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Mr. Oakley has x students in his class. All but 5 of his students plan to go on the scheduled field trip. If 90% of the students will go on the field trip, how many students are in Mr. Oakley's class?

a) x−5
b) 0.9x
c) 1.1x
d) x+5

1 Answer

6 votes

Final answer:

To find the number of students in Mr. Oakley's class, we set up the equation 0.9x = x - 5 and solved for x, which results in x = 50 students. The correct answer is (a) x - 5.

Step-by-step explanation:

Mr. Oakley has x students in his class, and 90% of the students will go on the field trip. If all but 5 of his students plan to go, this means that the 90% of the class that is going on the trip is equivalent to x minus 5 students because 5 students are not going. To solve for x, we set up the equation 0.9x = x - 5.

Now, we can solve for x:

  1. Add 5 to both sides: 0.9x + 5 = x.
  2. Subtract 0.9x from both sides: 5 = x - 0.9x.
  3. Combine like terms: 5 = 0.1x.
  4. Divide both sides by 0.1 to find x: 5 / 0.1 = x.
  5. x = 50. Therefore, there are 50 students in Mr. Oakley's class.

The correct answer to the question is (a) x - 5 because this expression represents the number of students going on the field trip which is 90% of the total number of students.

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