who is right?

My boyfriend (native speaker) A large percentage of good students are

or me A large percentage of good students is

Or are we both right?

I'm not a native speaker, but I would say that since "percentage", the subject of your sentence, is singular, the corresponding verb has to be singular too.

I believe the correct usage is "is", but "are" is becoming increasingly common.

If the subject was "good students" then it would be plural, therefore "are would be correct".
If the subject were "large percentage", then "is" would be correct.

Personally, i have no doubt the latter is the case, but i agree with #2.

I think that in spoken English either are acceptable, though "are" sounds more natural (even if on formal analysis it is incorrect). In written English, I'd use "is" or recast the sentence to avoid the problem, e.g., "Many good students are ..."

(Stylistically, "a large percentage" is objectionable, because it sounds more precise than it really is.)

I would say that the first example is correct. I'm sure there's some grammatical rule to back this up, but because a large percentage isn't going to be singular, then it is plural.

I remember reading it somewhere, but I can't remember where.

I think most native speakers would say "are". Although "is" may technically be correct, it doesn't sound right.

You're Dutch, right? That's the source of the confusion, I think. In Dutch only "a percentage is" is correct. Not so in English.

#4 OZinOH don't wish to be fussy but it should be "either IS acceptable", ie either one is acceptable.

It seems to me that it's rather difficult to analyse incomplete sentence fragments. Maybe we would make more progress by thinking about meaningful sentences.

So here are some examples using "are":
"A large percentage of good students are immigrants."
"A large percentage of good students are from small families".
"A large percentage of good students are glad they chose to continue their education and would encourage their younger brothers and sisters to do the same."

Not only do all of these sound OK to me, but I don't see how any of them would work with "is". So I am going to put forward the claim that "are" is both more natural-sounding and more technically correct than "is". I am open to being persuaded otherwise - but please illustrate with complete sentences!

This sounds to me like a "collective noun" situation--like army, committee, team, etc.

One of my English handbooks (McGraw-Hill) says this about that:

These collective nouns take a singular verb and singula pronouns when the collection of individuals is thought of as a unit. However, they take a plural verb and plural pronouns when the members of the group are though of as individuals, acting separately.

SO, I would say that either could be used, depending...

Example: A large percentage of good students are entering the professions.
As opposed to: A large percentage of good students is the result of good teaching.

Or something like that. Maybe someone can come up with more convincing examples. Anyhow, just a thought.

alan - they may sound more natural sounding, but they are technically INcorrect. However, as I said in my original post, more people are using are nowadays.

BTW, in each of your examples one just needs to change 'are' to 'is'.

I don't think it is technically incorrect to use "are", any more than it would be wrong to say "Chelsea are the cup holders", for example. It's just the way it is in English.

Many of the good students are...
A large percentage of the student body is...

See point #11 here

This kind of "pluralization by proximity" is a frequent bone of contention in style / grammar / usage guides. Most will tell you to do precisely what #13 proposes: change the awkward phrasing of the original sentence to eliminate the ambiguity.

When you use the term "A large number" you are naturally speaking of more than one. The correct word, grammatically, in this case would be "are" because you are referring to more than one. An example of using "a large number is" where it would be correct, is where (say) one might say "a large number is easier to read than a small number". Satchie, I agree with you and your reference but my point is that the "percentage" referred to hear is not just a number but a collective noun or adjective for several people.

Can anyone really back up an argument that "a large percentage of students is good students" It's not the large percentage that is the subject but the students

see #13....

While "Chelsea are the cup holders" is normal in British English, US speakers would always say "Chelsea is the cup holder." Actually, Americans probably wouldn't refer to "cup holders," but constructions like "Ford is introducing a new line of fuel-efficient cars" would be the norm, never "Ford are introducing ...."

zz -- yes you are right but Chelsea is singular -- it's the club, so it would be valid to say is because you are saying "the club" Chelsea is the cupholder. Again Ford is the Ford Motor Company -- again singular.

I can't imagine anyone saying "A large percentage of students is immigrants," or "A large percentage of students is failing."

My old American Heritage Dictionary says "The number of the noun that follows per cent or percntage, or is understood to follow them, governs the choice of verb: Forty per cent of his estate is in securities. A large percentage of the patients are chldren." As far as I know, that is the rule that is universally followed by writers of English. I've never seen anything different.

#18 - Yes, that is the normal American interpretation, but my point is that British speakers also use the plural in a way that US speakers do not. "Ford are introducing ..." is common in British advertising but never seen in America.

#11 - what makes "A large percentage of the students IS immigrants" more technically correct than "A large percentage of the students ARE immigrants"? Vinnie's quote from the American Heritage Dictionary makes sense to me.

The "Chelsea/Ford" issue is a bit different. In this case the cup is held by Chelsea, the football club - the individual players are not cup holders. Similarly no individual Ford employee is launching a new model - the company as an entity is doing it. So the singular is logical in these examples (even though, as already noted, in Britain/Ireland the plural is often used). By contrast, in my example, it is the individual students that are immigrants.

heres the way in canada.

regarding the anaheim ducks hockey team:

the ducks ARE the cup holders.
Anaheim IS the cup holder.

but....
are anaheim the champs?
or
is anaheim the champ?

very confusing. furthering the need for revision of our ridiculous language.

Thank you all very much for your interesting replies!

I'll give the context of the discussion. Bf and I were talking about corruption in Chinese middle schools. Students have to take extremely diffucult entrance exams to go to 'the best schools'. I think that the original sentence was something like this:

'60% of the students is (are) very good, the others just pay a lot of cash and get in too. Bf was very abrupt in correcting me. I just said yes and wanted to hear other people's opinion, so that's why I asked you. Today he said that it does sound more natural to say 'are'.

Btw, I am Dutch and I remember reading a collumn by Kees van Kooten about the topic, he was upset about the frequent usage of 'are' when it should be is.

Did Kees van Kooten write about "is" vs. "are" in English or in Dutch? (And out of curiosity, was it Kees van Kooten or one of his countless alter egos "Prof. dr. E. I. Kipping, neerlandicus"?)

OP, you changed it in such a way that there's really no issue (in English, anyway). The votes for "a large percentage . . . is" were based on the facts that "a percentage" is grammatically the subject of the verb and is grammatically singular. But if you say "60% . . . are/is' there's no question that the answer is "are" (I don't really think there's a question even with the other, but not everyone agrees). Per cent = in a hundred. "Sixty [students] in a hundred of the students are very good."

#25 -- There is an issue for us Dutch speakers. In Dutch "procent" is a singular noun, and 60% is read as "60 procent"; the plural "procenten" is not used. Thus, "60% is is" (with the singular form of the verb) is the only correct form, no matter what kind of 60% (60% of children, 60% of the estate). It may not be entirely logical from an English speaker's point of view, but neither is "the police are" from a Dutch point of view. It is something that needs to be memorized as 'just the way it is'.

The word "percent" or the symbol "%" can be singular in English. For example, "60% of the cake is coated with chocolate icing." I don't think anyone would say "60% of the cake are ...". Similarly, "60% of the city is African-American" -- but, "60% of the people in the city are African-American."