CS 473: Algorithms
(Fall 2025)

• Graded work
• Late, dropped, and forgiven homework
• Regrade requests
• Overall course grades
• Past grade distributions

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

Graded work

• Homeworks are graded by the entire course staff, directly within Gradescope. To keep grading consistent, each numbered problem is graded entirely by one person. Under normal circumstances, homework should be graded within one week of submission.
• Exams are graded by Makrand and the graduate TAs, also within Gradescope, using nearly identical rubrics as the homeworks. Under normal circumstances, exams should be graded within two weeks.
• Under normal circumstances, homework solutions are posted within 48 hours of the corresponding submission deadline, and exam solutions are posted within 24 hours of each exam. All homework and exam solutions include preliminary grading rubrics; graders may readjust or refine these rubrics on Gradescope during the grading process.

Late, Dropped, and Forgiven Homework

By default, homework assignments are due every Tuesday at 9pm, except in weeks with exams. Gradescope will accept homework submissions until Wednesday at 9pm, but all submissions received after 9pm Tuesday will automatically be marked late. We will grade all submitted homework as though it was submitted on time. We will not accept any homework more than 24 hours late for any reason.

At the end of the semester, we will calculate each student's total homework score as follows:

• We will drop the six lowest homework problem scores except those on Homework zero. (If we assign more than 30 homework problems, we will drop more.)
• Then we will retroactively grant you an automatic extension for up to six late homework problems. If you submit more than six late homeworks, the six late submissions with the highest scores will granted extensions.
• Any late homework beyond the six highest scores will receive a 50% late penalty.

It is each student's responsibility to keep track of how many problems they have submitted late. Gradescope cannot show penalties for late homework. Gradescope records a single score to each submission, which applies to the entire homework group, but groups can change, and extensions and late penalties apply to students individually.

That said, if you find yourself trying to optimize which homeworks to submit late or not at all, your attention is on the wrong target. Experience suggests that more than 90% of students will submit a solution for every homework problem, and more than 80% will submit every homework problem on time.

Gradescope allows multiple submissions for the same problem, but only the last submission actually matters. In particular, late submissions are late, and thus subject to late penalties, even if an earlier submission for the same problem was on time.

Forgiving homework: In extreme circumstances, we may forgive homeworks or even exams. Extreme circumstances include documented illness or injury, disability accommodation, an academic integrity violation by another group member, or similar emergencies outside the student's control. (They do not include registering late or travel for job interviews or conferences.) We will compute your final course grade as if the forgiven homework simply did not exist; your other homeworks will have more weight. Students requiring accommodation for a disability should first contact DRES. Please ask Makrand for further details.

Regrade requests

If you believe that your score for any homework or exam problem is inconsistent with the published grading rubric, or that you were graded more harshly than other students for similar work, you can request a regrade.

• Submit regrade requests for homework and exams on Gradescope. If you have questions or concerns about any grade, we strongly encourage you talk with the course staff before submitting a regrade request. However, no grades will be changed in any student's presence; you must submit an official request through Gradescope.
• Regrade requests can be submitted up to two weeks after the graded work is released on Gradescope. Regrade requests for the final exam can be submitted up to three weeks after graded exams are released. However, final-exam regrade requests (and any other requests still outstanding after the final exam) will only be considered if a successful regrade would change the student's course grade.
• All regrade requests must include a brief written justification for the request. (Fill in the appropriate textbox on Gradescope.) 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."
  • "My answer is correct, even though it does not match the posted solution."
  • "There is no explanation for my grade."
  • "The grading for this problem is bonkers; please regrade it from scratch."

  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.
• Most grading mistakes should be corrected after the first regrade request. We reserve the right to treat subsequent regrade requests for the same problem as requests to grade the problem again. To handle those requests, we will unmark all rubric items and delete all markup in Gradescope, and then give the problem to a different grader to grade from scratch. Your new grade could be higher or lower than your old grade.

Overall course grades

We will determine final course grades as follows. (What do you expect from an algorithms course?)

1. Compute total scores from guided problem sets, homeworks, and exams.
   • 36% Homework: Each submitted homework problem is worth 1.5% of your raw total.
     • We expect to assign and grade about 30 homework problems during the semester.
     • We will count a maximum of 24 homework problems, dropping the lowest scores (except the problems on Homework zero) if you submit more than 24.
     • We will count up to the six highest late homework scores for full credit; any additional late homework scores will receive a 50% late penalty. (Late penalties are applied after dropping lowest scores.)
   • 64% Exams: There will be two midterm exams, each with four problems, and a cumulative final exam with six problems. All 14 exam problems have equal weight; thus, each exam problem is worth roughly 4.5% of your overall grade.
   • Exceptions:
     • Forgiven homework will be treated as if it did not exist; submitted homeworks will have more weight in the overall grade computation. In exceptional cases, we may compute course grades based entirely on exams.
     • Forgiven midterms will be treated as if they did not exist; their other exams will have more weight in the overall grade computation.
     • We will not drop zero grades that result from cheating offenses.
2. Exceptional cases.
   • We reserve the right to give an F to any student with an overall exam average below 25%, OR submits less than half of the assigned homework problems, OR otherwise does not appear to making a good-faith effort. This rule rarely applies to more than one student out of 200.
   • Anyone who misses both the regular final exam and the conflict final exam will be given an ABS ("absent from final"), which is equivalent to an F, unless they get an Incomplete from their college.
3. Determine letter grades, according to the following fixed cutoffs. Each possible letter grade (except D+ and D–) covers a range of 6%. We reserve the right to lower these cutoffs.
   • 82% ≤ A– < 88% ≤ A < 94% ≤ A+
   • 64% ≤ B– < 70% ≤ B < 76% ≤ B+ < 82%
   • 46% ≤ C– < 52% ≤ C < 58% ≤ C+ < 64%
   • 40% ≤ D < 46%
   •   0% ≤ F < 40%
4. Adjust grades upwards at the instructor's whim.