MEP Practice Book ES9

9 Data Analysis
9.3 Calculations with the Mean
1. The mean shoe size of 12 shoes is 7.5. An extra shoe of size 8 is added to the group
of shoes. What is the new mean shoe size?

2. After 9 games, the mean number of goals scored by a football team is 3.

If after one more game
(a) they score 5 goals, what is the new mean value of goals scored?
(b) they score no goals, what is the new mean value of goals scored?
(c) the new mean value of goals scored is 2.9, how many goals did they score in
this game?

3. The mean number of sandwiches eaten at a party by 20 people was 2.8. How many
sandwiches would you need to order for a similar party for 35 people?

4. The first seven of eight judges in a skating competition gave the competitor an
average score of 5.8. If the competitor wants to score at least 5.7, what is the least
score the eighth judge has to give the competitor?

5. The mean of 7 numbers is 5. When an extra number is added the mean is 5.5.
What is the extra number?

6. When 8 is added to a set of 4 numbers, the mean changes to 9.6. What was the
mean of the original numbers?

7. On a plane there are 20 business class passengers and 123 tourist class passengers.
The mean weight of baggage for the business class passengers was 17.5 kg, and for
the tourist class was 9.4 kg.
(a) What is the mean weight of baggage for all passengers?
(b) If the plane is allowed to carry 2000 kg of luggage, how much extra
luggage could have been carried?

8. The table below shows the number of people in each of the 100 cars passing a
particular place.

No. of people in each car 1 2 3 4

No. of cars x 50 y 16

(a) Find the value of x + y.

(b) If the mean number of people per car is 2.4, show that x + 3y = 76.
(c) Find the value of x and of y by solving appropriate equations.
(d) State the modal number of people per car.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.3
1
9. (a) The median of a set of eight numbers is 4 2 . Given that seven of the
numbers are 9, 2, 3, 4, 12, 13 and 1, find the eighth number.
(b) The mean of a set of six numbers is 2 and the mean of another set of ten
numbers is m. If the mean of the combined set of sixteen numbers is 7, find
the value of m.

9.4 Mean, Median and Mode for Grouped

Data
1. 100 sentences were taken from a book and the number of words per sentence was
counted.
(a) Copy and complete the following table .

No. of words per sentence Mid-value (x) No. of sentences (f)

1-5 16
6 - 10 22
11 - 15 18
16 - 20 11
21 - 25 23 12
26 - 30 9
31 - 35 8
36 - 40 2
41 - 45 2

∑ f = 100
(b) Hence, estimate the mean number of words per sentence.
(c) Given that the mean number of words per sentence of the next
50 sentences is 17.3, estimate the mean number of words per sentence
of all 150 sentences.

2. The daily wages of 100 construction workers are displayed in the table below.

Daily wage (£) 16 ≤ x <18 18≤ x < 20 20 ≤ x < 22 22 ≤ x < 24 24 ≤ x < 26 26 ≤ x < 28 28≤ x <30
No. of workers 8 10 18 30 22 7 5

(a) Write down the modal class.

(b) Estimate the mean daily wage.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

3. A school librarian recorded the number of books borrowed weekly by pupils in one
particular class during 40 successive weeks. The results are shown in the table
below.

No. of books borrowed 10 - 14 15 - 19 20 - 24 25 - 29 30 - 34 35 - 39

No. of weeks 5 7 9 8 5 6

(a) Write down the modal class.

(b) Draw a bar chart to illustrate this information.
(c) Estimate the mean number of books borrowed per week.

4. In an experimental farm, 30 hectare plots of land growing potatoes produced yields

in tonnes as shown in the frequency table below.

Yield (x tonnes) 3.4 ≤ x <3.6 3.6 ≤ x < 4.0 4.0 ≤ x < 4.4 4.4 ≤ x < 4.8 4.8≤ x < 5.0 5.0 ≤ x < 5.6
No. of plots 3 6 8 5 6 2

(a) Draw a histogram to represent the results.

