Question

Recently Mr. McKeague taught a college algebra class that started the semester with 32 students having the following characteristics. AgeMenWomen18 2 319 2 220 5 421 + 7 7What is the probability that a student selected at random from this classa. is female? b. is 19 years old? c. is 20 years or older? d. is under 20 years of age

Answer 1

For all the questions we will use the following quotient for the probability that an event occurs:

`\frac{\text{favorable cases}}{total\text{ cases}}.`

We know that there are 32 students in total, then the number of total cases will be 32 for all the questions.

a) From the given data we get that there are 16 female students, therefore the probability of selecting a female student is:

`(16)/(32)=0.5.`

(b) From the given data we get that there are 4 students that are 19 years old, therefore the probability of selecting one of those students is:

`(4)/(32)=0.125.`

(c) From the given data we get that there are 23 students that are 20 years old or older, therefore the probability of selecting one of those students is:

`(23)/(32)=0.71875.`

(d) From the given data we get that there are 9 students that are under 20 years of age, therefore the probability of selecting one of those students is:

`(9)/(32)=0.28125.`

Answer:

(a) 0.5,

(b) 0.125,

(c) 0.71875,

(d) 0.28125.