An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes

Question

An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping  classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give  students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors.
 
A) classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give

B) classes that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give

C) classes and allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
 
D) classes, which allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving
 
E) classes, which allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving

KyleWiddison · Accepted Answer

This is a really good question. You are correct, we aren't choosing E because "giving" does not refer back to the "which" modifier. The problem is in trying to stack the -ing modifier after a non-essential modifier. The non-essential clause can be "omitted" from the sentence from a meaning standpoint. Watch what happens when we remove the non-essential clause: "An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes, giving students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors." You can see here that the clause "giving students.. " doesn't make sense in the sentence without that non-essential modifier. Why does a looping class give this opportunity? We don't know because we don't really know what a looping class is.

KW

surbhi87 · Answer

B v/s E but i'd choose E.

Here's why : 
 
A) classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give. 
 "that allows" doesn't go with "looping classes". Also, "to advance.....to give" - should've been "to advance....AND to give" . 
 
B) classes that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
"that allow teachers TO advance....and TO(missing) give" . Parallelism! 
 
C) classes and allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
1) classes AND allow teachers is incorrect. should be "classes THAT allow teachers" . 
 
D) classes, which allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving
 looping classes ..allows - Subject Verb Disagreement
 
E) classes, which allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving
best of the lot.

What's the OA?

rajat0627 · Answer

OA is B, btw can you explain why the classes are allowing not the experiment?

pradeepdeeps · Answer

An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors.

A) classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give

looping classes is plural and the phrase modifying it cannot be singular , which mean "that allows " is wrong

B) classes that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
This statement is perfect , subject-verb agreement and parallelism is perefectly put here . HENCE RIGHT ANSWER

C) classes and allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give

allow teachers phrase is supposed to modify the action of looping classes , which means it is dependent on the first phrase of looping classes, And will make it equal which is wrong here.

D) classes, which allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving

Missing parallelism , as all sentences seem to be in simple present which gets spoiled by "giving" in the end and Allows is singular and not acceptable

E) classes, which allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving
same as above , missing Paralellism .

surbhi87 · Answer

1. An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give I'm not very good with the rules of grammar but i THINK the reason "why classes are allowing the experiment and not experimenting" is that 1. classes is the noun that is the closest to the fact explained "that allow teachers to.. " 2) Also, if experiment had to be linked to "that allow teachers...", the sentence would've said "an inc. no. of schools are performing experiments that allow teachers..." NOT "are experimenting that allow teachers..." Again, pls pardon my bad sense of rules but this is the best reasoning i could come up with :oops:

Does anyone know why B is ok in terms of parallelism ? classes that allow teachers TO advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and (TO?? ) give ? Thanks !

KyleWiddison · Answer

Parallelism is pretty concrete in Sentence Correction, but there is an area where the GMAT gets relaxed. The preposition "to" can be omitted from the second element in parallelism because it's "understood". I like to eat hamburgers and (to) drink milkshakes. That sentence is perfectly fine with or without the "to".

KW

KyleWiddison · Answer

Your grammar rules are correct. The placement of the modifier next to classes means that we are modifying classes. The additional question is meaning-based - does it make sense for a class, a thing, to allow a teacher, a person, to do something? In this case it certainly does. Normally teachers are assigned to a grade level and they are with students for a year before the students move on. The new "looping classes" keep the teachers with the students so the new class type "allows" the teachers to stay with the students. Here is a different example: "The new bridge allowed the people across the river to get to town in half the time." In this example a thing is allowing people to do something they couldn't do before.

KW

surbhi87 · Answer

Thanks Kylie for the detailed explanation. I was very confused between B and E and somehow neither looked perfect to me . Why can't "giving" in E modify the whole "which allow...." expression? I believe "which" modifying "classes" in E should be okay and the reason we're not choosing E is the word "giving" . Right ?

Thanks !

sandaki · Answer

An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping  classes;that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give  students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors.

a) classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give
 
b) classes that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
 
c) classes and allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils and give
 
d) classes, which allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving
 
e) classes, which allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, giving

sandaki · Answer

I was able to narrow down to option B and E,finally ended up choosing E.

I thought "teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils" gave the students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors,was better in meaning. Can anyone tell why B is better than E

sobby · Answer

i also struggled between B and E..(50-50) i chose B , but still not 100 % convinced with my own selection :lol:

which and that both seems fine to me...looping classes are special type of classes (checked in wikki) ..so which and that both are fine here in this context . In B i think there must be "that" in second half for llism ..that allow and that give ...i guess ellipses worked here ..."that " we can assume in second part . Expert advice needed ... GMATNinja please help ...

sandaki · Answer

This is the OE

When you read the original, you have to wonder what the pronoun that is standing in for. The experimenting? The looping? The classes, which actually allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, are plural and could never be called that. So this connector, the semicolon followed by that, cannot be the correct choice.