(b) Estimate the mean yield per plot.

5. (a) The diameters of 50 ball bearings produced by a factory measured in mm

(correct to 2 significant figures) are given in the table below.

Diameter (mm) 5.0 - 5.2 5.3 - 5.5 5.6 - 5.8 5.9 - 6.1 6.2 - 6.4 6.5 - 6.7
Frequency 6 8 12 11 7 6

(i) State the modal class.

(ii) Estimate the mean diameter.
(b) The diameters of 50 test tubes produced by a glass factory measured in mm
(correct to 2 significant figures) are given in the table below.

Diameter (mm) 5.8 - 6.0 6.1 - 6.3 6.4 - 6.6 6.7 - 6.9 7.0 - 7.2 7.3 - 7.5
Frequency 6 8 12 11 7 6

(i) State the modal class.

(ii) Using the answer in (a) (ii), or otherwise, estimate the mean diameter
of the 50 test tubes.

6. The ages of a group of 25 artists are given below.

16 17 15 15 8
26 16 14 9 13
9 16 20 19 22
18 11 15 14 21
12 20 w21 16 17

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.4
(a) Without grouping, find the mean age.
(b) Arrange the data in classes, 8 - 12, 13 - 17, and so on. Estimate the
mean age.
(c) Find the difference between the estimated mean age in (b) and the actual
mean age in (a) and express this difference as a percentage of the actual
mean age.

7. The following data show the places of wedding ceremony against length of
engagement (in months), for a sample of 250 couples.

Length of Engagement 0-6 6 - 12 12 - 24 24 - 36 36 - 42

Registry Office 39 20 14 10 2
Church 16 13 35 62 39

(a) Using separate diagrams, draw histograms to illustrate the above

information.
(b) Calculate the mean length of engagement for each place of marriage.
(c) What conclusion can you draw from the answers in (b)?

8. (a) The ages of 30 men convicted for the first time of violent crime in Country
X gave the following figures.
22 32 29 28 22 16 19 17 17 16
19 18 18 30 20 20 28 28 20 23
23 35 19 22 21 17 32 23 30 21

(i) Arrange the data in classes of 15 - 19, 20 - 24, . . . , 35 - 39.

(ii) Estimate the mean age.
(b) The grouped frequency distribution of the ages of a group of men convicted
for the first time of violent crime from Country Y is as shown in the table
below.

Age (x years) 16 ≤ x <18 18≤ x < 20 20 ≤ x < 25 25≤ x < 28 28≤ x <30 30 ≤ x < 40
Frequency 12 10 23 15 8 12

(i) Draw a histogram to represent this information.

(ii) Estimate the mean age.
(iii) Comparing the answers in (a) (ii) and (b) (ii), draw a conclusion
concerning the ages of men convicted for the first time of violent
crime from Country X and Country Y.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

9. The heights of 30 children are given in the table below.

Height in cm Frequency
150 ≤ x < 155 2
155 ≤ x < 160 5
160 ≤ x < 165 8
165 ≤ x < 170 10
170 ≤ x < 175 5

(a) Calculate an estimate of the mean height.

(b) The class teacher said she expected the average height to be about 165 cm.
How was the teacher able to do this?
(SEG)

10. Andrew is a checkout operator at the local supermarket.

At the end of a shift, he looked at the total amounts of money that people had
spent.
Amount spent (£x) Number of people
0 < x ≤ 20 25

20 < x ≤ 40 9

40 < x ≤ 60 10

60 < x ≤ 80 15

80 < x ≤ 100 8

(a) Calculate an estimate of the mean amount spent by his customers during
that shift.
(b) The manager of the supermarket decides to give a bonus to the most
efficient checkout operator. She decides that this will be the person who
works at the fastest rate.

Here is some information about the three checkout operators after their shift.

Operator Number of items sold Time worked

1
Andrew 10 500 7 2 hours

Barbara 6400 4 hours 15 min

Colin 9120 6 hours

Who should get the bonus?

