Argument174 3.16

longxuUID: 2290268

TOPIC:ARGUMENT174 - The following recommendation was made by the president andadministrative staff of Grove College, a privateinstitution, to the college's governing committee.

"Werecommend that Grove College preserve itscentury-old tradition of all-female education rather than admit men into itsprograms. It is true that a majority of faculty members voted in favor ofcoeducation, arguing that it would encourage more students to apply to Grove.But eighty percent of the students responding to a survey conducted by thestudent government wanted the school to remain all female, and over half of thealumni who answered a separate survey also opposed coeducation. Keeping thecollege all-female, therefore, will improve morale among students and convincealumni to keep supporting the college financially."
WORDS:435          TIME: 0:30:00          DATE: 2007-3-16:cool:

The arguer claims that the Grove College should preserveits all female education rather than admit men into its programs. To justifythe conclusion, the arguer presents some evidence from a survey by the studentgovernment and a separate survey of the alumni. However, the assumptions aboutthe survey and financial support from the alumniare dubious on several grounds, rendering the argument wholly unpersuasive asit stands.

First of all, the arguer unfairly assumesthat the survey by the student government is strong evidence for therecommendation. It is entirely possible that the student government are infavor of the recommendation and make no fair measures to assure the reliabilityof the survey. Lacking enough information that the subjects for the survey arerandomly chosen and can representative enough to reflect the attitudes of a diverse cross section of students inthe school, we cannot evaluate the reliability of the survey or to makeinformed recommendation.

Next point, the arguer fails to take intoaccount some possibilities about the students.Perhaps, the students in the survey are shy to admit that they are in favor ofthe coeducation. Or perhaps, they do not want to disobey the rule of the schooland  show the true thoughts aboutdissatisfactory rules. Therefore, unless the arguer demonstrate the true viewsof the whole students of the school and and coeducation will be detrimental tothe morale among students, the arguer cannot convince us.

Last but not least, the assumption that the financial support from the alumniwill be affected by the coeducation seems logical but still cannot beinterpreted. There is no evidence from the alumni to support the assumption.Common sense tells us the financial support for alumni result form the feelingsfor the mother school and the memory of their time spent in the school ratherthan the measures in the nowadays school. Though there are many alumni whoopposed coeducation, the people maybe not the major resourceof the financial support. It is likely that the major supporters for the schoolare in favor of coeducation. If the arguer cannot rule out the aforementioned possibilities, the conclusion of the argument is toohasty to be informative.

To sum up, the argumentis indeed logical unsound with the existing survey and the flawed assumptionsabout the alumni. Before any final decision, the arguer should present moresubstantial evidence to inform us that the coeducation will affect the morale andthe financial support from the alumni. To better assess it, the arguer alsosupply clear evidence about the reliability of the survey by the studentgovernment.