The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time

Question

The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time taking care of children whose parents do not arrive to pick them up from class on time. As a result, more teachers will have to be hired. The school could, instead, charge parents a nominal fee whenever they fail to arrive to pick their children up on time. This charge would encourage punctual pickup.

The conclusion above depends most strongly on which of the following assumptions?

(A) Parents will simplify their daily schedules in order to arrive at pickup time punctually.

(B) The fee charged for late pickup will not be a significant additional burden to most families that can afford tuition at Soundview School.

(C) Parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable than a tuition hike that would be necessary to pay for additional staff.

(D) A staff of highly qualified teachers is part of what encourages parents to bring their children to Soundview School.

(E) Parents who have errands to run or other tasks to complete could place their children in dedicated after school daycare programs.

KarishmaB · Accepted Answer

Responding to a pm:

Argument:
Staff is spending more time taking care of children whose parents get late. 
As a result, more teachers will have to be hired. 
Instead, charge parents a nominal fee whenever they get late.
This charge would encourage punctual pickup.

The author says that instead of hiring more teachers, levy a fine on the parents who arrive late. This would encourage punctual pick up. The purpose of the plan is to encourage parents to pick students on time. It is not to manage late pick up. So the author says that instead of hiring more teachers (which increases the tuition and hence may encourage parents to pick kids on time), charge a nominal fee for late pickup. That will actually lead to parents arriving on time. 
The author is assuming that nominal late charge will be more effective than fee hike in encouraging people to pick on time. 
Hence (C) is correct.

Options (A) and (E) discuss how parents will manage arriving early. Note that these are not assumptions. They are not necessarily what parents will do. e.g. parents may not simplify their schedules. They may just re-arrange their schedules to arrive on time. Similarly, parents may not put their kids in school day care - they may ask relatives/friends to help out etc. An assumption needs to be necessarily true for the conclusion to hold. (A) and (E) don't need to be necessarily true.

(B) weakens the argument. If the late fee charged is not significant, parents may not mind it and hence may not arrive on time. So the purpose of the fee hike will be lost.

(D) is out of scope.

Carcass · Answer

I respect Veritas but for me this question is not really a good question.

I f we analize sentence by sentence.

The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time taking care of children whose parents do not arrive to pick them up from class on time.

Ok pretty clear

As a result, more teachers will have to be hired.

Now: her the verbe tense is in the future. here should be used (in my opinion and accordingly with the rest of the tone of the stimulus)would be hired to cope that emergency situation.

The school could, instead, charge parents a nominal fee whenever they fail to arrive to pick their children up on time.

then: instead to hire more teachers the school increase the fees on children

This charge would encourage punctual pickup.

the parents who do not want to pay can or could: change their schedule to pick the guys on time. pay someone to go and pick on time. and so on....

Now C says:

Parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable than a tuition hike that would be necessary to pay for additional staff.

In my opinion should be will NOT find more objectionable.......I do not see much sense in C as it is.

avohden · Answer

Official Explanation

Answer: C   - This argument depends on the assumption that the fee charged to parents will actually work -- a typical assumption for "plan suggesting" questions such as this. As answer choice (C) suggests such a mechanism -- that parents will prefer to pick their children up rather than pay for increased teaching staff -- it is the correct answer choice. Answer choices (A) and (E) provide ways that parents could accommodate the request but do not discuss the logic used by the argument. Answer choice (B) is opposite and would actually weaken the argument. Answer choice (D) is out of scope.

ramannanda9 · Answer

C,
 
Conclusion: Charging a nominal fee would lead to the parents being more punctual.

The goal is to encourage parents to be more punctual and not to hire more teachers.

The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time taking care of children whose parents do not arrive to pick them up from class on time. As a result, more teachers will have to be hired. The school could, instead, charge parents a nominal fee whenever they fail to arrive to pick their children up on time. This charge would encourage punctual pickup.

The conclusion above depends most strongly on which of the following assumptions?