Give a reason for your answer and show all your working.
(NEAB)

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.4
11. Vicki investigated the times taken to serve 120 customers at Supermarket A.
Her results are shown below.

Time (seconds) 20 - 30 30 - 40 40 - 50 50 - 60 60 - 70
Number of customers 4 17 48 16 35

(a) (i) Calculate an estimate of the mean time to serve the customers.
(ii) Write down the modal class for the serving times.

Vicki decided to extend her investigation to Supermarket, B.

She obtained the times taken to serve 120 customers at Supermarket B. Her
extended table is shown below.

Time (seconds) 20 - 30 30 - 40 40 - 50 50 - 60 60 - 70

Number of customers at Supermarket A 4 17 48 16 35

Number of customers at Supermarket B 5 20 54 36 5

(b) Vicki correctly worked out the mean and modal class for the times at
Supermarket B. She also worked out correctly the median of the times for
each supermarket.
Use your answers to part (a) to complete the table below.

Supermarket A Supermarket B

Median 48.1 46.5

Modal class 40 - 50

Mean 46.3

(c) Which average in this table represents the data most fairly?
Give a reason for your answer.
(MEG)
12. The table shows the weights of 100 children in year 7.

Weight, w (kg) Frequency

20 < w ≤ 30 12
30 < w ≤ 40 21
40 < w ≤ 50 38
50 < w ≤ 60 a
60 < w ≤ 70 b

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

An estimate of the mean weight of the children is calculated as 44 kg.

Calculate the values of a and b.
(AQA)

13. 50 people were asked how long they had to wait for a bus.
The table shows the results.

Time, t (minutes) Frequency Mid-point

0 < t ≤ 5 16
5 < t ≤ 10 21
10 < t ≤ 15 10
15 < t ≤ 20 3

(a) Calculate an estimate of the average time they had to wait.

(b) On a copy of the grid below, draw a frequency diagram to represent the data.

25

20
Frequency
15

10

0
0 5 10 15 20
Time, t (minutes)
(AQA)

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.4
14. The histogram shows the test scores of 320 children in a school.

4
Frequency
density
3

0
70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150
Score

(a) Find the median score.

(b) Find the interquartile range of the scores.
(AQA)

15. The table shows the weight of the luggage for passengers on one plane.

Weight, w (kg) Frequency

0 < w ≤ 5 14
5 < w ≤ 10 28
10 < w ≤ 15 12
15 < w ≤ 20 9
20 < w ≤ 25 2

(a) What was the modal class?

(b) One of the passengers is selected at random.
What is the probability that this passenger's luggage weighs 15 kg or less?
(c) Draw a frequency diagram for this distribution.
(d) Calculate an estimate of the mean weight of luggage for these passengers.
(OCR)

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

9.5 Cumulative Frequency

1. A check was made on the speeds of vehicles travelling along a motorway.

Speed in mph (x) Number of Vehicles

45 < x ≤ 55 4

55 < x ≤ 65 9

65 < x ≤ 75 10

75 < x ≤ 85 14

85 < x ≤ 95 11

95 < x ≤ 105 8

105 < x ≤ 115 7

Construct a cumulative frequency table and answer the questions that follow.
(a) How many vehicles were travelling at 85 mph or less?
(b) How many vehicles were travelling at 75 mph or less?
(c) How many vehicles were travelling at more than 75 mph?

2. The following frequency table shows marks scored by a class of pupils in a test.

Mark (x) Number of Pupils

0 ≤ x < 20 4

20 ≤ x < 40 8

40 ≤ x < 60 18

60 ≤ x < 80 8

80 ≤ x < 100 2

Construct a cumulative frequency table and answer the questions that follow.
(a) How many pupils scored less than 80 marks?
(b) If the pass mark was 40,
(i) how many pupils failed the test?
(ii) what percentage of pupils passed the test?

3. The life spans of 40 batteries are tested using an electric toy by recording the
length of time the toy operates before each battery fails. The results are recorded in
the following cumulative frequency table.

