If you have any questions or concerns, please ask in
lecture, during office hours, or on Piazza.
Graded work
-
Guided problem sets (GPS) are auto-graded on PrairieLearn.
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Written homeworks are graded by the entire course staff, directly
within Gradescope. To keep grading consistent, each numbered
problem is graded by 4 graders, under the supervision of one of
the TAs, using a common detailed rubric developed within
Gradescope. All numbered homework problems are worth the same
amount. Under normal circumstances, all homework should be graded
within two weeks of submission.
-
Exams are graded by the instructors and graduate TAs.
Graded exams will be available via gradescope. Under normal
circumstances, all exams should graded within two weeks.
Regrade requests
-
Please check that your grades are tabulated and recorded
correctly. If you notice a mistake, please use gradescope
to ask for a regrade. Regrade period for homeworks/exams is one
week after the grade is available.
-
Please double-check the posted solutions for correctness.
If any posted solution contains a serious error, all students will
receive a perfect score for that problem. Yes, really.
- If you do not understand your grade on a homework or exam
problem, please discuss your grade with one of the
instructors or TAs during office hours. After that discussion, if
you still believe that your work has been graded incorrectly,
please request a regrade.
-
Late regrade requests will be ignored. Homework and exam regrades can
be requested within Gradescope.
-
All regrade requests must include a brief written
justification for the request. Good justifications
include the following:
- My answer agrees with the posted solution, but I still
lost points.
- I lost 4 points for an incorrect time analysis, but
the rubric says that's only worth 2 points.
- You took off points for missing the base case, but it's
right here (right here!).
- My answer is correct, even though it does not match the
posted solution. (This happens more frequently if your
answer is not even remotely similar to the "standard"
solution.)
- There is no explanation for my grade.
- The official solution is incorrect; here's a counterexample.
Regrade requests with poor or missing justifications will be
denied.
- We can only grade what you actually
submitted. You
cannot get a higher grade by explaining what you meant, either
in person or in writing; your original submission must stand on
its own.
-
If you submit a regrade request, we will regrade the
submitted problem from scratch.
The TAs will regrade homework problems; Instructors will
regrade exam problems. Your grade may go down.
-
We will readily admit, apologize for, and correct our mistakes
if you have been graded unfairly. However, please remember
that "unfairly" means your grade is inconsistent with the
published grading rubric, or that you were graded more harshly
than other students, not just that you think the
rubric itself is too harsh. Please also keep in mind that
each homework point is worth approximately 0.1% of your final
course grade. Don't fight for each point like your life
depends on it - it does not!
Final course grades
We will determine final course grades as follows.
- We compute the raw total from your homework and exam scores.
Course work is weighted as follows.
-
Homework is worth 28%:
- We expect to assign and grade 33 homework problems during the semester:
each of the 11 written homeworks will contain two problems, and for grading purposes, each guided problem set (GPS) on PrairieLearn has exactly the same weight as one numbered homework problem.
- When calculating the homeworks contribution to final grade, we
drop the bottom 6 grades you got for homework problems.
In other words, if you submit more than 27 homework problems, we
keep only your top 27 problem scores.
-
Exams are worth 72%:
There will be two midterm exams, each worth 21% of your raw total, and a cumulative final exam worth 30% of your raw total.
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Exceptions:
- Forgiven homeworks will be treated as if they did not exist; the other homeworks will have more weight in the final grade calculation.
- Forgiven midterm exams will be treated as if they did not exist; the other exams will have more weight in the final grade calculation.
- We will not drop zero grades that result from cheating offenses.
- We reserve the right to give any student meeting at least one of
the following conditions an automatic F:
- Raw total below 33%
- Raw exam average below 25%
- Submitted less than 16 homework problems (unless there is an overriding excuse).
These are not the only ways to fail!
- We determine your fixed letter grade from the raw total according to the following cutoffs:
| Min | Max | Grade |
| 95 | 100 | A+ |
| 90 | 95 | A |
| 85 | 90 | A- |
| 80 | 85 | B+ |
| 75 | 80 | B |
| 70 | 75 | B- |
| 65 | 70 | C+ |
| 60 | 65 | C |
| 55 | 60 | C- |
| 50 | 55 | D+ |
| 45 | 50 | D |
| 40 | 45 | D- |
| 0 | 40 | F |
- Alternatively, we determine your curved letter grade from the raw total.
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. We may decide to exclude
certain outliers from the cutoff computation, to avoid unfairly
skewing the curve.
- Your actual letter grade is either your fixed letter grade or your curved letter grade, whichever is higher.
- We reserve the right to adjust grades upwards at the instructors' whim.
Web page adapted from those of previous semesters.