The following appeared as part of a newspaper editorial:
‘Two years ago Nova High School began to use interactive computer instruction in three academic subjects. The school dropout rate declined immediately, and last year’s graduates have reported some impressive achievements in college. In future budgets the school board should use a greater portion of the available funds to buy more computers, and all schools in the district should adopt interactive computer instruction throughout the curriculum.’
The argument concludes that in future budgets Nova High School should invest more money from the available funds in buying computers for the interactive computer instruction and also that all schools in the district should adopt the same teaching method given that Nova High School achieved great results with it. However, for this conclusion to hold true there are several assumptions that should be proved.
Firstly, it is assumed that because the interactive computer instruction worked two years ago and in Nova High School it must work now and for all schools in the district. Actually we don’t have further information of the situation of this high school and others in the district before the program was implemented. And this piece of information would be very helpful to better evaluate the conclusion.
Secondly, the author assumes that the students and the results of the high school before the interactive computer instruction was established were very poor. And there is not any kind of evidence of this in the text to support this assumption. The only information provided is that the dropout rate declined immediately, but again it is unknown the previous situation of the high school.
Thirdly, it is assumed that those students who achieved impressive results in college were underachiever students at high school and since the program was establish they become better students. Thus the author makes the assumption that the program was the responsible of their improvement.
Lastly, the assumption that investing a bigger portion for the budget to buy more computers the high schools is going to improve even more the results is necessarily made to support the conclusion.
Overall, the argument is not strong enough to support the conclusion given that it is based in assumptions that have not any evidence to support them. Therefore, more research into these assumptions is needed to better evaluate the conclusion.
‘Two years ago Nova High School began to use interactive computer instruction in three academic subjects. The school dropout rate declined immediately, and last year’s graduates have reported some impressive achievements in college. In future budgets the school board should use a greater portion of the available funds to buy more computers, and all schools in the district should adopt interactive computer instruction throughout the curriculum.’
The argument concludes that in future budgets Nova High School should invest more money from the available funds in buying computers for the interactive computer instruction and also that all schools in the district should adopt the same teaching method given that Nova High School achieved great results with it. However, for this conclusion to hold true there are several assumptions that should be proved.
Firstly, it is assumed that because the interactive computer instruction worked two years ago and in Nova High School it must work now and for all schools in the district. Actually we don’t have further information of the situation of this high school and others in the district before the program was implemented. And this piece of information would be very helpful to better evaluate the conclusion.
Secondly, the author assumes that the students and the results of the high school before the interactive computer instruction was established were very poor. And there is not any kind of evidence of this in the text to support this assumption. The only information provided is that the dropout rate declined immediately, but again it is unknown the previous situation of the high school.
Thirdly, it is assumed that those students who achieved impressive results in college were underachiever students at high school and since the program was establish they become better students. Thus the author makes the assumption that the program was the responsible of their improvement.
Lastly, the assumption that investing a bigger portion for the budget to buy more computers the high schools is going to improve even more the results is necessarily made to support the conclusion.
Overall, the argument is not strong enough to support the conclusion given that it is based in assumptions that have not any evidence to support them. Therefore, more research into these assumptions is needed to better evaluate the conclusion.