Life span in hours (x) 10 11 12 13 14

Number of batteries having life spans
of less than x 4 12 25 35 40

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9.5 MEP Practice Book ES9

Using a vertical scale of 1 cm to 5 batteries and a horizontal scale of 2 cm to

1 hour, draw a cumulative frequency curve. Use your graph to answer the
following questions.
1
(a) How many batteries have life spans less than 11 h?
2
1
(b) A battery is graded as 'super' if its life span is 13 h or longer. Find the
2
percentage of 'super' batteries in this batch of 40 batteries.

4. The heights of 80 plants of the same species were measured. The results were
tabulated as follows.

Height in cm (x) Number of Plants

18 < x ≤ 21 15

21 < x ≤ 24 16

24 < x ≤ 27 21

27 < x ≤ 30 20

30 < x ≤ 33 8

The table was then reorganised to read:

Height in cm (x) 21 24 27 30 33

Number of plants of this height x or less 15 A 52 72 B

(a) Find the values of A and B.

(b) How many plants have heights 21 cm or less?
(c) How many plants have heights 27 cm or less?
(d) If all plants with heights greater than 27 cm are exported, how many plants
are exported? What percentage of the total is exported?

5. A survey was carried out on 100 pupils to find out the distance of each of their
houses from school. The results are shown in the table below.

Distance in miles (x) 2 4 6 8 10

Number of pupils whose house is 18 50 80 96 100

x miles or less from school

Using a vertical scale of 2 cm to 10 children and a horizontal scale of 1 cm to

1 mile, draw a cumulative frequency curve. Use your graph to estimate
(a) the median distance,
(b) the inter-quartile range.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

6. A check was made on the speeds of 100 vehicles travelling along a motorway.
The following frequency table shows the results.

Speed in mph (x) Number of Vehicles

30 < x ≤ 40 4

40 < x ≤ 50 5

50 < x ≤ 60 8

60 < x ≤ 70 16

70 < x ≤ 80 23

80 < x ≤ 90 25

90 < x ≤ 100 12

100 < x ≤ 110 6

110 < x ≤ 120 1

(a) Copy and complete the following cumulative frequency table.

Speed in mph (x) 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120

Number of vehicles with
this speed x or less 4 9 100

(b) Using a horizontal scale of 2 cm to 10 mph and a vertical scale of 2 cm to

10 vehicles, draw a cumulative frequency curve.
(c) Use your graph to estimate
(i) the median speed,
(ii) the inter-quartile range.
(d) If driving at a speed above 85 mph is considered speeding, what percentage
of vehicles were speeding? Give your answer correct to the nearest whole
number.

7. As part of his Geography fieldwork, Tony took measurements of the steepness of

slopes. The steepness was measured as the angle the slope made with the
horizontal.
Tony's results are shown below.
15° 16° 9° 21° 32°
37° 25° 36° 40° 8°
13° 21° 32° 29° 32°
7° 4° 18° 17° 32°

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.5

Tony decided to group the data into 4 equal class intervals on an observation sheet.
(a) Copy and complete the observation sheet below, using 4 equal class
intervals.

Class interval Tally Frequency

(steepness ° )

(b) Use the completed observation sheet to draw a frequency diagram of the
data.
(LON)

8. A group of people took a fitness test.

They exercised hard.
Then they were timed to see how long their pulses took to return to normal.
The time taken for a pulse to return to normal is called the recovery time.
The recovery times for the group are shown in the table below.

Recovery Time (seconds) Frequency Cumulative

Frequency

0 up to but not including 20 0 0

20 up to but not including 40 7 7

40 up to but not including 60 9 16

60 up to but not including 80 18 34

80 up to but not including 90 13 47

90up to but wnot including100 12 59

100 up to but not including 120 9 68

120 up to but not including 140 6 74

(a) Use the figures in the table to draw a cumulative frequency curve.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

(b) Use your cumulative frequency curve to estimate the value of

(i) the median,
(ii) the inter-quartile range.

