CS/ECE 374 (Spring 2020): Grading Policies

If you have any questions or concerns, please ask in lecture, during office hours, or on Piazza.


Graded work


Regrade requests


Final course grades

We will determine final course grades as follows. (What do you expect from an algorithms course?). Note, that we reserve the right to fiddle with the low level details of the algorithm described below when assigning the final grades.
  1. Compute raw totals from homework and exam scores. Course work is weighted as follows.

  2. Remove outliers at both ends of the curve.

  3. Determine letter-grade cutoffs from the raw totals. Outliers are excluded from the cutoff computation to avoid unfairly skewing the curve. The mean is a borderline B-/C+, and each standard deviation is worth one full letter grade. For example, the B+/B cutoff is 2/3 standard deviations above the mean, and the D/D- cutoff is 5/3 standard deviations below the mean.

  4. Compute final letter grades (for non-outliers).

  5. Adjust grades upwards at the instructor's whim.

Alternate grading scheme (added on 4/7)


Pass/No-Pass Grading (announced on 4/15)


Web page adapted from those of previous semesters.