Question 8494: For the quadratic equation 3x^2=7-2x I decided to subtract 3x^2 from both sides of the equation and came up with 0=-3x^2+7-2x and then from there I solved the equation using the quadratic formula. Is that the correct way to solve this equation?
Answer by rapaljer(4671)   (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website! There are two issues to deal with here in this problem. First, when solving a quadratic equation, it's best to keep the coefficient of the  term positive. However, even more important here is to make sure that you put the terms of the equation in DESCENDING powers of the variable, in order to identify the a, b, and c for the quadratic formula. It looks like you will have a=-3, b=-2, and c=7, right? If you do this you will end up with a negative denominator in your answer, and nearly every math book in the country will have a positive denominator. It's really better to avoid the negative coefficient by going to the other side of the equation or multiplying both sides of your equation by -1.
If you do this, you get  , where you will have a=3, b=2, and c=-7. It just works better this way.
R^2 at SCC
|
|
|
