Adapted from Noah Dear, City Council Member 44th district, New York, NY
Letter to the Editor, New York Times, Aug. 6 1997

To acquire more information, the school system should require all school personnel--teachers, administrators, nurses and advisors--to report any signs of obvious or even suspected abuse.

policy claim

This is a policy claim since the author specifies a course of action to be taken.

Assess the quality of this claim.
Does it possess all four qualities of a good claim? YES!

controversy

This claim is controversial because people are not in agreement as to whether all school personnel should be "required" to report suspected abuse.

clarity

The author is specific as to whom he would like to see be responsible for implementing the program. He could be even more precise in describing who or what agency should receive the reports and what steps would follow the reporting of an incident.

balance

There is no apparent bias in the claim. The author uses neutral terms to describe his policy and avoids placing blame for the present situation.

challenge

The status quo does not require all school personnel to report suspected child abuse, therefore, the claim challenges the status quo.