GRE · Analyze an Issue · TOPIC LESSON
Treat an opposing view fairly, decide what it establishes, and use the response to sharpen your own position.
BY THE END, YOU CAN
BEFORE YOU START
Original educational lesson. Work through the examples before revealing the practice answers. This original lesson supports current GRE General Test study; it does not reproduce official questions, certify a writing score or predict test content.
LEARN THROUGH ORIGINAL PRACTICE
All teaching passages, writing prompts, examples and exercises in this lesson are original. No official ETS questions, prompts or explanations are reproduced. Current structure and observed public sample metadata are separate from this original teaching; no official score or question probability is implied.
01 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
A counterargument is a reason to reject, narrow, or reconsider your position. It is not simply the opposite opinion. If you favor late opening hours because they improve access for workers, a relevant objection might concern staffing costs that reduce daytime service. That objection matters because it challenges whether total access actually improves.
Treat the challenge as information. You can reject its factual premise, dispute its inference, concede a limited point, or change your position. Which response is justified depends on what the objection establishes. Writing “However, my view is still correct” without addressing the objection leaves the conflict unresolved.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
B.
B supplies a reason the proposal might undermine its own goal. A is only an opposing conclusion, and C is a general comment. A useful response to B would examine funding and capacity rather than restate the benefit of a zero price.
02 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
Ask what a reasonable person could object to while sharing your broad goals. Strong objections often concern scarce resources, competing rights, implementation burdens, uneven effects, or uncertainty. A critic of an access policy may care about access but disagree about which barrier matters most. This is more demanding than portraying the critic as selfish or ignorant.
The strongest objection is not necessarily the most dramatic imaginable one. It should be relevant, plausible, and significant enough to affect the decision. A bizarre chain of events can distract from an ordinary but serious cost. Choose a challenge you can explain and answer in the space available.
ORIGINAL WORKED EXAMPLE
Thesis: Libraries should lend tools as well as books. Weak opposition: “Some people hate useful services.” Develop a stronger objection.
Answer The serious objection is resource displacement, not hostility to usefulness. A tool-lending program deserves support only if its benefits justify maintenance and staffing costs without silently degrading more valuable services.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
Livestreaming may make some residents less willing to discuss sensitive personal experiences, and small groups may lack staff to manage privacy and technical problems.
The objection identifies costs within the policy’s actual scope. It does not deny the value of transparency. A response might distinguish public decision-making from sensitive testimony and explain what kinds of exceptions are justified.
03 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
An objection may challenge a fact, the link from fact to conclusion, the value used to judge outcomes, or the practicality of a proposal. These require different replies. If the critic questions whether a program reaches excluded users, saying that inclusion is important does not answer the factual question. If the critic accepts the effect but disputes the cost, repeating the effect is also insufficient.
Restate the objection in a compact form before responding: “Even if X helps, it may cause Y.” This prevents accidental evasion. Then ask whether your response addresses Y, explains why Y is less decisive, or changes the proposal to reduce Y. If it does none of those, it is probably an unrelated defense.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
The response repeats a benefit without addressing unequal access to it.
The critic grants usefulness and questions reach. An answer should address device availability, an alternative format, or the limits of the recommendation. Praise of the information does not resolve the barrier identified.
04 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
A rebuttal rejects part of the opposing reasoning. It might reveal an unsupported universal, a false choice, or a mismatch between the evidence and the conclusion. Rebuttal should be precise: explain which step fails and why. Do not merely label an argument “illogical” or attack the person making it.
Be careful not to rebut a stronger claim than the opponent actually makes. If the opponent says a policy may create crowding, answering that it will not always create crowding does not eliminate the risk. The degree of certainty in the objection determines what would count as a successful response.
ORIGINAL WORKED EXAMPLE
Objection to making archives easier to use: “If staff create plain-language guides, the collection can no longer be technically accurate.” Rebut it.
Answer Plain-language guides can coexist with detailed records. The appropriate response to oversimplification is careful explanation and access to full information, not a blanket choice between accuracy and usability.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
Imperfection alone does not show that the system is worse than available alternatives; compare the information it adds, its errors, and the costs of correcting them.
The objection assumes that only a flawless system can have value. The rebuttal does not claim every imperfect system is worthwhile. It restores the missing comparison and leaves open the possibility that a particular system is too unreliable to use.
05 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
A concession accepts part of the challenge. It strengthens an argument only when followed by an explanation of its effect. You may narrow the claim, add a safeguard, or show why the conceded cost is outweighed. “Admittedly there are disadvantages” does little because neither the disadvantage nor its significance is specified.
Concession is not surrender. You can accept that a plan imposes an administrative burden while arguing that the burden is justified. But you must explain why, and you should avoid calling a cost “small” merely because it is inconvenient for your position. Use a relevant comparison or identify the condition under which the cost becomes too large.
ORIGINAL WORKED EXAMPLE
Thesis: A neighborhood museum should offer one late opening each week. Objection: Late hours can increase staffing costs.
