Writing prompt Grade 12 English Language Arts
Lead Service Lines in Quarry Bend: An Argument Writing Prompt
A grade 12 argument prompt where students choose an accelerated or phased plan to replace lead service lines, using real federal deadlines and rate data as evidence.
Objectives
- Students will write an argument essay that states a claim, addresses a counterclaim, and supports both with evidence.
- Students will use real regulatory deadlines and rate data to evaluate a municipal funding decision.
- Students will weigh a public-health tradeoff against a cost tradeoff in a written argument.
Vocabulary
- Lead service line
- A lead service line is an old water pipe made of lead metal that connects a house to the water main. Lead can get into the drinking water, so these pipes are being dug up and replaced across the country.
- Action level
- A trigger number in lead and copper testing. If too many homes test above this level, the utility must take steps like improving treatment and telling the public.
Also: bond, counterclaim, phased replacement
Teacher overview
Federal rules now require every US water utility to replace nearly all of its lead service lines within a decade, but a deadline that far out still leaves a real choice for a town's utility board: replace the lines as fast as a bond can pay for them, or spread the work across the full ten years the rule allows. This prompt puts students in the position of Quarry Bend's utility board, using real federal deadlines and national rate data to argue for one timeline over the other.
Prompt
Background: Quarry Bend is a fictional town used for this prompt. City records show that of its 8,000 water service connections, an estimated 1,200 are still made of lead pipe. These pipes were installed before lead pipes were banned in new construction. In October 2024, the EPA finalized the Lead and Copper Rule Improvements. Under this rule, utilities nationwide must replace nearly all remaining lead service lines within 10 years. The rule also lowers the lead action level, the concentration that triggers required corrective action, from 15 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion in 2027. That stricter standard will apply to Quarry Bend along with every other utility. Nationally, EPA estimates that about 4 million lead service lines remain in water systems across the country, based on the service line inventories utilities reported in 2025. These lines sit disproportionately in older, lower-income communities, a pattern Quarry Bend's own oldest neighborhoods reflect.
Quarry Bend's utility board has narrowed its choice to two plans. The accelerated plan would issue a bond and replace all 1,200 lead lines within three years. The engineering department estimates this plan would raise the average monthly water bill by about 12 percent for the life of the bond. The phased plan would spread replacement across the full ten-year federal deadline instead. It would be funded through ordinary rate increases, closer to what utilities nationwide have already experienced. Combined water and sewer bills nationwide rose about 24 percent from 2019 to 2024, and roughly another 5.1 percent in 2025.
Writing task: Write an argument essay that states a clear claim on which plan Quarry Bend's utility board should adopt: the accelerated plan or the phased plan. Address at least one counterclaim a resident or board member might raise about the plan you did not choose. Support your position with evidence from the background material above.
Planning Organizer
| Category | Your notes |
|---|---|
| Claim (accelerated or phased plan?) | |
| Reason 1 + evidence from background material | |
| Reason 2 + evidence from background material | |
| Counterclaim someone might raise about your plan | |
| Your rebuttal to the counterclaim | |
| Concluding statement |
From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.
Exemplar & Rubric
Exemplar response:
Quarry Bend's utility board should adopt the accelerated three-year plan and replace all 1,200 lead service lines as quickly as the proposed bond allows, because a public health risk does not become less urgent just because a federal deadline gives a town ten years to address it. Lead service lines expose residents, including infants who drink formula mixed with tap water, to a risk that grows with every year a pipe remains in the ground. Waiting the full decade simply because the rule permits it treats the deadline as a target, when it should be read as the latest acceptable date.
The evidence supports moving quickly. The lead action level is already dropping, from 15 parts per billion to 10 parts per billion in 2027, meaning the standard Quarry Bend's water must meet is getting stricter while the town waits. Nationally, about 4 million lead service lines remain in water systems by EPA's estimate, disproportionately in older, lower-income communities, and Quarry Bend's own oldest neighborhoods fit that same pattern. A town that already knows it resembles the national pattern of risk should not choose the slowest legally available response to it.
Some board members will argue that the accelerated plan's roughly 12 percent bill increase is too steep, especially for residents on fixed incomes, and that argument deserves a real answer rather than dismissal. It is true that a 12 percent jump is more than twice the 5.1 percent rise utilities nationwide saw in 2025, and it would arrive all at once, while the 24 percent national rise from 2019 to 2024 was spread over five years. But the phased plan does not avoid a bill increase; it only spreads a smaller version of one across ten years while leaving lead pipes in the ground for most of that time. The board could pair the accelerated bond with a temporary bill-assistance program for low-income households, addressing the affordability concern directly instead of solving it by extending everyone's exposure to lead for years longer than necessary.
Quarry Bend should choose the accelerated plan. The stricter 2027 action level, the national pattern the town's oldest neighborhoods already fit, and the availability of a bill-assistance option to answer the fairness concern all point toward replacing the town's lead lines in three years rather than ten.
Rubric:
| Criterion | Emerging | Developing | Proficient | Advanced |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claim | No clear position on accelerated versus phased replacement is stated | States a position but it shifts or is vague about which plan is chosen | States one clear, consistent position on which plan Quarry Bend should adopt | States a clear position and previews the essay's main lines of reasoning |
| Evidence & reasoning | No evidence from the background material is used | Restates one fact from the background material without explaining its relevance to the claim | Uses at least one specific figure (the action-level change, the 4 million figure, or the rate data) and explains how it supports the claim | Uses two or more specific figures and explains how each supports the claim in a distinct way |
| Counterclaim | No counterclaim is addressed | Mentions an opposing view without a rebuttal | States a counterclaim and offers a rebuttal | States a counterclaim, rebuts it specifically using evidence, and ties the rebuttal back to the claim |
| Organization & conventions | Ideas are disconnected; frequent errors interfere with meaning | Some organization is present; errors are noticeable but do not block meaning | Clear paragraph structure with a claim, evidence, counterclaim, and conclusion; few errors | Clear, purposeful structure with a strong concluding statement that synthesizes the essay's evidence; virtually error-free |
Differentiation
Support
Provide sentence starters for each Planning Organizer row ("Quarry Bend should choose the ___ plan because the background material shows ___.") and allow the counterclaim and rebuttal to be combined into a single simpler sentence rather than a full paragraph.
Extension
Ask students to look up a typical monthly water bill for their own area and the common affordability benchmark, which treats combined water and sewer bills above about 4.5 percent of household income as a high burden. Then have them calculate what a bill-assistance program would need to cover to offset a 12 percent increase for a household near that threshold, and add that calculation as a second piece of evidence supporting their rebuttal.
ELL supports
Pre-teach "service line," "action level," and "bond" with visuals (a labeled cross-section of a pipe from the street to a house for "service line"). Allow the Planning Organizer to be completed with phrases rather than full sentences before drafting begins.