LSAT 34, Logical Reasoning I, Q10, LSATHacks

LR Question 10 Explanation, by LSATHacks

QUESTION TEXT: Although the charter of Westside School states that…

QUESTION TYPE: Sufficient Assumption

CONCLUSION: The school is violating its charter.

REASONING: The charter says the schools needs to have some students with special educational needs. But there are no children with learning disabilities. 

ANALYSIS: This is a bad argument because it doesn’t make clear that all students with special educational needs have a learning disability. The school might have students with special educational needs even if none of them have a learning disability. 

We could show that all special needs students have a learning disability. Then the lack of students with a learning disability means that there are also no special education students. 

___________

1. Not quite. This leaves open the possibility that there is a student who has special educational needs but doesn’t have a learning disability.
2. The stimulus already tells us that no students with learning disabilities are enrolled. This is just repetition. 
3. This tells us what we should do: it’s a value judgment. But the stimulus is making a statement of fact: there are currently no special needs students enrolled. 
4. CORRECT. Every special needs student has a learning disability. Since there are no students with learning disabilities then there must be no students with special educational needs. 
5. This doesn’t tell us whether or the charter actually is being violated. 

Hi, I'm Graeme Blake

Founder of LSAThacks; I scored a 177 on the LSAT.

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