@rydlerjune I asked the chat and here's what it said: The distinction you're making is correct in principle. "Must be allowed to work alone" is a permission claim, not a mandate. In isolation, that phrasing would only guarantee the option to work solo — it wouldn't forbid someone from choosing to pair up voluntarily.

But look at what "assigned" is doing in the answer choice. The scenario in (D) doesn't say Yolanda chose to work with Mike — it says she "has been assigned to work with Mike... at the same workstation." An assignment is external and binding; it's not a choice she's making. If Jo's rule guarantees that the most productive programmers must retain the option to work alone, then forcibly assigning her a partner strips that option away entirely. She's not being "allowed" to work solo — she's being compelled into a pair.

So the violation isn't "she worked with someone, which is forbidden." It's "she was assigned into a pairing, which removes the very allowance/permission Jo's rule guarantees her." Contrast that with a hypothetical answer choice where the most productive programmer chooses to team up voluntarily — that wouldn't violate Jo's rule, since she'd still have had the option to go solo.

That's a genuinely tricky distinction between "permission" and "requirement" language, and it's exactly the kind of nuance that trips people up on Must Be False questions.

@rydlerjune I agree with you and thought the same thing. Simply because they are allowed does not translate to HAVE to work individually