13.1 Subject-Verb Agreement and Tense

13.1 Subject-Verb Agreement and Tense

Quick answer: The USAJOBS TSO Job Opportunity Announcement lists English proficiency — reading, writing, speaking, and comprehending — as a condition of employment. TSA's TSO careers page and the duty list still require giving directions, responding to inquiries, and retaining Standard Operating Procedures. Legacy computer-based-test write-ups describe a dedicated English Skills section. TSA does not currently publish item counts, and English is not a published TAB blueprint domain. Agreement and tense still matter on the floor: a pair of shears was found, the bag of items was screened, and an incident that happened at 09:14 stays in past tense unless a later clock time is a different event.

This section is checkpoint English, not SAT grammar. Every sentence you practice here should look like a bag-search note, a passenger direction, an SOP restatement, or a short incident report. If a sentence could appear in a high-school worksheet about cats and dogs, it is the wrong drill.

Why grammar is job-critical even when TAB is image-first

The current official invitation language for the computer-based test is the TSO Assessment Battery (TAB), described as evaluating x-ray interpretation aptitude or image interpretation aptitude. That purpose sentence is real. It is also incomplete as a picture of the job. You still have to tell a traveler to remove a laptop, restate an SOP to a teammate without changing its meaning, and write what happened in Lane 4 so a Lead Transportation Security Officer (LTSO) or Supervisory Transportation Security Officer (STSO) can act on facts.

Treat the two layers as separate:

If your invitation is a legacy-style battery, expect grammar, reading, and following-directions items as third-party reports describe them. If your invitation is TAB image-first, English still follows you into the airport assessment, new-hire training, and every shift. Do not quote unpublished item counts as TSA policy either way.

Find the true subject, then pick the verb

Subject-verb agreement is a search problem, the same way an X-ray image is a search problem. The loudest noun in the sentence is often not the subject. The subject is the head noun that the verb is about. Everything stuffed between the subject and the verb is clutter.

Intervening phrases. A prepositional phrase that names the contents, the location, or the equipment does not change the number of the subject.

• A pair of shears was found in the gray bin at Lane 4 after the X-ray operator called for a bag search.
• A pair of shears were found… is the classic miss. Shears is plural, but it is inside of shears. The head noun is pair, which is singular.
• The set of keys on the roller bag was left at the WTMD podium.
• The list of prohibited items was restated to the traveler at the table.
• The box of 3-1-1 bottles in the bin was over the published 3.4-ounce limit for one container.

Read the sentence without the phrase. If you would not write "A pair were found," do not write it after you add of shears in the gray bin at Lane 4 after the X-ray operator called for a bag search. Length does not change number.

Distance is a trap, not a rule. Officers write long sentences because the lane is busy. The verb still belongs to the first true subject:

• The traveler with two rolling bags, a backpack, and a child in a stroller was directed to Lane 2.
• The officer who called the bag search and then walked the traveler to the table was Officer Lee, not "were Officer Lee."

There is / there are. There is not the subject. The noun that follows the verb is.

• There is a pair of scissors in the exterior pocket.
• There are two laptops stacked in the same bin.
• There was an unresolved image on the Lane 3 monitor at 11:02.
• There were three unattended bins at the end of the belt.

Collective nouns at the checkpoint

A collective noun names a group as one unit. In U.S. checkpoint writing, that unit usually takes a singular verb when the group acts together.

Switch to plural only when you mean the members acting separately:

• The members of the screening team were each assigned a different position: X-ray, divestiture, and bag search.
• The items in the bag were separately identified: a folding knife, a laptop, and a quart bag of liquids.

Do not write "The bag of items were screened" just because items is plural. Do not write "The team were in disagreement" when you mean the team as a unit filed one note. If individuals disagreed, name the individuals.

Quantities and measurements follow the same logic. Fifty pounds of baggage in a lift note is a quantity treated as a unit: Fifty pounds of baggage was moved from the belt to the search table. If you count objects, use plural: Three bags were opened at the table.

Compound subjects. And usually makes a plural subject. Or and nor agree with the nearer noun.

