass will not be able to capture the market it has planned for and will not be successful with its current marketing plan, i,.e. to target exclusively large schools and colleges.
 
E. This statement strengthens the argument, but is not a “required” assumption: Vclass need not necessarily have the same outcome as the other companies and even if the other companies did not make profits soon after the launch of the product, subsequently they might.

Answer: D

Bunuel · Answer

The question or/and solution has been revised and edited. Thank you  sayantanc2k  !!!

gemministorm · Answer

I was quite confused, what if 'Private tutorials' overlaps with schools and institutions ?
bcz I did not understand Private tutorials refers to some coaching institutes which is not a formal education institution such as schools.

I have come across many such questions where verbiage and how one interprets the verbiage often impact the reasoning and given GMAT being global, and people from across the globe take exam, how does GMAT mitigate this?

miag · Answer

Hi,

Actually in this case, the definition is quite clear. This is what I got online when I googled it: 
 Private tutorials offer   personalized,  one-on-one or small-group  learning with expert teachers for tailored support in academics or competitive exams.  
 On the other hand, the passage says "  targeted exclusively at the large schools and colleges with high budgets.    
  >> Just based on the wording, you can see they are not the same, and there won't be overlap.   
  As for what you can do in such cases where wording might lead to room for interpretation:   
 
  Write down your interpretation and compare against the solution, and make an error log of where was the mismatch. Was there genuinely an ambiguity in the option, or was there some part you missed?  
  If you misinterpreted the definition, I would suggest making a vocabulary dictionary to keep revising over the course of your exam prep. This helped me tremendously.

Hope this helps!

gullyboy09 · Answer

B. Vclass will not have problems hiring adequately skilled personnel to develop the system software. - This statement is not a “required” assumption. The companies do not require to develop the system software themselves, but may sublet the software development to other companies.

Here, even if they sublet to other companies, it is also a form of hiring someone to develop your system (only difference is this is more of an external, and not in house built), in that way B is still a necessary assumption.  bb  can you opine.

AbhishekP220108 · Answer

Hi  gullyboy09  let me try to help

Vclass is planning to introduce their new product Virtual Classroom in the educational market, targeted exclusively at the large schools and colleges with high budgets for expenses in innovative teaching methods. In addition to online live sessions, Virtual Classroom provides interactive learning tools supporting active learning. During free trials for the product in such large schools and colleges, teachers commented that they can, as in a traditional classroom, take advantage of relative cues to make points and to verify that the points have been understood, while students loved to use various learning tools to control their learning pace. Therefore Vclass has a promising future with its current marketing plan.

Which of the following choices is a required assumption in drawing the above conclusion appropriately?

Conclusion- Vclass has a promising future with its current marketing plan. Why? 
Reason- Free trials showed good sign(  During free trials for the product in such large schools and colleges, teachers commented that they can, as in a traditional classroom, take advantage of relative cues to make points and to verify that the points have been understood, while students loved to use various learning tools to control their learning pace.  ) for a plan to introduce at the LARGE SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES WITH HIGH BUDGET.

Gap- the free trials good sign is an indicator for a promising future for Vclass current marketing plan(marketing plan- to target large schools and colleges  with high budgets for expenses in innovative teaching methods )
So any option's whose negated version breaks the conclusion is our answer

Which of the following choices is a required assumption in drawing the above conclusion appropriately?

A. The initial cost of investment in developing Virtual Classroom is not significantly high.- not capturing the gap

B. Vclass will not have problems hiring adequately skilled personnel to develop the system software.- even if they will have a problem, it can still be a success. Having problems doesn't mean they won't overcome them. This is an operational hurdle, not a fatal flaw in the  marketing plan  itself.

C. On a lecture video the students cannot notice the teachers’ gestures as well as they can in a traditional classroom.- negated one is still helping conclusion

D. Private tutorials are not the only institutions who are allowed to spend on innovative teaching methods that do not require physical attendance in classrooms.- if private ones are the only one, then marketing plan is not helping the vclass, hence this is our option

E. Other companies who developed similar products like Virtual Classroom have made profits soon after they launched the product.- other companies irrelevant.

Final verdict D. Hope this helps

gullyboy09 · Answer

Hi  AbhishekP220108 , thanks for your help. I agree with the given answer, but my concern is B can also be the one. See the question is " drawing the above conclusion  appropriately  ", now if I know that I will have problems regarding hiring the software guys to develop the system, then I cannot conclude "Vclass has a  promising  future",  appropriately . D is clear winner but we cannot reject B also here IMO.  MartyMurray  can you help here.

AbhishekP220108 · Answer

Hi  gullyboy09 , yeah, true, fair enough, but think like this: just because I have encountered a problem in my preparation, does it deter me from performing well in the GMAT? No right. I can find a way to resolve the hurdle and still perform well on the GMAT. For a necessary assumption, we need something which can break the conclusion if negated. Since we need a conclusion to be drawn appropriately, a hurdle in the path is not going to affect me. It may delay but it cannot completely conclude that I will not have a promising future.

gullyboy09 · Answer

Hi,  AbhishekP220108 , thanks, make sense. It's just as you mentioned it may delay, it may make it impossible also as what if we are not able to hire them at all, and in any case we can still conclude that future is promising. But can we conclude it "appropriately"?, that's my concern is. Like if I had been in that situation with that information available that I wont be able to hire techies, instead of making conclusion like future is promising, I would have been worried. But nevertheless, thankyou for your help.

MartyMurray · Answer

(B) doesn't really work as a correct answer because the conclusion could still be "appropriately" drawn even if the company will have problems hiring adequately skilled personnel. After all, if the product is highly marketable, then, presumably, such problems can be solved.

That said, choice (B) would probably be better if it were tuned a little so that the "problems" don't appear to be as problematic. For instance, the following toned-down version would probably work better:

B. Vclass will not encounter any difficulty in hiring adequately skilled personnel to develop the system software.

V11-23

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

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

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards