Question

If isme estimated that there are 50 students in the seventh grade class but there are actually 40 what is isme’s percent error?

Answer 1

The percent error is 25 %

Solution:

Given that it is estimated that there are 50 students in the seventh grade class, but there are actually 40

To find: percent error

Percent error is the difference between a measured and known value, divided by the known value, multiplied by 100%

The formula for percent error is given as:

$\text{ percent error }=\frac{\text { approximate value }-\text {exact value}}{\text { exact value }} \times 100$

Here, exact value = 40 and approximate value or estimated value = 50

Substituting the values in above formula,

$\begin{aligned}&\text { percent error }=\frac{50-40}{40} \times 100\\\\&\text { percent error }=\frac{10}{40} \times 100=\frac{100}{4}=25\end{aligned}$

Thus the percent error is 25 %