College Crew: Ever have a class where the average is an F.

[fleshconsumed]

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: fleshconsumed

Originally posted by: mugs
I did have a class where only 4 people passed (without a curve). I got an A (without the curve). If you decide that failing is acceptable because the professor will curve you to a B or C, then you deserve to fail. If you work your ass off to pass despite the difficulty, then you deserve to pass. "It's too hard" is a high school excuse. If you're not understanding the material, do what it takes to rectify that situation. Get a tutor. Talk to him during office hours. Doing as well as everyone else in the class is fine and all, but if you're failing tests and homework assignments that cover the class material, then you're not understanding the class material.

You probably haven't taken really WTF classes. I had several classes where average on the midterms or finals was 40-60 points, but those tests were doable and I usually performed way above average. However one of these classes really stands out. The teacher was absolutely horrible, supposedly PhD, worked at microsoft, made buttloads of money, but absolutely failed as a teacher. Couldn't explain anything, after first ten minutes she would start going off ten different off-topics and nobody could keep up with her. First test had 30 percent average, second test and final 50 (I suppose she made them easier because 30 points were too low). The last homework assignment, only several people turned in at all, because no one knew how to do a single problem on it. To my knowledge she is still teaching and students still universally hate her.


PS, funny that after taking classes like these I hate classes with no curve, especially 300-400 level classes.

This class - did it have a textbook?

It did, and the book was fine at first on Finite State Automata, but by the time it got to Turing Machines, it was absolutely unreadable, just like the teacher who couldn't explain anything. Trying to cram crapload of material in 300 5"x7" pages did not help either, overall in the course I think we covered only half of it, i.e. 150 pages. 150 smallish pages simply do not give you enough information to study for the class. Funny, but in that class I leaned much more from the discussion sessions with the TA once a week than three classes a week with professor. Every week we would go to discussion session with the TA and she would try to explain us in layman's terms material we studied with professor, and she did a much better job at it than the professor itself. Those people who skipped discussion sessions with the TA really missed out.

 

[DaShen]

Originally posted by: fleshconsumed

Originally posted by: mugs

Originally posted by: fleshconsumed

Originally posted by: mugs
I did have a class where only 4 people passed (without a curve). I got an A (without the curve). If you decide that failing is acceptable because the professor will curve you to a B or C, then you deserve to fail. If you work your ass off to pass despite the difficulty, then you deserve to pass. "It's too hard" is a high school excuse. If you're not understanding the material, do what it takes to rectify that situation. Get a tutor. Talk to him during office hours. Doing as well as everyone else in the class is fine and all, but if you're failing tests and homework assignments that cover the class material, then you're not understanding the class material.

You probably haven't taken really WTF classes. I had several classes where average on the midterms or finals was 40-60 points, but those tests were doable and I usually performed way above average. However one of these classes really stands out. The teacher was absolutely horrible, supposedly PhD, worked at microsoft, made buttloads of money, but absolutely failed as a teacher. Couldn't explain anything, after first ten minutes she would start going off ten different off-topics and nobody could keep up with her. First test had 30 percent average, second test and final 50 (I suppose she made them easier because 30 points were too low). The last homework assignment, only several people turned in at all, because no one knew how to do a single problem on it. To my knowledge she is still teaching and students still universally hate her.


PS, funny that after taking classes like these I hate classes with no curve, especially 300-400 level classes.

This class - did it have a textbook?

It did, and the book was fine at first on Finite State Automata, but by the time it got to Turing Machines, it was absolutely unreadable, just like the teacher who couldn't explain anything. Trying to cram crapload of material in 300 5"x7" pages did not help either, overall in the course I think we covered only half of it, i.e. 150 pages. 150 smallish pages simply do not give you enough information to study for the class. Funny, but in that class I leaned much more from the discussion sessions with the TA once a week than three classes a week with professor. Every week we would go to discussion session with the TA and she would try to explain us in layman's terms material we studied with professor, and she did a much better job at it than the professor itself. Those people who skipped discussion sessions with the TA really missed out.

Automata Theory is fun stuff.

Basically Linguistics

 

[Ayah]

Originally posted by: tmc
it happened to my senior batch in undergrad. apparently, all the students decided to miss (cut) the class one day (understanding among all students), the prof. came to the class saw that nobody was there and went back. he was furious. he made the final very difficult and apparently many students failed.

his point was that if the students wanted to cut the class, then they should have informed him so that he wouldn't have wasted time in coming to the class.

after an apology, he fixed the grades. .

:laugh:

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: StatsManD
Well one of my advanced math classes are like that now. Prof gives ridiculously long and difficult homework assignments. Average on the homework is like 40 out 100. The high on the homework has never been over a C-.

Yeah, I had a class like that. I was the school of accounting, it was thast class required before graduation - Auditing (the last of bunch IIRC).

I always made straight "A"s but got a "D-" on the midterm and was stunned. Then learned that it was the highest grade in class. Everybody else got F's & F-.

The whole thing seems stupid to me. You can't fail a whole class of seniors. I think he did it just to show us that we weren't as smart as we thought. Wanted to prepare us for the "real world" coming up very soon.

Fern

 

[sourceninja]

Originally posted by: DaShen

Originally posted by: sourceninja
I teach a class on basic linux usage and administration. It covers a minor howto on bash, basic commands, basics services, how to use them. How to use gnome, how to compile software, etc. The class has no homework, all labs are done in class with me there, and and 3 tests and 1 final. The questions on the 3 tests come directly from the book and are multiple choice or true/false. I review the book questions directly before the test, they are allowed to use notes and their computer to answer the questions.

