Succeeding in the World of Work

Science
Physicists often study forces in nature. Those forces are described in Newton's Three Laws of Motion. Newton's Third Law of Motion states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. For instance, when a baseball batter hits an incoming baseball, the baseball flies away in the opposite direction. How fast the baseball moves is determined by how hard the batter hits the ball.

Press your hand against a table or desk and notice how your hand changes shape. The desk exerts an equal and opposite reaction to the force with which you are pushing against the desk. The desk is pushing back. This is an example of Newton's Third Law.

Can you think of other instances where you notice an equal and opposite reaction to some applied force?

Math
Differences in Pay
Nikki decided to take a job with fewer hours so that she can spend more time at home. In her former job she worked 40 hours a week at $17.60 an hour, and now she works 30 hours a week at $17.80. What is the yearly difference in pay?

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Science
As a chemist, working in a chemistry lab, you often have to make solutions of different substances for your experiments. Tris-HCl (Tris-Hydrochloride) is a common reagent in the lab. Let's say you were making a solution that called for 100 g of Tris-HCl powder in 1 Liter of water, or 100 g/L. How many grams of Tris-HCl powder would you add if you wanted 2 L of this Tris-HCl solution?

Can you calculate the amount you would need for a 500 ml solution (0.5 L)?

Math
Calculating Gross Profit
Ken is calculating the gross profit on the products in his store. The retail price for one of the products is $15.45, and the production costs are 40 percent of retail. What is the gross profit on each of these products sold?

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Science
Radioactive dating is used to determine how old objects are. It used often in geology and biology. Certain elements like Carbon-14 radioactively decay at a consistent rate, which allows us to measure it. For instance, Carbon-14 has a half-life of 5,730 years. That means every 5,730 years, the amount of Carbon-14 you have will be reduced by one half. All plants and animals have Carbon-14 in them. The ratio between normal Carbon-12 and Carbon-14 is nearly constant in all living things. When a living organism dies, the Carbon-14 begins to radioactively decay, while the Carbon-12 stays constant. By measuring the amount of Carbon-14 left in an organism's bone or tissue, you can tell how long ago the organism died.

Let's say you found the bones of a pre-historic man in a remote region. After measuring the ratio of Carbon-14 to Carbon-12 in the bone, you determined 1/2 the Carbon-14 had decayed since the man passed away. Knowing the half-life of Carbon-14, calculate how long ago this person passed away?

Math
Calculating Salary Increase
Henri is choosing between two job offers. One job pays $40,000 with a 2.5 percent increase the second year. The other job pays $42,000 with a 2 percent increase the second year. After the second year, how much more will he have earned in the second job?

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Science
Physicists often study the behavior of atomic and sub-atomic particles around us. One of the things they measure is the average speed of the particles. This determines things like temperature. The higher the average speed of particles in a substance, such as the air, the higher the temperature. You can measure the average speed by adding up the speeds of all the particles and dividing by the number of particles you measured.

Calculate the average speed for the following 4 particles:

Particle 1: 12 meters/second
Particle 2: 15 meters/second
Particle 3: 16 meters/second
Particle 4: 17 meters/second

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Math
Understanding Inflation
At her new job, Deborah was told that she is likely to receive a 2.9 percent pay increase her second year and a 1.3 percent increase to compensate for inflation. If her salary for the first year is $48,000, what will her salary be the second year?

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Science
The electrical energy we use can be measured in a unit called the Watt. Electricity companies charge us for the amount of kilowatts we use per hour (kilo means 1000). Here is the formula they use to charge us:

Total Cost = (kilowatts used)(total time used)(kilowatt cost per hour)

Let's say you're in charge of a technology company and you have a machine that uses 20 kilowatts of energy. You must run it for 40 hours per week to stay in business. The energy company charges you $0.05/kilowatt hour. How much will it cost for you to run it for one week.

Math
Calculating Bonuses
At the store where Tina works, employees make a $50 bonus for every 25 items they sell. She usually sells 20 items a day and works 5 days a week. How much extra does she make in a week in bonuses?

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Science
The surface area for a flat object can be measured by using the following formula:

Surface area = height x width

Example: Surface area = 10 feet x 10 feet
= 100 square feet

Let's say you're the designer for a company that makes solar panels for people's roofs. The more surface area a panel has, the more energy it can collect and use from the sun. You have a customer whose roof has a 30 foot height and 50 foot width. The customer wants the solar panel to cover his entire roof. How much surface area will this panel cover?

Math
Understanding Wages
In the restaurant where Fran works, servers are paid $5.22 an hour before tips. If this amount is actually 180 percent of the state minimum, what is the minimum?

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Science
In science, you often use statistics to measure phenomena. One statistical variable is called the Mode. A mode is the number in set of data that shows up the most often. For instance, here is a set of numbers: [10, 8, 7, 10, 11, 10, 9, 10]. The mode is 10, because it shows up more often than any of the other numbers.

Let's say you were a wildlife biologist, and you were measuring the speed of cheetahs in Africa. You measured the speed of 8 cheetahs and came up with the following data set in terms of miles per hour: [60, 65, 70, 65, 58, 65, 60, 65].
What is the mode of this data set?

Math
Understanding Work Hours
Karen wants to talk to her boss about changing her work hours for this month so that she can take a short trip to see her brother. She typically works 5 days a week, 8 hours a day. To work the same number of hours total this month, but take four days off, how many hours will she have to work each day?

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Science
Volume is used to measure the amount of space a 3-D object takes up. You can calculate it by multiplying the height x width x depth of an object. Here is an example:

Let's say you were the owner of a fish tank company and you were writing up the brochure for the new fish tank you designed. Your fish tank has a height of 3 feet, a width of 5 feet, and depth of 3 feet. How many cubic feet of water will you say your fish tank can hold, in other words, what is the volume?

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Math
Understanding Dimensions
The dimensions of the poster Kaled designed for the job fair he is going to are 18" by 12". If 50 percent of that space is occupied by the text and 25 percent by the title, how many square inches are left for the figures?

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Science
Structural engineers must often calculate the weight of an object in order to know how much force they need to support it when they build things. In physics, the weight of an object is measured in terms of a unit called the Newton (N), which is equal to the mass of an object times the acceleration of gravity.

Weight = (mass in kilograms)(acceleration of gravity)

The acceleration of gravity on earth is 9.8 meters/ second2. We can approximate it by using 10 meters/second².

Let's say you were a structural engineer, and someone hired you to design a deck that could hold a 500 kilogram statue (about 1100 pounds). How much would this statue weigh in term of Newtons.

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Math
Calculating Time Needed
Erik is downloading some photos that he is going to use in a presentation. If it takes an average of 50 seconds to download one photo, how many minutes will it take to download all 45 photos that he needs?

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Science
Statisticians are people who take a wide range of data on a certain topic and look for patterns or other important information within the data. One of the things they must report when they announce their results is the range of their data. The range is defined by the lowest and highest data points recorded.

Let's say you were a statistician measuring the annual income for actors in Hollywood. You talked with 10 actors, asked them how much money they made last year, and came up with the following data set:

[$10, $400, $5000, $55,000, $900, $100,000, $200, $40,000, $30,000, $5,000,000]

What is the range of this data set?

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Math Check
Understanding Taxes
Bruno expected his paycheck to be $400.00 because be worked 40 hours at $10 an hour but instead it was $332.00. He realized that the rest went to taxes. What percentage of Bruno's paycheck went to taxes?

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