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What's the reason for using the article in the following sentence?

University is seeking to transform people's lives for the better.

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    @P.E.Dant I understand that figuring out what role "better" plays in the sentence would be a good first step toward understanding this construction, but article usage is notoriously tricky and difficult to research for learners. I can't explain (off the top of my head) why that particular noun gets "the" but not the noun in "I live for ice cream."
    – ColleenV
    Commented Jul 13, 2017 at 17:56

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"For the better" is an idiomatic expression meaning "to improve" that (usually) functions as an adverb. As with other idioms, you use the whole thing, commonly with a verb that indicates a change:

Hook Street School had not been changed for the better by the war

Her condition took a turn for the better.

The new CEO's cost-cutting measures have been for the better, at least in the opinion of the shareholders.

You do have to be careful to not confuse this with other instances where the three words simply happen to be next to each other, for example:

They'd been walking for the better part of the morning before they reached the first trail marker.

Here "the better part of the morning" is a different idiomatic expression that means "most of the morning".

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