A second group of people took the fitness test. The recovery times of people in this
group had a median of 61 seconds and an inter-quartile range of 22 seconds.
(c) Compare the fitness results of these two groups.
(LON)

9. (a) 50 pupils take an English exam and a Maths exam. The distribution of the
marks they obtained is shown in the table below.

Mark 21 - 30 31 - 40 41 - 50 51 - 60 61 - 70 71 - 80 81 - 90 91 - 100
English 0 1 4 20 14 8 2 1
Number
exam
of
pupils Maths 2 3 6 10 12 10 4 3
exam

The following graph shows the cumulative frequency for the English marks.

50 English

40

Cumulative
frequency 30
Cumulative
Frequency
20

10

0 20 40 60 80 100
Marks
Marks
(i) On a copy of the the graph, show the cumulative frequency for the
Maths marks.

(ii) Copy and complete the table below.

English Maths
Median 60
Inter-quartile
range 14

(iii) Use the information in the table to comment on the differences

between the two distributions of marks.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.5

(b) Of the 50 pupils, 30 pass the Maths exam at the first attempt. From past
performance it is known that, if a pupil fails at the first attempt, the
probability of passing at the second attempt is 0.7. Calculate the probability
that a pupil, chosen at random from 50 pupils, will pass the maths exam at
either the first or second attempt.
(MEG)

10. Pete wanted to find out the length of time cars were left in a car park. His results,
to the nearest minute, are given in the table.

Length of stay Number of cars Cumulative

(minutes) (frequency) frequency

0 < t ≤ 15 0

15 < t ≤ 30 23

30 < t ≤ 45 35

45 < t ≤ 60 41

60 < t ≤ 75 63

75 < t ≤ 90 21

90 < t ≤ 120 10

120 < t ≤ 135 7

(a) Copy and complete the table.

(b) Draw a cumulative frequency diagram for the data.
(c) Use your diagram to estimate the inter-quartile range.
(d) The owners of the car park think that about two thirds of the cars are parked
for between 40 and 80 minutes.
Do Pete's results support this?
Give a reason for your answer.
(NEAB)

11. The table shows information about the number of hours that 120 children watched
television last week.

Number of hours Frequency

(h)
0 < h ≤ 2 10
2 < h ≤ 4 20
4 < h ≤ 6 25
6 < h ≤ 8 40
8 < h ≤ 10 15
10 < h ≤ 12 10

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

(a) Work out an estimate for the mean number of hours that the children
watched television last week.
(b) Copy and complete the cumulative frequency table.

Number of hours Frequency

(h)
0 < h ≤ 2 10
0 < h ≤ 4
0 < h ≤ 6
0 < h ≤ 8
0 < h ≤ 10
0 < h ≤ 12

140

120

100

Cumulative
frequency
80

60

40

20

O 2 4 6 8 10 12
Number of hours (h)

(c) On a copy of the grid, draw a cumulative frequency graph for your table.
(d) Use your graph to find an estimate for the number of children who watched
television for fewer than 5 hours last week.
(Edexcel)
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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.5

12. A manufacturer investigates how far a car travels before it needs new tyres.
The distances covered by 100 cars before they needed new tyres is shown in the
table below.

Distance covered Number of cars

(x thousands of miles)
10 < x ≤ 15 10
15 < x ≤ 20 23
20 < x ≤ 25 31
25 < x ≤ 30 19
30 < x ≤ 35 12
35 < x ≤ 40 5

(a) Complete a copy of the cumulative frequency table for the 100 cars.

