Information and IdeasVery hardFinding weakening a score-rise claim
Information and Ideas practice question
A school claims that its new homework policy improved test scores, citing a rise in the average score from 68 to 74 in the year after the policy began.
Which finding, if true, would most directly weaken the school's claim?
- A. The test was made easier that year, and average scores rose by a similar amount at schools that had not changed their homework policies.Correct
- B. Students said they enjoyed the new homework policy.
- C. Teachers were trained in the new policy before it began.
- D. The school's average score had been 68 for three years before the policy.
Answer: A. The test was made easier that year, and average scores rose by a similar amount at schools that had not changed their homework policies.
If scores rose everywhere because the test got easier, the school's rise needs no policy to explain it.
Why the other answers are wrong
- B. Students said they enjoyed the new homework policy.
- Enjoyment doesn't bear on whether scores rose because of the policy.
- C. Teachers were trained in the new policy before it began.
- Training makes the policy more likely to have worked, if anything.
- D. The school's average score had been 68 for three years before the policy.
- A flat run before the rise makes the policy look MORE like the cause.
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