broall wrote:
Employees accepted into the program - for which the application process is long and arduous - attend several workshops aimed at what the company calls emotional intelligence, practice active listening skills, and they learn how to provide easily-digestible constructive criticism.
A. practice active listening skills, and they learn
B. they practice active listening skills and learn
C. practicing active listening skills, and at learning
D. practicing active listening skills and learning
E. at practicing active listening skills and learning
VERITAS PREP OFFICIAL EXPLANATION:
In correct answer choice D, the verbs "practicing" and "learning" form parallel components of a participial modifier, describing what happens when the employees attend the workshops. And this is logical: active listening and providing feedback are components of emotional intelligence, and the sentence could very easily end right after "intelligence." This is unnecessary but helpful description, perfectly performing the role of a modifier. To see that this correct, use slash-and-burn to create a much simpler sentence:
"Employees attend workshops, practicing x and learning y."
Choice A bungles its attempt at making a three-verb series ("attend, practice, and learn"), adding "they" to the third item when the second does not have a subject.
Choice B essentially commits the same error, just reversing the placement of the single "they" this time before the second verb but not the third.
The "at" in choice C is similarly problematic: if the meetings are aimed at two things ("at what the company calls..." and "at learning..."), those two things aren't parallel (one is a noun and the other a verb), and if the verbs are to be parallel (as A and B seem to try to do) then the term "at" breaks up the series.
Choice E is guilty of an error with the placement of "at" as well: "at" could work to connect two parallel things that the meetings are aimed at, but would need to be connected by the word "and" which is missing here.