At the Henderson Middle School awards ceremony, the principal is going to honor outstanding students with gift cards. The gift cards for excellent grades, g , are worth $40, and the gift cards for perfect attendance, a , are worth $25. The principal has $4,000 allotted for this event, and he is going to recognize 100 students. Write the pair of linear equations that model this situation.

Let g represent the number of gift cards for excellent grades and a represent the number of gift cards for perfect attendance.

The total amount of money allotted for gift cards is $4,000, so one equation is:
40g + 25a = 4000

The total number of students being recognized is 100, so the second equation is:
g + a = 100

Therefore, the pair of linear equations that model this situation are:
40g + 25a = 4000
g + a = 100