Physics 161 General Physics
Mechanics and Particle Dynamics

Spring 2009
Sections 0301-0306



Main Page Course Info/ Syllabus Schedule/ Assignments Contacts and Course Times
The average score was 22.7 points; the standard deviation was 9.6.  The highest score was 50; the lowest was 1.   

Please go over your exam carefully when you get it back; read the solutions, and check our grading for errors.  We grade a lot of exams quickly, and it happens that we make mistakes.  Don't be shy about it; we want you to find things we got wrong! 
So look carefully, and if you find something that you think needs reconsideration, write a clear explanation of  your case for a regrade, and hand it in to me with your exam. 

Do not write on the exam itself, though! That can look like academic dishonesty... then I have to go look at the scans and compare, send to the honor council...

For multiple choice questions, it will be easy.  Question 6 will go to Eric and question 7 to me (Ayush)

Here's what I'll use for grade cuts: 

A-range:  36-50.
B-range:  28-35.
C-range:  18-27.
D-range:  8-17.
F-range:  0-7.

Here's what those numbers mean:  When it comes time to grade, I create ficitious students who score at exactly the cutoffs of everything -- participation points, homework, and exams.  Then I find the weighted total score for each of those students, and these become the cutoffs for final totals.  So what I'm telling you here is what I'll use as the cutoff scores for this exam.  For most students, scores in these other aspects of the course bring their grades up.  It's entirely possible to be below, e.g., the cut for a B on all of your exams but above it in all other categories, and end up with a B for the course. 

In that weighted total, this exam is worth 1/4 of 50%, or 12.5 % of the total grade.  But there's an out:  I will reduce the weighting of your worst exam, and increase the weighting of your best exam.  That means that if you do  better on the remaining exams, I'll give less weight to your score on this first one. 

I am doing that precisely because I don't want you to feel as though the course is lost if you did poorly, and I want you to have reason to go back and work through that material.  Please do that!  You'll really need to understand the material on this first exam in order to do well in the exams to come, because it all builds on those same ideas. 

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