Rules, Reasoning and Ordering on the School Safety Agent Exam

Deductive reasoning: the rule is on the page

You are given a rule or a procedure and a situation, and you decide what follows. The notice's example is determining the proper course of action when identifying and reporting a crime.

The rule is always on the page. Marks are lost by answering from what a reasonable person would do rather than from what the stated rule requires — and by missing the condition that makes the ordinary rule not apply.

Inductive reasoning: you have to find the rule

Here you get several cases and have to work out what they have in common, or what explains them. The notice's example is assessing a complaint from information and observations.

The trap is a rule that fits most of the cases. One case that does not fit is not an exception you may ignore; it is the evidence that the rule is wrong.

Information ordering: careful, not clever

A set of steps or items and a rule for arranging them, with the notice noting the rule used must be given. The example is arranging data on a report.

These are marks you either collect or throw away. Nothing has to be worked out; the whole task is applying a stated order carefully, which means the failure mode is speed rather than difficulty.

Problem sensitivity: what would you notice first

Telling when something is wrong or likely to go wrong, including identifying parts of a problem as well as the whole. The example is dealing with an irate member of the public.

The question is usually not what to do but what to notice first. A situation with three things wrong with it has one that will get worse fastest, and that is what the item is asking about.

Related guides

• What Is on the NYC School Safety Agent Exam
• The Reading and Writing Questions on the School Safety Agent Exam
• The Floor Plan Questions on the School Safety Agent Exam