When calculating an experimental probability, we are comparing the number of times the event occurs to the number of times the experiment is done.
P=Times the Event Occurs/Times the Experiment Is Done
This is very similar to the Probability Formula.
Below we can see the results of a survey of 100 randomly selected students at a 2000-student high school. Now we can find the experimental probability that a student selected at random plans to go either to trade school or community college.
Response
Number of Responses
Go to community college
24
Go to 4-year college
43
Take a year off before college
12
Go to trade school
15
Do not plan to go to college
6
In the table, there is a total of 24 students who plan to go to community college, 43 whose plan is going to a 4-year college, 12 who plan taking a year off before college, 15 who plan going to trade school, and 6 who do not plan to go to college. The sum of these values is the number of possible outcomes.
24+43+12+15+6= 100
Out of these, 15 people plan to go either to trade school and 24 plan to go to the community college.
The sum of these values is the number of favorable outcomes.
24+15= 39
Now we have enough information to calculate P(trade or community college).
