Error in the SAT Question of the Day

Error in the SAT Question of the Day
November 26, 2012

Each day, the College Board offers an online "Official SAT Question of the Day" to help students prepare. The question also indicates what percentage of those who tried it answered correctly. The question for Friday shows an unusually low correct answer rate (28 percent). But that may not reflect a weakness in mathematics education. Until some time over the weekend, the College Board's website was telling people who answered correctly that they were wrong, and those who selected one of the incorrect answers that they were correct.

The question: If 24/15 = 4/n, what is the value of 4n

A. 6

B. 10

C. 12

D. 30

E. 60

Michael Paul Goldenberg wrote at the website of Rational Mathematics Education that he answered B (the correct answer) and was told by the website that the correct answer was A. He also noted that the explanation for the incorrect answer (A) actually pointed to B being the real answer.

Michael Pearson, executive director of the Mathematical Association of America, said that the explanations were correct from the start (even when the answer was incorrect), so that "it's clear that someone simply set the wrong answer among the multiple-choice selections."

In an e-mail Sunday, a College Board spokeswoman confirmed that the error was in programming the answer key, and said that "we have resolved the issue and apologize for any confusion this may have caused."





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