• The laptop and the tablet were removed from the bag in the standard lane.
• The traveler or the companion was asked to wait at the end of the belt — not both at once if only one person is the subject of the request.
• Neither the belt nor the shoes were removed in the typical PreCheck lane.
• Neither the shoes nor the belt was the alarm source — if you keep a singular noun nearest the verb, the verb is singular.

When a compound subject would confuse the record, split the sentence. "The laptop was removed. The tablet was removed." is better than a tangled either/or if both actions actually happened.

Tense is a timeline, not decoration

Checkpoint writing uses three tenses for three jobs. Mixing them inside one event is how a note becomes unusable.

Incident narratives stay in past tense from the first verb to the last unless a later sentence is a different clock time. These are broken:

• At 09:14 the WTMD alarmed. The traveler returns to the podium and removed a belt.
• The X-ray operator calls for a bag search. The traveler waited at the end of the belt and then walks toward the sterile area.
• Officer Patel notified the STSO at 09:16 and is waiting for a response in the same sentence as the 09:16 fact.

Repair by picking one time and one tense:

• At 09:14 the WTMD alarmed. The traveler returned to the podium and removed a belt. At 09:16 Officer Patel notified the STSO.

If you must show a condition that is still true at the time of writing, start a new sentence with a new time: "As of 09:20 the traveler remains at the search table." That is a current status, not a rewrite of the 09:14 alarm into present tense.

SOP restatements stay in present. You are not narrating a past shift; you are restating a standing rule. "Travelers in a standard lane remove laptops, tablets, e-readers, and handheld game consoles and place them in a bin with nothing on or under them." Do not past-tense an SOP ("travelers removed laptops") unless you are describing one traveler who already did it.

Passenger instructions stay in imperative. The verb is the action you need: Remove light outer garments for AIT. Place liquids in the bin. Wait for a same-sex officer. Do not dress a direction up as a tense maze: "You will have been removing your laptop" is not a checkpoint sentence.

Error / correction table: agreement and tense

Worked checkpoint scenarios

Scenario A — Bag search note. An X-ray operator in Lane 4 sees an unresolved dense object. A bag search finds a pair of kitchen shears under a folded sweater. The wrong note says: "A pair of shears were located and the traveler says it is for cooking and we send them back." Three failures: were does not agree with pair; says jumps to present in a past event; we send them back does not state the outcome. The usable note: "At 08:41 in Lane 4, a pair of shears was found under a folded sweater during a bag search after an X-ray alarm. The traveler stated the shears were for cooking. The traveler exited the checkpoint with the item at 08:47. STSO notified at 08:48."

Scenario B — Team assignment. The STSO moves a team. "The screening team were told to rotate" looks like several people received different unofficial instructions. "The screening team was assigned to Lane 5 at 06:00. Officer Kim operated X-ray. Officer Ruiz conducted bag searches." The collective stays singular; the members get their own sentences when you need to name separate actions.

Scenario C — Live directions. A standard-lane traveler stacks a laptop, a tablet, and a quart bag in a backpack. The officer's spoken English is an imperative list with agreement inside the facts: "Remove the laptop and the tablet. Place them in the bin with nothing on or under them. Place the quart bag in the bin. Wait at the scanner." Do not say "The laptop and the tablet is coming out" or "There is two devices in that bag." The traveler hears the error as confusion about what to do.

Scenario D — SOP restatement to a teammate. A new officer asks whether PreCheck travelers remove shoes. The restatement is present tense and exact: "In a typical PreCheck lane, travelers leave shoes, belts, and light jackets on and leave electronics and 3-1-1 liquids in the bag. No individual is guaranteed expedited screening." Past tense ("they left shoes on") would describe one passenger, not the rule.

The pattern is the same on a legacy English item and on a live note: identify the true subject, ignore the clutter between subject and verb, pick a tense that matches the job of the sentence, and do not change tense until the clock does. TSA does not publish how many such items appear on a 2026 TAB. The checkpoint publishes the need every time a traveler, a bag, and a clock time have to be written down correctly.