Distance covered x ≤ 15 x ≤ 20 x ≤ 25 x ≤ 30 x ≤ 35 x ≤ 40
(x thousand miles)

Cumulative frequency 10

(b) Draw the cumulative frequency diagram on a copy of the grid below.
Cumulative
frequency

100

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Distance covered
(thousands of miles)

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

(c) Use your cumulative frequency diagram to estimate the median distance
covered.
(d) Use your diagram to estimate how many cars travelled less than 23 000
miles be fore needing new tyres.
(OCR)

9.6 Standard Deviation

1. Find the mean and standard deviation of these sets of numbers
(a) 8, 9, 10, 11, 12.
(b) 1, 2, 10, 18, 19.
(c) 10, 10, 10, 10, 10.
(d) 1. 10, 10, 10, 19.

2. Without doing all calculations, decide which of the following sets of numbers has
(a) the smallest
(b) the largest
standard deviation.
Set A : 10, 15, 20, 25, 30.
Set B : 5, 10, 20, 30, 35.
Set C : 18, 19, 20, 21, 22.
Set D : 18, 18, 20, 22, 22.

Check your answers by actually calculating the standard deviation.

3. The number of minutes late was noted for a sample of journeys on the
'Golden Hind' Intercity train from Penzance to London Paddington. Some of
these journeys took place before privatisation, others after privatisation.

Before 0, 3, 0, 25, 0, 0, 5, 55, 0

After 10, 5, 0, 0, 3, 2, 0, 15, 4

Find the mean and standard deviation of each set of times. What can you conclude
from this data? Is this a fair conclusion?

4. The following graph gives information about the weight of cucumbers produced
from 100 seeds of two different varieties, type x and type y.

(a) Which variety of seed has more variation in the weight of cucumbers
produced?
(b) Give a reason for your answer.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9
9.6

50

50
Type x
40
Numberof
Number
of seeds
seeds 30

20

10 Type y

0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5 5.5 6

Weight
Weight of
of cucumbers perseed
cucumbers per seed(kg)
(kg)

(SEG)

5. A researcher is trying out two types of compost, A and B. The yield of each tomato
plant, grown with each compost, in similar conditions, is given below.

A (kg) 25, 22, 30, 19, 17, 26, 12, 9

B (kg) 22, 18, 21, 20, 19, 23, 20, 17

Find the mean and standard deviation of each set of results. Which compost should
the researcher recommend for commercial use?

6. A group of 20 pupils took two mock exams from different exam boards. Each score
was out of a total of 100 marks. The scores obtained are given below.

Exam Mark

First 76, 52, 10, 27, 34, 53, 72, 64, 55, 67,
42, 45, 91, 28, 52, 61, 70, 34, 96, 15
Second 43, 52, 61, 55, 72, 36, 37, 53, 62, 71,
32, 25, 74, 67, 69, 55, 57, 43, 62, 70

Find the mean and standard deviation for each exam.

Compare and contrast the results.
If the pass marks for each exam were the same, which exam do you think is the
easier?

7. Normally, a superstore sells bottles of champagne with a mean of 10 bottles per

day and standard deviation of 2.5.
It is introducing a new brand, and over the first 20 days sells the following
quantities:
17, 15, 12, 7, 5, 12, 12, 10, 7, 15,
12, 11, 6, 8, 11, 13, 10, 14, 12, 11
Find the mean and standard deviation of this data.
Would you vote this new brand as a success? Give your reasons.

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 MEP Practice Book ES9

8. A football manager wants to buy a new striker for his team. He has two players in
mind. The goal scoring record of these players for their last 14 games is given in
the table below.

Player 1 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 3, 1, 0, 1, 1, 3, 0, 0, 3
Player 2 1, 1, 0, 2, 1, 1, 0, 1, 1, 0, 2, 1, 1, 1

Find the mean and standard deviation of each player's scoring record.
Which striker do you think the manager should buy? Give your reasons.

9. The numbers of students travelling on the school bus each day over the past term
have mean value 20.4 and standard deviation 3.2.
For the new term the bus fares have been reduced. The loadings for the first
15 days of operation were:
22, 25, 24, 22, 26,
27, 25, 24, 26, 27,
28, 27, 25, 29, 28
Find the mean and standard deviation of this data.
Has the reduction in fares been successful? Explain your answer.

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