The director of a secondary

Answer choices

1. A

   Irrelevant Quality5% picked this

   some students who spend time on sports do not have

   This is enticingly weak wording, but do we care whether all sports kids have academic problems vs. whether many do but some don't? The argument is only talking about students who DO have academic problems while playing sports, so whether that's all sports kids or just a subset of sports kids, it doesn't matter.

   5%
2. B

   Too Strong: all Reversal10% picked this

   all students who do well academically do so because of time saved by not

   The author is saying "with time saved by not participating in sports" I guarantee you that these students will "do well academically". But this answer says "if a student is doing well academically" I guarantee you that the student got there because the cut sports out of their live to save time. The author doesn't need all academically successful students to be ex-athletes, which is what this answer is saying.

   10%
3. C

   Correct79% picked this

   at least some of the time the students will save by not participating in sports will be spent

   Why this is right

   This is also enticingly weak. Is the author thinking that students will stop playing sports, which will free up time in their life, and then they'll use some of that extra time to study? Of course! That's the whole plan. The director heard that they were struggling because they spent too much time on sports and not enough on studying, so she is canceling their sports so that they can re-allocate that time to studying. If we negated this, it would certainly weaken: None of the time the students save by quitting sports will be spent working on their academic problems.

   Skill tested: Necessary Assumption · how this choice captures the argument's function is the move to repeat next time.

   79%
4. D

   Too Strong: no5% picked this

   no students who do well academically spend time

   The author doesn't have to think that every athlete struggles academically. The first sentence says at this school "many students are athletes who struggle academically". That's who this argument is directed towards. It doesn't hurt the argument if there is a student who spends time on sports and does well academically.

   5%
5. E

   Irrelevant Causality1% picked this

   the quality of the school’s sports program would not suffer as a result

   This is lovable because of the Defender-esque "not" in it. We should negate and see if it weakens: The quality of the sports program WILL suffer as a result of this ban. Does that weaken the idea that "the students will do well academically"? No. They're two separate things. The fact that the sports program is suffering doesn't tell us anything about whether or not the students would be doing well academically.

   1%