The band chosen for the annual spring concert

[MichelleN]

Hi,

I have a question about Problem 13 of Chapter 6 (page 91) in the 2007 Edition Sentence Correction guide.

The incorrect sentence reads as: "The band chosen for the annual spring concert appealed to the student body and the administration as well."

The answer says that the correct sentence should be: "The band chosen for the annual spring concert appealed to both the student body and the administration.

I thought that having "as well" instead of "both" shouldn't make a sentence incorrect. I did not see anything in the guide specifying when to use "as well" instead of "both" and vice versa.

Any advice would be appreciated!

--Michelle

[esledge]

Generally, "as well" means the same thing as "and" so the GMAT would consider "appealed to the student body AND the administration AS WELL" redundant.

You might object to the use of "both," arguing that "both X and Y" is an unnecessary construction; you could get the idea across with simply "X and Y= the student body and the administration." However, the "both" serves a distinct purpose: it tells you to expect a list of two things--particularly nice when the things are long phrases. For example: "At the concert tonight, the band will play BOTH old favorites, such as patriotic marches and big-band hits, AND modern music."

The GMAT uses "as well as" to indicate the start of a new list. Use "and" to continue an already started list. For an example, see OG #132, which uses "as well as" incorrectly.

[MichelleN]

Thanks Emily! That explanation helps a lot... especially since the "as well as" vs. "both" situation came up in several other practice problems.

[StaceyKoprince]

as always, we're glad to help!