Question

Suppose 51% of students chose to study Spanish their senior year, and that meant that there were 357 such students. How many students chose not to take Spanish their senior year?

Answer 1

Let's call the total amount of students as x. We know that 51% of students chose to study Spanish their senior year, and that meant that there were 357 such students, in another words, 357 is 51% of our x value. To find a percentage of a given value, we multiply the value by the percentage, and then divide by 100.

Using this information, we can write the following equation for x:

`x*51\%=357\Rightarrow(51x)/(100)=357`

Solving for x, we have

`\begin{gathered} (51x)/(100)=357 \\ x=357*(100)/(51) \\ x=700 \end{gathered}`

We have a total of 700 students. To find how many students chose not to take Spanish their senior year, we subtract the amount of students chose to take Spanish their senior year from the total amount.

`700-357=343`

343 students chose not to take Spanish their senior year.