A total of 626 tickets were sold for the school play. They were either adult tickets or student tickets. There were 74 fewer student tickets sold than adult tickets. How many adult tickets were sold?

351 adults and 275 students

Step-by-step explanation:

We can set-up a system of equations to find the number of adults. We know students and adults attended. We will let s be the number of students and a be the number of adults. Since 626 tickets were purchased, then s+a=626.

We also know that 74 fewer student tickets then adult tickets. So s+76=a, the number of student tickets plus 76 will be the number of adult tickets.

We will solve by substituting one equation into the other. We substitute a=76+s into s+a=626. Simplify and isolate the variable a.

s+a=626

s+76+s=626

2s+76=626

2s+76-76=626-76

2s=550

s=275

This means that 275 students attended and 351 adults attended since 275+351=626.