2019 AMC 8 Problem 25

Attempt Problem 25 of the 2019 AMC 8 below, then check your answer against the video solution and professionally curated solution from LIVE by Po-Shen Loh. You can also try the full timed exam, view all 2019 AMC 8 solutions, or check the answer key.

All problems are used with official legal permission of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA).

25.

Alice has 2424 apples. In how many ways can she share them with Becky and Chris so that each of the three people has at least two apples?
105105
114114
190190
210210
380380
Answer: C
Concepts:stars and bars
Small hint:
Give each person 22 apples first
Big hint:
Distribute the remaining apples with two dividers
Video solution:
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Written solution:
Let us assign everybody 22 apples. This leaves us with 24−3⋅2=1824 - 3 \cdot 2 = 18 apples.
Then, we want to solve a+b+c=18, a + b + c = 18, where a,a, b,b, and cc are the additional apples given to Alice, Becky, and Chris.
Note that these are all nonnegative, since we already satisfied the only condition we needed to.
We can use stars and bars to get the number of solutions as (18+3−13−1)=(202)=190. \binom{18 + 3 - 1}{3 - 1} = \binom{20}{2} = 190.
Thus, the correct answer is C.
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