Percentiles

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Percentiles

by rnaah » Mon Oct 03, 2011 12:34 am
A student scored the 90th percentile out of 80 grades in her class. In another class with 100 grades, 19 are above her grade. If no other grade is equal to her own, what is her average percentile from the two classes?
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by shankar.ashwin » Mon Oct 03, 2011 12:58 am
She scored 90 percentile in 80 grades, so there are 8 grades above hers.

And the other class has 19 grades above hers.

So in total 27 grades are above hers or she would be the 153rd grade of the total 180.

153/180 * 100 = 85 percentile.

I am not pretty sure if I understood the question correctly though.

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by GMATGuruNY » Mon Oct 03, 2011 5:00 am
rnaah wrote:A student scored the 90th percentile out of 80 grades in her class. In another class with 100 grades, 19 are above her grade. If no other grade is equal to her own, what is her average percentile from the two classes?
Shankar's solution is great.

Another approach:
In the class with 80 grades, the student = 90th percentile.
In the class with 100 grades, the student = 81st percentile. (Since 19 grades are higher, implying that 81 grades are lower.)
Thus, to determine the weighted average of the 180 grades:
[(80*90)+(100*81)] / 180 = 15300/180 = 85.
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