8 out of 11 kids are either failing or have a D. I do not grade on a curve.

Is this at a college/university or a technical school? There is a difference.

The college I went to pushed most undergrad students to go to grad school. Some schooling is totally based off of training the person for a specific job, some schools train the students so that they can do the job or they can further their schooling. There is a difference.

This is a small college, not a tech school. The course I teach is an elective, not a requirement (although it can count for a CS degree). I can't understand how you can take a class where an instructor basically gives you all the answers minutes before your test, and not even break out a pen to write them down.

 

[Kwaipie]

Long ago, I had a 14 week class in the Navy with an 80% drop rate. That class was brutal and actually gave you nightmares and made you see things that weren't really there.

Mind control is a scary thing

 

[Beller0ph1]

Heh, welcome to Engineering school.

 

[Imported]

While it wasn't a hard hard class.. I got an 18/180 on a midterm once. Class was midterm+final, thats all for grading. Got a 178/180 on the final and passed with a B+

 

[GoSharks]

I would say that 90% of the classes that I have taken here at Hopkins are graded on a curve.

 

[blade47]

I have to agree with some of the previous posts that part of what is wrong with our education system is that they rely too much on curves and scales to prevent people from failing. When I first went to college none of my teachers graded on a curve. I returned to school 7 years later to pursue an accounting degree and found that quite a few were few scaling grades. I was glad to see that some teachers rejected the practice, and in my major of study they weren't allowed to do it in any class except for one. I had a teacher tell me he was against it because from his +20 years of teaching experience he knew some classes were simply dumber than others on average and it wasn't fair to give them all the same grade. Also all of my teachers believed you should earn your grade not have it given to you.

Several of the required courses typically have failure rates of 50-60%. These were always taught by the best teachers and they were really good teachers with real world experience in the field as well as over a decade of teaching experience. In the "easy" classes the test averages were normally 60-64% and there would be enough homework assignments to pull most people up to a final grade of 70-74% so students could pass if they applied themselves and did the work. The one class where grades were scaled was advanced tax. You were allowed one page of notes front and back and the class average on the exams was still only 50-56%. I didn't learn as much in the class because I knew the grades were going to be scaled. I just typed my note sheet and took the tests. I believe I studied for the first exam and that was it because I knew all I needed to be "given" an A was to "earn" a mid 70.

I'm glad my teachers didn't let us just show up and earn a degree because I feel more prepared for the CPA exam, which has a pass rate of around 15%.

While a C may mean "average" the actual % reflects the % of graded material the student understood. If the school deems that the student should understand 70% of the graded material in order to pass the course and the student only understands 60% they have not "earned" a passing grade. That is assuming the tests accurately reflect the information students should know and the teacher has explained it well.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

Originally posted by: DaShen
Big deal. Most people on ATOT with a science degree had classes like that.

yup. also my math teachers never curved. got a c in adv calc even tho i was well above the avg

 

[wasssup]

I had lots of classes like this when I was an undergrad at Rutgers..our algorithms class average was a 35 or 40 or something. Our professor had just finished working for google at that time and kept talking about how he was just waiting for it to go public so he could cash out.

I hardly figured anything in that class out and ended up with a C+ (after the curve). Whatever.

 

[Fenixgoon]

i haven't had any uber-hard classes yet. there have been ones that were challenging (complex variables) or poorly taught ( general materials class), but i've done well even w/o a curve (materials was curved, fwiw). still haven't failed a test.....yet

<--- materials engineer

 

[shortylickens]

Originally posted by: WW

Originally posted by: StatsManD
He even tells us, he doesn't expect anyone in the class to know how to do most of the problemss.

then he should get an "F" for teaching ability

I had classes like that too....you'd look at the test and think it was for a different class than the one you were taking

Thats what I was thinking.
I dont pay good money and spend lots of time to learn nothing or learn the wrong stuff.

 

[imported_Imp]

Originally posted by: shortylickens

Originally posted by: WW

Originally posted by: StatsManD
He even tells us, he doesn't expect anyone in the class to know how to do most of the problemss.

then he should get an "F" for teaching ability

I had classes like that too....you'd look at the test and think it was for a different class than the one you were taking

Thats what I was thinking.
I dont pay good money and spend lots of time to learn nothing or learn the wrong stuff.

Agreed. If 2 people out of a whole class can pass, and the average is below 50%, the professor is a mofo who fails at teaching. Only had 2 classes like this I can think of, 1 this past semester. The first one had a final exam average of 46%, lot of people failed, I just inched past the passing grade somehow: was never happier. This term, professor gives BS uber long project, mid-term with a failing average (~50%) and a final that was nothing like anything we ever did in homework, project or mid-term. I'll be happy if I pass, can't believe I gave the guy 'good' in the instructor assessment (probably too damn tired to remember how he screwed people over).

 

[HombrePequeno]

Originally posted by: Citrix

Originally posted by: Garet Jax

Originally posted by: StatsManD
He even tells us, he doesn't expect anyone in the class to know how to do most of the problemss.

They why the #&*%@! is he wasting his and everyone else's time?

yea no sh|t. i hated classes like that, its just as bad where the damn instructor reads from the book word for word and nothing else. its like story time.

That reminds me of my Econ 200 class with Eugene Silberberg. The guy wrote the book and all of his lectures were essentially verbatim of what the book said. That would not have been so bad if he didn't use the exact same jokes in class that were also in the book. Hopefully he's got some fresh material for Econ 400 next quarter.