I just got my first fluid mechanics homework back today. I got every answer correct and got a 24/50.
10 points off for not following a format that has never been mentioned by the professor or the TAs or anybody else.
1 point for not writing f=ma, instead I wrote 300N=m*9.81m/s^2
8 points broken up into -5 and -3 for not labeling a variable I used. I can see some points being taken off on this problem, but I got 0/10 for it with a labeled diagram, the one single equation I need, and the correct answer.
5 points for making an assumption so I didn’t have to work through a problem in variables. Yes that’s decent practice, but not needed and it was never mentioned that the professor prefers we do that.
I’m deducting 5 points from the OP for not explaining the format he was supposed to use, 2 points for the confusing formatting on “300N=m*9.81m/s^2” (couldn’t you be troubled to code an actual superscript), and a whopping 25 points for not posting this in the Pit and using appropriately colorful and creative invective against the grader in question.
Well, I don’t know how my grade will be adjusted after I speak with the professor. I get to drop 2 of the homeworks, and the grader in question might turn out to be hot, so I can’t get that worked up.
Once, in accounting, I actually received a minus score. I would like to blame the lecturers, because it took me three attempts to pass Accounting 1. And I am pretty sure I only managed to do so after they changed the course, and left out the assignment in which I got negative marks the first time around. So I’d like to blame them, but probably can’t. However, at least 10% of the people in the class also got negative scores, so something was not right.
I lost marks for not using pencil. I’d always been told to use pen because it’s hard for the teachers to read pencil quickly. This assignment is the only one in which using pen was a problem.
I also lost marks because I used only my first initial, and not my complete first name. The assignment had my student number on it, and I do not have a common surname. There are only 6 in the same phone book as me, and two of those are my parents!
I never bothered to query it, because even with those I would have only had 4/50. I was not very good at accounting.
I wish you luck getting your marks fixed up though.
I have refused to do any extra credit work ever since 10th grade when I got a 98 in Algebra. I turned in a complete notebook that should have garnered me three extra points putting me at 101 for the first semester.
I can understand that the school computer might have kicked out an ‘impossible’ score, but the bitch could have given me 100!
For the rest of the year (out of (misguided) protest) I only did classroom tests and the finals (no homework) which each counted for one-third of the grade so I barely passed with Cs (66%).
We were always told to use pen in ‘final’ work and exams. That way nobody could erase your work and put something else there. I can’t believe anyone insists that people use a pencil in an exam.
Had a physics prof at GMI that did not like the way I learned physics in high school. Although I got every answer correct, he would write “Answer by accident / 0 points”. Needless to say, I had a problem with that, too.
I really, really hate that. Especially in 100 and 200 level courses, where they expect you to “show your work”. It’s a bunch of bull this would be a good time for a curse word, I’d say! If I can get the answer without 10 lines of algebra, because I can see the answer just by looking at the problem, give me credit, Og gorram it!
I suspect they make you jump through the hoops of showing your work to prove that you 1) didn’t cheat and 2) didn’t just plug the answer into a calculator.
The year that I took Calculus 3, TI had just come out with the shiney new machines that could calculate abstract derivatives and integrals. Oh, the thoughts of bliss that ran through our heads when it came up in the shopping list…followed by the groans when our teacher very cheerfully told us that we were not allowed to use them on the test.
I’m sorry, but everyone who posts in this thread automatically fails my course. If you want to discuss it, my next office hours will be on September 13, 2017.
I was recently in a class with some people who were taking Case Studies from a difficult professor. They were working their butts off and everyone in the class was numerically failing (40% on this, 50% on that). They were working so hard that they didn’t have time to give to the class we had together.
They complained to the professor, nope, this was it. He expected this level of work and if they didn’t get it together, they could retake the class.
Class they were numerically failing - both got As
Class they didn’t bother to study in because they were too busy trying to please Professor GradeTooHard - C+ (at least they passed).
I once got a 0 on a Trig test for “cheating” (I should have got a 70% or so). It was because I didn’t show the work. I asked why that was cheating and was told one particular problem was “too hard for anyone to do in their head, so you must have copied someone else’s answer”. AFAIK no one seated near me got the problem correct. I told the teacher that “just because you’re too dumb to do it in your head doesn’t mean I can’t do it in mine” (or words to that effect), walked out of class and never returned that semester. Worst grade I ever received.
Certainly a pig-headed lot we have here, me (as a teen at least) included.
In my calc 3 class, we were allowed to use calculators, but they made sure that any problems on the test would take too long for the calculator to figure out to make it worth it (sometimes longer than the entire test period).
The format for tests in that class was ten multiple choice questions worth one point each, and two long-answer questions (where you had to set up the equations, show your work, etc.) worth three points each. One test I answered both questions correctly, and received a grand total of one point. I was leaving engineering for music, so I didn’t care enough to argue.
I handed in an English paper once, and it was graded in sections, neatly divided up into x points for spelling, y points for grammar, whatever. I don’t remember the grade scheme, but we had it ahead of time and it was a perfectly fair scheme.
The teacher filled the marks in as she went along, added them up, obtained a total of 25/25… and subtracted 1 because “English papers can always be improved, no one can be perfect when the material is subjective” or some such nonsense. I was pretty pissed off about it. Either I met the requirements for that paper, or I didn’t, but you don’t just take marks off because you feel like it!
There was another time, in university, when I picked up an exam paper in the professors office, and right there in front of him I double checked that the TAs had graded it correctly (that they had summed up the marks for each question and put the right sum on the front page). I discovered a mistake, where 2 marks were missing from my total, which would up my grade by 4%. Naturally, I wanted it corrected. The professor didn’t want to change my grade because I had written the exam in pencil so he couldn’t know if I had tried to change my responses to get a better grade*! I, of course, pointed out that since he had been sitting in front of me watching me since I picked up the paper, I had had no opportunity to secretly change anything, and besides, the teaching assistant had managed to screw up the addition of the numbers that had been written in red pen. No pencil involved.
It actually took 20 minutes of discussion with him, and with another student that showed up and took my side of things, to get him to change my grade!
*It was an analytical chemistry exam… pretty much everyone did those in pencil! If I submit something in pencil, I accept the grade as is. If I take the time to do it in pen, or to write a final copy, then I will nitpick and beg for any part marks I might feel are due!
Easy. You get positive points for doing it right, you get zero for not doing it at all, and you get negative points for doing it wrong. Engineers will have no problem with this.
I once had a calculus professor who insisted that we use correct punctuation on our homework. For instance the equation:
F=ma
would be wrong.
F=ma.
would be right. It’s a sentence, you see, so you need the period. :rolleyes:
OTOH, I think that showing some work, taking the time to put units in with one’s numerical answers, even clear punctuation are all good things. (Not to say that I think an equation should be treated like a sentence.) The best example I can think of for this kind of nitpickiness is the Mars Climate Obiter crash. My interpretation remains that one set of programmers assumed English units, and the other assumed Metric, and no one talked about it. Labelling units may well have been able to prevent this costly error.
I’m not about to defend being held to a standard that one hasn’t been trained on, of course - just saying that showing work and the other nuisance things people are complaining about make sense to me.
If it is the same GMI, then according to Wikipedia, “On January 1, 1998, the school’s name was formally changed to Kettering University.”
I was only there a year, but I can completely believe that one of their professors did that. I missed having Fast Eddie for Calculus by a whisker. He wrote at the board with the chalk in one hand and an eraser in the other. If you didn’t get your notes fast enough, you’d better get them from somewhere else.
