Question: Part time students take $60\%\ (6/10)$ of the course load of full time students, and there are $1000$ part time students. How many full time equivalent students are there?
The answer is $(6/10)×1000=600$, but I cannot figure out what the numerator/denominator units of the $60\%$ figure are. If $1000$ units is "part time students", the denominator $(10)$ must be "part time students", but I cannot then figure out what the $6$ would be.
Help? Thanks!
The key is to interpret the ratio as the comparison (in some way) of full-time students to part-time ones. Since you're told that (the load of) 10 part-time students is equal to (the load of) 6 full-time students, your ratio is
60% = 6 full-time students / 10 part-time students