A. Parents will simplify their daily schedules in order to arrive at pickup time punctually.  They might have busy schedules or they might not. We are not told that they have a busy schedule. So this can't be the assumption

B. The fee charged for late pickup will not be a significant additional burden to most families that can afford tuition at Soundview School. Weakens.If it won't be a additional burden, it will actually weaken the argument

C. Parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable than a tuition hike that would be necessary to pay for additional staff. Correct. They find late pickup fee more objectionable than tuition fee hike (It means that even though they can pay more tuition fee, they will not do so because they find late pickup fee more objectionable, hence will become more punctual)

D. A staff of highly qualified teachers is part of what encourages parents to bring their children to Soundview School.  Irrelevant

E. Parents who have errands to run or other tasks to complete could place their children in dedicated after school daycare programs. Does not strengthen the argument

DrFeelgood · Answer

I believe that the word "objectionable" is poorly used here. How can an objectionable method/rule make someone change his/her initial attitude to the desired one? If I find something objectionable, I usually protest, get displeased and inevitably might stop having an affair with said establishment (in our case the Soundview school). Sure some people might not say anything and eventually change their attitude, but still we are not 100% sure. In my opinion this argument seriously weakens the conclusion.

surbhi87 · Answer

C it is. Objectionable also means something that one does not approve of, or would rather not have , or does not like. The staff has 2 ways to take care of unattended children: 1. Hire more staff OR 2. Charge parents a nominal fee in case of late pickup. Conclusion: Option 2 will lead to punctual pickup. Assumption: Parents will prefer 2) to 1) -- Option C says "Hiring more staff (option 1)" will lead to increased tuition fee. But since conclusion says option 2 will lead to punctual pickup, we can assume that parents would prefer 2) to 1) ; or in other words, parents would not like to pay the fee which is why charging them would fix the problem. Basically they just assumed that parents would not like the school to hire more staff! Hope this helps 8-)

CEdward · Answer

I am on the same board as both of you. C is totally nonsensical. Why would you assume that parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable? You can restate it as such:

Parents are late
We will impose a fee.
Parents will find the fee more objectionable. 
Therefore, parents will be punctual (the plan will work).

The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time taking care of children whose parents do not arrive to pick them up from class on time. As a result, more teachers will have to be hired. The school could, instead, charge parents a nominal fee whenever they fail to arrive to pick their children up on time. This charge would encourage punctual pickup.

P: Staff at school spending more time taking care of children whose parents don’t arrive to pick them up on time
P: More teachers will have to be hired as a result
P: Instead, the school could charge parents a fee
C: This charge would encourage punctual pickup

The conclusion above depends most strongly on which of the following assumptions?

(A) Parents will simplify their daily schedules in order to arrive at pickup time punctually.

Correct! The proposed implementation hinges on the fact that there must be some change to the lives of the parents that would allow them to show up on time – what that change is, we don’t care. If it turns out that parents don’t schedule better, then the plan will fail.

(B) The fee charged for late pickup will not be a significant additional burden to most families that can afford tuition at Soundview School.

Irrelevant. This can be spun in two ways anyway. Suppose it’s not a significant additional burden, then that may or may not have the effect that we are looking for – maybe people continue to be late or not…On the other hand, let’s say it is a significant burden…well maybe this would actually encourage people who want to avoid the fee so they do show up.

(C) Parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable than a tuition hike that would be necessary to pay for additional staff.

No…why would you assume this at all? This might actually work against the staff…if parents find it objectionable then maybe they don’t end up implementing the plan at all and we are back at square one.

(D) A staff of highly qualified teachers is part of what encourages parents to bring their children to Soundview School.
That’s nice…so what?

(E) Parents who have errands to run or other tasks to complete could place their children in dedicated after school daycare programs.

What we care about is whether the parents will pickup their kids on time. What the parents do with the kids after the fact is irrelevant.

carcass

Bambi2021 · Answer

I totally agree here. That's why I felt C can not be correct even if it was the only option that was close to what I was looking for.

If the pickup fee is more objectionable, they might just take their kids to another school. If they accept the pickup fee, an acceptable fee of 30$, they might pick their kids up late every once in a while but not as often as they do right now. But a really objectionable fee, say 500$, would simply have them remove their child from that school. Objectionable is a strong word.

tinbq · Answer

Hi  VeritasKarishma ,

In my opinion, the conclusion of the stimulus is that the charge will encourage parents to come on time. It's not about a comparison between the two options, even though the two options are mentioned in the question. And for me the gap between the conclusion (above) and the premise about the charge is that the additional charge would encourage parent to pick up their children on time. Hence A should be the correct choice.

Thanks.

KarishmaB · Answer

tinbq  - Do you NEED parents to simplify their schedules to arrive on time? What if instead, they hire an extra assistant at work? Or they pick the kids on time and bring work back home and continue working late into the night? 
There are many many different ways in which parents can pick up the kids on time. We don't NEED them to simplify their schedules to pick up on time. Hence, we don't NEED option (A) to be true for the conclusion to hold.

