Blogger Right, Reader Wrong

Patti Ghezzi, who blogs about education at the Atlanta Journal Constitution, takes on a reader who complained about this sentence. She's right.

“Donna Scullin also sees no reason to transfer her sons out of Norcross High, even if one of the county’s less diverse and higher-performing schools were an option.”

The reader objected to the "were". Ghezzi went to the Harbrace College Handbook to support her use of the subjunctive.

From Harbrace: Use the subjunctive to express wishes or a hypothetical, highly improbable or contrary-to-fact condition.” The example says… “Drive as if every other car on the road were out to get you.”