From there, compare the connectors in the other choices. Are schools experimenting with looping classes that allow teachers to advance? That seems possible. Are they experimenting with looping classes and allow teachers to advance? That connector doesn’t seem to make sense, so you can eliminate Choice C. Choices D and E both use which, but Choice D uses allows, which creates a subject-verb agreement issue with the plural word classes.

So, ultimately, you need to decide between Choices B and E. If the difference between that and which does not decide it for you, look at the ends of the two answer choices. Choice B says that these classes allow teachers to advance and give students the opportunity. That seems like a reasonable sentence, with some clear parallelism thrown in for good measure. In Choice E, you find allow teachers to advance grade level along with their pupils, giving students the opportunity. What is giving students the opportunity? The connectors in this answer choice make it very unclear what the subject of giving is, and putting it after the comma implies that the pupils are giving themselves the opportunity, so you should eliminate it and take Choice B.

Abhishek009 · Answer

Correct answer must be (B) for the highlighted errors in the options...

mailabhishekmathur · Answer

Giving used in the option E is a participle so does not necessarily refer back to the word preceding (as far as I remember), it can refer to the complete clause. So the question that what the giving refer to is answered by something that allows the teachers to advance to the advanced grade.

Given that looping classes are some special classes the use of that is not necessary to explain the term.

I am still a little confused as to why B was preferred over E. Please explain a little more if possible

Nightmare007 · Answer

I narrowed down to B and E.
I Have removed B because of two reasons 
 - that allows and that gives - I thought the word "that" pronoun must be present for parallelism. 
 - E changes the meaning of the sentence but is grammatically correct.

daagh  ,  GMATNinja  , Please kindly help me where i went wrong.

Thank you.

arvind910619 · Answer

Imo E
Tough choice between B and E .
Can some one explain why E is wrong

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daagh · Answer

Nightmare wrote
I narrowed down to B and E.
I Have removed B because of two reasons 
- that allows and that gives - I thought the word "that" pronoun must be present for parallelism. 
- E changes the meaning of the sentence but is grammatically correct.

What is the second reason for removing B? Your first reason isn't an issue since the first 'that' stands good for the second issue also. 
With reference to your observation regarding E, if E changes the meaning, then however grammatically correct it might be, it will not a contender. 
In E, it is a confusion what the adverbial --, giving -- is modifying. It may be modifying the classes that are allowing the students or the schools' experimentation that allow the students. The OE is also suspect in this case. Its reasoning that -, giving- may imply the students is erroneous. The -, verbing - will never modify the noun it touches, as adverbs do not modify nouns. All said, it is best to keep off E

Nightmare007 · Answer

daagh  sir,
 I got another doubt in general grammar. 
 
 An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give students the opportunity to form long-term relationships with their instructors.
 
 The Sentence intention is to say that "that allows teachers ...... with their pupils" is an essential modifier.
 
 While in E the essential modifier is turned into an non-essential modifier. 
 
 My doubt is - can we remove such options because the intended meaning is changed since an essential modifier is changed into non-essential modifier.

Secondly, The verb-ing modifier is ambiguous- whether it is referring to the non-essential modifier's part classes allow ... or Classes ,{removing non-essential modifier}, giving ..... . 
 
 my Second doubt in the just above sentence is - can the verb+ing modifier modify the subject + verb of non-essential clause preceding it ? 
 Help appreciated. Thank you.

cledgard · Answer

First check grammar

B:  looping classes that allow … and give…   correct parallelism.
E:  looping classes, which allow….., giving students…  not parallel. However, they do not have to be parallel; after a comma, we can have  a present participle modifying the whole clause , “ which allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils ”

So they both are grammatically correct.

Now let’s check the meaning of the original sentence:

…looping classes; that allows teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils, to give students the opportunity… 
The use in the original “ to give ” introduces purpose.

In B, the use of “ and give ”, gives another quality of the classes, not purpose.
In E, the use of “ giving ” refers to a consequence of the previous clause, and thus, it looks better.
Still, all this is arguable. Nevertheless, if we look at the original sentence “ with looping classes; that allows teachers to advance ”, the use of a semicolon and the pronoun “that” is wrong, and we cannot be clear about the intended meaning of the author. But I believe it is important to decide  which pronoun is better “which or “that” ; in short,  is this an essential clause or a non-essential clause?  
It is my contention that this is a    non-essential    clause because we do not need it in order to know which looping classes are we talking about; we refer to all looping classes. Thus,  we must use the “which” clause .

If it were essential, the sentence would refer only to the looping classes “that allow teachers to advance to the next grade level along with their pupils“; however,  all the looping classes do that, because that is the definition of looping classes. 
 I go for E

An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

An increasing number of schools are experimenting with looping classes

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