Now focus on what the argument tells us.

On one hand, the school can hire extra help to take care of kids staying back late. 
If they hire extra help, the tuition could increase. To avoid that, parents may start picking kids on time. 
The argument says that they should instead levy a late fees (don't hire more teachers). Parents would find late fees objectionable so they may start picking kids on time.

The author is saying that levy late fees instead of hiring teachers. Late fees will prompt parents to pick on time. Then it must be true that the parents will find it more objectionable than tuition fee increase. If they were to be ok with late fees, then they may not pick up their kids inspite of additional late fee charges.

The late fee will work if parents find it more objectionable than higher fees. If they were to find the tuition fee increase more objectionable then the hiring more teachers plan may work.

So for the author's suggestion to work, parents must find late fee more objectionable. Hence option (C) is correct.

Kailash331 · Answer

Exactly! If they FIND it to be more objectionable, that means they’d PREFER a tuition hike! Poorly worded question, and getting it wrong doesn’t hell my confidence :/ they should be more careful with the questions they post up.

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Westfolia007 · Answer

VeritasKarishma   egmat   chetan2u   Bunuel  Can you please tell me if my thinking is correct?
The "nominal fee" charges for the late comers will encourage them to be punctual only if it is a significant amount to them or a significant amount when compared to the fees. Eg : If the fee is Rs250000 and extra fee is only Rs20, it will not make any difference to the parent but if the extra fee were to be Rs15000, it would make a difference to them as this amount is comparable to the total fees. Hence option C

Fdambro294 · Answer

I fully agree and I find this question deceptively tricky. Nailing down the Main Idea exactly is not at all easy.

The key is to fuse together what the author is saying in the last two sentences and, of course, pay attention to transition words.

We have this current problem at the school. Parents aren’t picking their kids up on time and, as a result, the school will have to hire more teachers.

The author suggests that INSTEAD of hiring more teachers, the school could charge a nominal fee. The author is assuming that this fee will impact the parents such that they will choose to pick their kids up at the proper time rather than whatever they have been choosing to do. By picking their kids up on time, the parents will unintentionally be helping the school out in that the school will not have to hire more teachers (hence, the school could charge the fee Instead of hiring more teachers).

A
In order for this fee to work and have the proper effect on the parents, the logic of the argument doesn’t require the parents to simplify their schedule. Really, all the plan requires in order to succeed is for the fee to motivate parents to come pick their kids up on time. However they are able to do this is irrelevant. As  KarishmaB  pointed out, the parents could hire an assistant or perform other actions to free up time. It is not necessary to perform the one action of “simplifying the daily schedule.”

Answer D is off topic. We don’t care why the parents choose this school for their kids to attend. We want to find what is the author assuming when he claims that the school could initiate this fee to encourage punctual pickup rather than the inevitable result of hiring more teachers.

C: “parents will find the late pickup fee more objectionable than a tuition hike that would be necessary to pay for staff.”

If the parents did not find this fee more objectionable, then the author is wrong. This argument has no merit.

The plan to INSTEAD charge the fee wouldn’t encourage punctual pickup because parents wouldn’t find the fee more troublesome than a hike in teacher pay. After all, we need the parents to find this fee objectionable. Otherwise, what would spur the parents to come pick their children up on time?

If the parents don’t find the fee more objectionable, they will most likely ignore the fee and continue their current actions. Most will think “who cares? Let them hire more teachers….” In such a case, the author would be wrong in claiming that the school could charge this fee to encourage punctual pickup in place of hiring more teachers. The plan would not reach its goal.

C seems to be the only necessary assumption for the reasoning of the argument to work.

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gullyboy09 · Answer

Hi  KarishmaB , if we do negation here, Parents find the fee  less  objectionable than a tuition hike, they might still be willing to pay it. Conclusion  can still  hold, it's not getting destroyed here.

KarishmaB · Answer

The author is giving an alternative, supposedly better solution to late picking problem. Start charging late fee instead of hiring more teachers and jacking up the tuition. 
The author's assumption is that the 'late fee' would be more objectionable than the increase in tuition. Only then does it make sense that late fee is a better solution than hiring more teachers leading to increased tuition. If increased tuition were a bigger problem to the parents, then the school's solution of hiring more teachers would be better for the school.

The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time

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The staff of Soundview School is spending more and more of its time

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