Critical Reasoning

My Ans: Stimulus : profit not generate - principal fired.
Conclusion , Principal should be fired.
Questions: Except weakening = Neutral or Strengthening.
A . Weaken
B. Neutral, New information , ambiguous , who is head of school? It can be a management board .... Not principal
C. Weaken
D. * Support ,Its was this fav teacher (she should have been fired after retirement not principal)
E. Weakens , new building attracted ppl thus profits

I thought D not B ,

I also learned that GMAC never gives support + neutral ans (for ambiguity) . now I reach a stage that i have to select one of it. So how do I eliminate.

If its LEAST weakening and u have two ans one neutral and one strengthening , then what do u do?

any elimination technique?

-eski

Buddy,

Option D says: Students left because a teacher left. By saying so, option D reduces the blame on the principal. So, in a way this statement says that principal should not be fired.
HTH

eski wrote:My Ans: Stimulus : profit not generate - principal fired.
Conclusion , Principal should be fired.
Questions: Except weakening = Neutral or Strengthening.
A . Weaken
B. Neutral, New information , ambiguous , who is head of school? It can be a management board .... Not principal
C. Weaken
D. * Support ,Its was this fav teacher (she should have been fired after retirement not principal)
E. Weakens , new building attracted ppl thus profits

I thought D not B ,

I also learned that GMAC never gives support + neutral ans (for ambiguity) . now I reach a stage that i have to select one of it. So how do I eliminate.

B is the answer.

David@VeritasPrep wrote:Yes the construction is mentioned as a primary reason that the school could not make a profit. Since the principal is being fired for the failure to make a profit, then it would weaken the argument if we know that the decision to build, cost of building, etc. are not the principal's fault.

David, I know this question has been addressed many times but my main confusion lies in the fact that

Principal might have come after the construction and may have spent $200,000 on additional equipment etc in classrooms, libraries or general renovation as the timeframe of when it was newly built is not mentioned.In such a case the principal may not be absolved.

Could you please throw some light on this aspect.

I will admit that this question is a little bit of an odd one. I think that I would make a couple of edits to be honest with you...make it a little clearer, you know.

So, not so much in reference to just this question, but for critical reasoning in general I will say that you are making some pretty big assumptions in the question that you asked. Nowhere does it say that the principal spent lots of money on things after the building was built.

Now you will say that the answer choices also come up with things not mentioned. For example, choice D says that the students left because a favorite teacher retired. This is not mentioned in the stimulus, right??

However, the answer choices are allowed to - in fact are supposed to - bring in new information on a strengthen or weaken question. The question stem says "which of the following, if true" so you are Supposed to think of the answer choice as being true. Any assumptions that you might make are different...they are not to be given credit.

The stimulus seems to indicate that the building of the new building was part of the problem with making a profit in 2010 so if we can show that this was not the principal's decision then we weaken the conclusion that he/she should be fired.

well, i m in initial phase of preparation and believe the only one who chose E.

E) More than half of the new families who joined the school in 2010 cited the beautiful new school facility as an important factor in their selection of the school.

that means new building is attracting students which will help in earning profits but school is still making lose,so it may be the principal who is not up to the mark in terms of running the school hence should be fired.

@ david please clear this doubt.

RadiumBall wrote:I do not agree with B at all, As I understand B only talks of a large library in which the principal plans to hold regular cultural sessions...how does this indicate if the principal should be fired?

Read the question properly. Question asks you to pic the option in which principle should not be fired. So B does not indicate that principle should be fired. So B is the correct answer.

parul9 wrote:"Except" qsn always gets me! Grr! X-(

Parul, in Except question in which weaken is mentioned, think to strengthen the argument or choose that one which does not affect the argument. It will work.

go for B

option a