Composer Florence Price won first place for her score Symphony in E Minor at the 1932 Wanamaker Foundation Awards. The piece was performed the following year by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, a significant recognition of its quality. Price continued to compose many musical pieces throughout her career, blending traditional Black spirituals with classical European Romantic musical traditions. In recent years, Price’s concertos and symphonies have been performed and recorded by several major orchestras, further preserving her work for others to enjoy.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) To argue that more major orchestras should perform Price’s compositions.

B) To provide examples of Price’s importance as a composer.

C) To describe the musical styles that inspired many of Price’s symphonies.

D) To compare Price’s scores with those of classical European composers.

The following text is adapted from Paul Laurence Dunbar’s 1902 novel The Sport of the Gods. Joe and some of his family members have recently moved to New York City.

[Joe] was wild with enthusiasm and with a desire to be a part of all that the metropolis meant. In the evening he saw the young fellows passing by dressed in their spruce clothes, and he wondered with a sort of envy where they could be going. Back home there had been no place much worth going to, except church and one or two people’s houses.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A)It illustrates a character’s reaction to a new environment.

B) It explains why a character has traveled to a city.

C) It compares a character’s thoughts about an event at two different times of day.

D) It presents a character feeling regret over leaving home.

In many agricultural environments, the banks of streams are kept forested to protect water quality, but it’s been unclear what effects these forests may have on stream biodiversity. To investigate the issue, biologist Xingli Giam and colleagues studied an Indonesian oil palm plantation, comparing the species richness of forested streams with that of nonforested streams. Giam and colleagues found that species richness was significantly higher in forested streams, a finding the researchers attribute to the role leaf litter plays in sheltering fish from predators and providing food resources.

Which choice best states the main purpose of the text?

A) It discusses research intended to settle a debate about how agricultural yields can be increased without negative effects on water quality.

B) It explains the differences between stream-protection strategies used in oil palm plantations and stream-protection strategies used in other kinds of agricultural environments.

C) It describes findings that challenge a previously held view about how fish that inhabit streams in agricultural environments attempt to avoid predators.

D) It presents a study that addresses an unresolved question about the presence of forests along streams in agricultural environments.

Part of the Atacama Desert in Peru has surprisingly rich plant life despite receiving almost no rainfall. Moisture from winter fog sustains plants once they’re growing, but the soil’s tough crust makes it hard for seeds to germinate in the first place. Local birds that dig nests in the ground seem to be of help: they churn the soil, exposing buried seeds to moisture and nutrients. Indeed, in 2016 Cristina Rengifo Faiffer found that mounds of soil dug up by birds were far more fertile and supported more seedlings than soil in undisturbed areas.

Which choice best describes the function of the underlined portion in the text as a whole?

A)It elaborates on the idea that the top layer of Atacama Desert soil forms a tough crust.

B)It describes the process by which seeds are deposited into Atacama Desert soil.

C) It identifies the reason particular bird species dig nests in Atacama Desert soil.

D) It explains how certain birds promote seed germination in Atacama Desert soil.

The following text is adapted from Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto’s 1925 memoir A Daughter of the Samurai. As a young woman, Sugimoto moved from feudal Japan to the United States. The standards of my own and my adopted country differed so widely in some ways, and my love for both lands was so sincere, that sometimes I had an odd feeling of standing upon a cloud in space, and gazing with measuring eyes upon two separate worlds. At first I was continually trying to explain, by Japanese standards, all the queer things that came every day before my surprised eyes; for no one seemed to know the origin or significance of even the most familiar customs, nor why they existed and were followed.

Which choice best describes the main purpose of the text?

A)To convey the narrator’s experience of observing and making sense of differences between two cultures she embraces

B)To establish the narrator’s hope of forming connections with new companions by sharing customs she learned as a child.

C) To reveal the narrator’s recognition that she is hesitant to ask questions about certain aspects of a culture she is newly encountering.

D) To emphasize the narrator’s wonder at discovering that the physical distance between two countries is greater than she had expected.