School administrators face a peculiar challenge in their quest for cul

Question

School administrators face a peculiar challenge in their quest for cultural inclusiveness; official recognition  of the growing amount of religious holidays means less days are spent in school.

A. of the growing amount of religious holidays means less days are spent in school

B. for the growing number of religious holidays means less days are spent at school

C. for the increasing amount of religious holidays mean fewer days are spent in school

D. of the increasing number of religious holidays mean fewer days are spent in school

E. of the growing number of religious holidays means fewer days are spent in school

Source:  McGraw Hill GMAT

gmatexam439 · Answer

ans -> E

holidays are countable therefore amount cannot be used to count holidays. 
"Number of things" is singular therefore means is correct. Thus E

adityapareshshah · Answer

Isnt'  official recognition ' for '  idiomatic than official recognition ' of '?

Besides what is wrong in the usage of 'increasing' in Option D?

nazgull · Answer

School administrators face a peculiar challenge in their quest for cultural inclusiveness; official recognition  of the growing amount of religious holidays means less days are spent in school.

A. of the growing  amount of  religious holidays means less days are spent in school
 wrong modifier 
B.  for  the growing number of religious holidays means less days are spent at school
 'recognition' is an action noun, so it should be 'recognition of'.  
C. for the increasing  amount of  religious holidays mean fewer days are spent in school
D. of the increasing number of religious holidays  mean  fewer days are spent in school
 the subject is a gerund 'increasing number'; 'of religious holidays' modifies that gerund. So it should be 'means'.   adityapareshshah 
E. of the growing number of religious holidays means fewer days are spent in school  CORRECT

gmatexam439 · Answer

The issue is not with increasing, its with " MEAN ". The sentence should have mean S .

DmitryFarber · Answer

adityapareshshah , the two idioms are different. A person or organization can receive recognition  for  an action or contribution. Note that we're recognizing the person, but specifically in light of something they did. If we are simply recognizing a thing, as in acknowledging a holiday, we use recognition  of .

As for "increasing" in D, there's no clear problem with it, except that all the answers are a bit odd in this regard. Is the number of religious holidays really growing? (Are we coming up with new religions or inventing new holidays?) It seems more likely that what is growing/increasing is not the number of holidays, but the number of holidays  that are recognized officially by schools . In this case, "a growing number" would be idiomatic: "recognition of a growing number of holidays."

adityapareshshah · Answer

Thanks all for the explanation. :-D

Doer01 · Answer

Hi,
 There are clearly two factors to decide splits: mean vs means & less vs fewer
first, mean vs means: Since amount/number of holidays is singular, means is correct. This gives us enough reason to reject D & C.
Second, less vs fewer: fewer is correct because days are countable. This gives us A,B, & C  vs  D & E. 
Since D is already rejected, E is the only remaining & correct choice.

School administrators face a peculiar challenge in their quest for cul

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School administrators face a peculiar challenge in their quest for cul

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