What is the vertex form of y= (3x+9)(x-2) ?

1 Answer
Mar 12, 2017

y=3(x+0.5)^2 -18.75

Explanation:

First let's expand the equation:

(3x+9)(x−2) = 3x^2 -6x+9x-18

which simplifies to:
3x^2 +3x-18

Let's find our vertex using x=-b/(2a) where a and b are of ax^2 +bx+c

We find the x value of our vertex to be -0.5
(-3/(2(3)))

Plug it into our equation and find y to be -18.75
3(-0.5)^2+3(-0.5)-18

so our vertex is at (-0.5, -18.75)

We can also check this with a graph:
graph{(3x^2+3x-18) [-10.3, 15.15, -22.4, -9.68]}

Now that we have our vertex, we can plug it into the vertex form!

f(x)=a(x-h)^2+k

where h is our x value of the vertex, and k is the y value of the vertex.

so h=-0.5 and k=-18.75

In the end we find:

y=3(x+0.5)^2 -18.75