الثلاثاء، 29 مارس 2011

Students performing "similar or worse" than...

I suppose I'm nitpicking this morning, but the following sentence in the Wisconsin State Journal grated on my English-major nerves:
As Republican lawmakers push for expansion of Milwaukee's 20-year-old voucher program, state test results for the first time show voucher students performing "similar or worse" than other poor Milwaukee students, according to the Department of Public Instruction.
The phrase was used without corrrection by USA Today, but the actual press release (cited here) by the Department of Public Instruction has it a little better; "our statewide assessment data shows, with very few exceptions, that the choice program provides similar or worse academic results than MPS."

I would have liked the author or copyeditor to have written "students performing similar to or worse than other...."  The word "to" could perhaps have been left implied ("students performing similar or worse than other poor...") - but not when "similar or worse" is enclosed in quotation marks (for inexplicable reasons).

Sigh.  English majors are never happy on the 'net.  Now on to more interesting things...

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