- PowerScore Staff
- Posts: 1358
- Joined: Dec 15, 2011
- Tue Nov 08, 2022 7:15 pm
#98180
Thanks for the assist, lynsi! You are right on target here.
Our stimulus tries to draw the conclusion that the new curriculum isn't working from the fact that students from the school using the curriculum do worse than average on a certification test. However, we can't draw any conclusion about the new curriculum without knowing how students were doing before it was implemented. What was the change, if any, in the pass rate? Knowing they are currently worse than average doesn't mean much by itself. It's a causal relationship suggested here---the author suggests that the new curriculum causes the low pass rate.
Answer choice (A) uses causal language, and I can see why it's tempting. But there's a critical word in that answer choice: CHANGE. We don't know anything about the change in scores, which is the underlying flaw in the argument as a whole. So the answer choice describing that we do have knowledge about a change is going to be incorrect. It describes a situation that just does not occur in the stimulus.
Answer choice (E) is a conditional answer choice, stating the argument states something is required. We don't have anything required in this stimulus--we are merely trying to describe an observed effect.
Great work all!
Our stimulus tries to draw the conclusion that the new curriculum isn't working from the fact that students from the school using the curriculum do worse than average on a certification test. However, we can't draw any conclusion about the new curriculum without knowing how students were doing before it was implemented. What was the change, if any, in the pass rate? Knowing they are currently worse than average doesn't mean much by itself. It's a causal relationship suggested here---the author suggests that the new curriculum causes the low pass rate.
Answer choice (A) uses causal language, and I can see why it's tempting. But there's a critical word in that answer choice: CHANGE. We don't know anything about the change in scores, which is the underlying flaw in the argument as a whole. So the answer choice describing that we do have knowledge about a change is going to be incorrect. It describes a situation that just does not occur in the stimulus.
Answer choice (E) is a conditional answer choice, stating the argument states something is required. We don't have anything required in this stimulus--we are merely trying to describe an observed effect.
Great work all!