A Draft With Verb Errors

In practice

This worked example is constructed for this course. The draft reads: "Every spring the science club organizes a cleanup of the river. Last year, each of the volunteers were given gloves and a bag. The group of students work along the bank for three hours and collected almost two hundred pounds of trash. If the city was willing to pay for a dumpster, the club could collect even more. The news from the city have been encouraging." First, set the governing tense. The opening describes a yearly habit in the present, and the second and third sentences narrate last year in the past. Second, check each verb against its subject. "Each of the volunteers were given" is wrong, because each is singular: it should be was given. "The group of students work" is wrong twice: group is the subject, singular, and the narration of last year calls for the past, so it should be worked. Third, check mood. "If the city was willing" states a condition that has not happened, so standard written English uses the subjunctive were: "If the city were willing." Fourth, check plural-looking nouns. "The news have been" should be "The news has been," because news is singular in meaning. The corrected draft keeps the shift from the present, for the yearly habit, to the past, for last year's event, because that shift marks a real change in time.