Question

A class has $90 to spend on a field trip. The field trip costs $2.50 per person and there will be 5 chaperones on the trip. One student used the inequality 90 > 2.50 (x + 5)to find x, the number of students that the field trip budget could accommodate. Which best describes the error in the student’s inequality?

Answer 1

Instead of greater than, the inequality symbol should be greater than or equal to.

Explanation:

We know the variable x represents the number of students. We also know there are 5 chaperones attending; this makes x+5 the total number of people attending.

It costs $2.50 per person; this means we multiply the number of people, x+5, by 2.50:

2.50(x+5)

The class has $90 to spend; this means they can spend up to and including $90. This gives us

90 ≥ 2.50(x+5)

Answer 2

Greetings!

The inequality sign is not correct because the > symbol means greater than. However, up to and including $90 can be spent so the inequality sign should be ≥ (greater than or equal to).

Hope this helps!