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Main Point - MGMT cat 1

by agarwalva » Thu Apr 26, 2012 4:56 pm
Only those students who maintain 2.5 grade point averages are allowed to participate in school sports. Amy is
captain of the school's tennis team, so she must have at least a 2.5 GPA. Which of the following statements best
summarizes the main point of the above argument?
"¢ Students who don't maintain a 2.5 GPA can't participate in sports.
"¢ Amy is a good tennis player.
"¢ The school should only require a minimum GPA of 2.0 to participate in sports.
"¢ Amy has earned at least the minimum GPA required to participate on a school sports team.
"¢ Amy wouldn't be captain of the tennis team if her GPA were lower.

What is wrong with A ? .. I thought amy is just an example

OA is D
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by agarwalmanoj2000 » Thu Apr 26, 2012 6:29 pm
Why not A?
Students who don’t maintain a 2.5 GPA can’t participate in sports.

If a student is maintaining a 3.0 GPA, still he/she can participate in sports, so option A is out.
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by sam2304 » Thu Apr 26, 2012 6:38 pm
Agarwalmanoj has explained it clearly. A states that you have to maintain 2.5 GPA to participate in sports anything more or less then you cannot participate. So it eliminates the possibility of a student having 3.0 as GPA. D is better compared to A.
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by vk_vinayak » Thu Apr 26, 2012 11:50 pm
Why not A?
Students who don’t maintain a 2.5 GPA can’t participate in sports.

Pay close attention to the wordings of the option A. The argument talks about 'School sports' and A talks about 'sports' - Both are different. Hence A is out.
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by [email protected] » Fri Apr 27, 2012 7:29 am
Only those students who maintain 2.5 grade point averages are allowed to participate in school sports. Amy is
captain of the school's tennis team, so she must have at least a 2.5 GPA. Which of the following statements best
summarizes the main point of the above argument?
"¢ Students who don't maintain a 2.5 GPA can't participate in sports.
"¢ Amy is a good tennis player.
"¢ The school should only require a minimum GPA of 2.0 to participate in sports.
"¢ Amy has earned at least the minimum GPA required to participate on a school sports team.
"¢ Amy wouldn't be captain of the tennis team if her GPA were lower.


Remember guyzzz, this is an inference question. In an inference or a main point question, consider only what is clearly given in the stimulus. Do not add any outside information whatsoever.

This was close between option A and D.

Even I felt that probably option D was just the repitition of the last sentence in the argument.

Now option A: Lets say that All cricket players who have scored more than 10000 runs are good players.

In the above sentence, I have mentioned a thing about all cricketers or players who have scored more than 10000 runs.

From the above sentence , it can never be implied that the cricket players who have scored less than 10000runs are not good. Because that condition is simply not given in the stimulus.

It can also be possible that students in the school have a GPA of 3.0 but still they do not play school sports due to other reasons. Like lack of interest, lack of required skills in such sports, etc etc. We do not know that. That is why always stick to the point.


Listen guyzzz from my experience I am telling you, and now I have mastered the Inference questions.

In Inference question or a main point question, never assume or take any outside information come what may. Write this thing down... Be straight to the point.

With option D: The passage does talk about a girl named Amy, yes correct. She fulfills the condition of participating in the school sports by getting the minimum GPA...

This is very clearly given in the passage.

Hope this post really helps the students who are getting started with the GMAT...

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by Stuart@KaplanGMAT » Fri Apr 27, 2012 8:00 am
agarwalva wrote:Only those students who maintain 2.5 grade point averages are allowed to participate in school sports. Amy is captain of the school's tennis team, so she must have at least a 2.5 GPA. Which of the following statements best
summarizes the main point of the above argument?

"¢ Students who don't maintain a 2.5 GPA can't participate in sports.
"¢ Amy is a good tennis player.
"¢ The school should only require a minimum GPA of 2.0 to participate in sports.
"¢ Amy has earned at least the minimum GPA required to participate on a school sports team.
"¢ Amy wouldn't be captain of the tennis team if her GPA were lower.
Hi!

Step 1 of the Kaplan Method for CR: identify the question type

A large part of the problem here is that people have misidentified the question; it is NOT asking us to draw an inference. Rather, it's asking for the main point, or the conclusion of the argument.

Remember: an inference is any statement that MUST be true based on one or more statements in the stimulus. The conclusion is the MAIN POINT of the argument, i.e. the big idea that the author wanted to communicate.

To find the conclusion, we can use various tools. Among them:

1) keywords;
2) fact vs opinion;
3) the what vs why test; and
4) the one-sentence test.

Here, keywords are our greatest ally. Common conclusion keywords include therefore, hence, consequently, thus and so. Sometimes on main point questions (which are quite rare on the GMAT) traditional conclusion keywords can lead you astray, but that's not the case in this example - "so" clearly indicates where to find the author's main point.

Accordingly, "[Amy] must have at least a 2.5 GPA" is the main point of the argument.

The "what vs why" test would also have been very useful for this question. Simply put, the conclusion always answers the question "WHAT does the author want us to believe?" and the evidence answers the question "WHY should we believe it?".

Applying "what vs why" to this question:

WHAT does the author want us to believe: that Amy has at least a 2.5 GPA.

WHY should we believe the author: because students require a min 2.5 GPA to play on sports teams and Amy is on a sports team.

Here's another way you can apply the what vs why test - paraphrase the argument in the following form:

X is true because of Y.

X will always be the conclusion, Y the evidence.
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