Answer Staffing costs are a legitimate constraint. A late opening is most defensible when shifting a low-demand daytime period creates access for otherwise excluded residents while preserving adequate daytime availability.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
…for a major irreversible redesign, a bounded comment period can reveal access problems before construction makes them costly to fix; routine minor repairs need not face the same delay.
The response accepts delay, explains why it may be worthwhile in a defined setting, and narrows the rule. It does not pretend that all consultation is free or that every decision has equal stakes.
06 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
Some disputes survive factual agreement. Both sides may agree that a policy improves efficiency and reduces individual choice but disagree about which matters more. Name the values and explain your criterion. Severity of harm, reversibility, fairness, and availability of alternatives can help make the comparison concrete.
A criterion is not a magic answer. “The greater benefit wins” is vague unless you explain who receives the benefit and who bears the cost. Small conveniences for many may not justify serious exclusion of a few. Conversely, a minor inconvenience may be acceptable to protect essential access. Make the judgment visible rather than hide it behind an abstract slogan.
ORIGINAL WORKED EXAMPLE
Original issue: A small public garden must choose between expanding its quiet area and adding a group-event space. Develop a comparative response.
Answer In the stated setting, I favor the quiet area because it supplies a scarce form of access that nearby event venues cannot replace. The conclusion depends on the available alternatives, not on declaring social activity unimportant.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
Priority to remedying exclusion from a basic service rather than adding convenience where adequate access already exists.
This is a reasoned value criterion, not a mathematical result from equal headcounts. The essay should explain why basic access deserves priority in the particular service and consider whether the proposed plan actually reaches the excluded users.
07 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
For a two-views assignment, the less favored view deserves a fair explanation even when it is not framed as an objection. Compare both using a shared standard. A response that describes only your preferred view has not performed the comparison. For a strongest-challenge assignment, devote real analysis to the best challenge, not a token sentence.
For claim-and-reason work, the supplied reason may itself be the weak link. Agreeing with the claim does not require defending a faulty rationale. Separate what the reason establishes from whether it justifies the proposed action. This separation can produce a nuanced position without indecision.
ORIGINAL WORKED EXAMPLE
Original claim: Public workspaces should require advance reservations for every desk. Reason: Reservations help users plan their day. Evaluate the pair.
Answer Reservations can improve predictability, but that reason supports a mixed system rather than advance booking for every desk. The universal requirement discounts users whose needs cannot be scheduled early.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
No. The writer should identify the view’s actual rationale and compare it with the preferred view.
A generic acknowledgement does not show understanding or evaluation. For example, if the other view prioritizes preservation, explain what damage it prevents and why that concern does or does not outweigh the access benefit in the relevant setting.
08 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
An objection can follow the claim it most directly challenges, appear in a dedicated paragraph, or shape the thesis from the start. Place it where the reader can understand what is at stake. A separate opposition paragraph is convenient only if it contributes to the essay’s progression rather than interrupting an unrelated topic.
After the response, return to the revised or defended conclusion. This closes the reasoning loop. Without that return, the reader may not know whether the objection changed your view. A sentence such as “The objection therefore limits the program’s scale, but not the case for a carefully funded trial” states its precise effect.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
B, C, A.
The sequence states the objection, explains a reason delay can be justified in a defined setting, then gives the resulting rule. Other surrounding paragraph structures are possible, but the conclusion must emerge from the comparison rather than appear before the relevant distinction is explained.
09 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
Three frequent failures are straw-man opposition, topic switching, and costless-safeguard thinking. A straw man weakens the opponent until the reply becomes trivial. Topic switching praises your proposal without answering the objection. Costless-safeguard thinking assumes every drawback can be removed by adding staff, money, or oversight without considering those resources.
A safeguard is persuasive when it addresses the stated mechanism and its own costs are plausible. “Hire more people” may solve a staffing problem only by creating a budget problem. A careful response can say that support is conditional on funding rather than pretending funding is automatic. If the objection remains decisive, revise the thesis openly.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
The response assumes away the budget constraint. Repair: support the program only if a limited pilot or dedicated funding can cover maintenance without displacing more valuable services.
Adding technicians changes the cost rather than answering it. The repair makes feasibility a real condition of support. If no feasible funding exists, the writer should be willing to defer or reject the proposal rather than preserve it by assertion.
10 / UNDERSTAND & APPLY
Write the strongest objection in a form its supporter would recognize. Then mark your response as rebuttal, concession, qualification, or weighing. The labels are for study, not necessary essay vocabulary. If you cannot name what the response does, it may be a general defense rather than a reply.
Finally, reread the thesis. Has the objection changed its scope? If so, reflect that change in the thesis and conclusion. A mature argument does not need to defeat every possible critic. It needs to address the relevant challenge honestly and make the resulting position clear.
ORIGINAL PRACTICE · 1
Objection: residents without reliable internet access may miss important information. Response: use digital notices to improve speed and reach, but retain printed notices or an equally usable alternative until reliable access is established for affected residents.
The objection concerns exclusion, not hostility to technology. The response accepts that concern and narrows support from complete replacement to conditional adoption. A strong essay would explain what counts as usable access and avoid assuming that nominal internet availability is enough.
KEEP THE BIG IDEAS
READ WITH CONTEXT
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