[procrastinator1357]

Topic:

The following recommendation was made by the president and administrative staff of Grove College, a private institution, to the college’s governing committee.

“We recommend that Grove College preserve its century-old tradition of all-female education rather than admit men into its programs. It is true that a majority of faculty members voted in favor of coeducation, arguing that it would encourage more students to apply to Grove. But eighty percent of the students responding to a survey conducted by the student government wanted the school to remain all female, and over half of the alumni who answered a separate survey also opposed coeducation. Keeping the college all-female, therefore, will improve morale among students and convince alumni to keep supporting the college financially."






In this argument, the author relies on the results of two surveys to convince the governing committee of Grove College to preserve the college’s tradition of all-female education. Close inspection of these surveys reveals, however, that they lend scant support at best for the author’s argument.

To begin with, the author does not include enough details to demonstrate the statistical reliabilities of the two surveys. There are no evidences of random samplings and sufficient sample sizes. Perhaps the participants of both surveys happened to consist mainly of Muslims who insisted on sex segregation, while the college itself is actually multicultural. Perhaps less than 100 students participated in the survey conducted by the student government, while the college has more than 10000 students. Perhaps the alumni surveyed were mostly middle and old aged, quite conservative and suspicious of any changes. If one or more of the conditions is true, the results of the surveys may not represent the opinion of the majority.

Undoubtedly, keeping the college all-female does no good to morale among students if most of them favor co-education. In fact, the school authority may harm the students’ feelings by making decisions based on the questionable results of a single survey. The majority of the students who did not get a chance to participate in the survey will feel that their voice is neglected. Even if the results of the survey are reliable, keeping the college all-female does not necessarily improve morale among students. Perhaps it will remain the same, since everything else stays unchanged. Perhaps some students even fear that the issue of coeducation will be put forward again in the near future.

Similarly, the author fails to establish the relationship between alumni’s attitude towards coeducation and their continual financial supports to Grove College. In fact, the two may be poorly-related or even unrelated. Perhaps the alumni make donations based on many factors including their own financial capacities, social statues, etc, among which a particular school policy is insignificant. If so, keeping the college all-female does not prevent a bankrupted businesswoman from withdrawing from the donor list. Perhaps most of the generous alumni donors are those who wish to help needy students, promote scientific research, encourage artistic originality, etc. Under these circumstances, adopting coeducation does not discourage a chemistry professor from initiating a scholarship to award students with outstanding performances in analytical laboratories.

To sum up, as it stands the author’s argument is unsubstantiated for its lack of details. To strengthen it, the author should provide more information showing that the survey cited are statistically reliable. To better assess the argument, it would be useful to establish the relationships between the results of the surveys and the morale among students and the financial supports from alumni.