Correct Answer: (A)
Ask yourself why the professor would pretend someone else's work was really his own. People usually do this type of thing to make themselves look better or smarter, so let's look for a word that means something like that. "Alleviate" and "condone" will not work in the context of this sentence because "alleviate" means "to relieve or sooth" and "condone" means "to approve or pardon."
Choices (D) and (E) cannot be correct because "mitigate" means "to weaken," the opposite of what the professor is trying to do to his career. Meanwhile, "attenuate" means "to prolong" --the professor may be trying to prolong his career, but to attenuate oneself does not make sense. The correct answer, therefore, is (A) "aggrandize" because it means "to acclaim."
