| Portion of Course | Percentage of Final Grade |
|---|---|
| Midterm Exams | 20% (10% each) |
| Final Exam | 15% |
| Quizzes (2 dropped) | 10% |
| Labs (1 dropped) | 15% |
| Homeworks | 40% |
Your final grade is computed based on the percentage of possible points you have earned.
It is common to write tests and quizzes where many of the questions are gotten right by almost all students. In this class, I generally omit those questions and only ask the harder questions. This tends to result in low raw scores, which I adjust by predetermined (but generally not pre-announced) nonlinear functions of the form g = \sqrt[w]{r} where 0 \le g \le 1 is your GPA-contributing score, 0 \le r \le 1 is your raw score, and w \ge 1 is the nonlinear weighting function.
When I’ve taught this course in the past, GPAs have averaged between 2.6 and 2.9.
Late homework submissions will receive a 10% penalty up to 48 hours late, and a 15% penalty up to 72 hours late, and will not be accepted past that time. Late quizzes will not be accepted; if you had an unexpected conflict the quiz, we may make other accommodations, like dropping an additional quiz for you. Late labs will usually not be accepted. Exam makeups will be handled case-by-case as needed.
If you would be late because of illness, sudden family issues, or other events that you could not reasonably have planned for, very often we can make a different accomodation; please ask about your particular circumstances.
The purpose of labs is for you to learn together enough to perform homeworks on your own thereafter. As such, you may collaborate on labs. Your lab submissions should indicate who you worked with, whether they were in the course this semester or not.
The purpose of homeworks is twofold:
As such, you must not collaborate on homeworks. You must not get help from others, including tutors, fellow students, or others. You must not look at or listen to descriptions of others’ solutions to the homework assignment.
As an exception, the course staff (instructors and TAs) have been trained to provide help that does not undermine the primary purpose of helping you learn; as such, you may ask them for help.
Many of the homeworks are designed to benefit from and build off of assigned readings and lecture content. You may also consult other static (non-interactive) content online provided that both (a) said content does not address the homework assignment itself and (b) you indicate what that content was in your homework submission.
Quizzes are open book, open notes, and open to other references. However, you may not ask anyone else for help on a particular quiz question. This includes, for example, asking about the question on any online discussion fora before the quiz is due. You may not share your quiz answers or reasoning with other students before the deadline for each quiz.
Exams are supervised and depend only on your internalized knowledge. You may not consult any source other than the exam itself during an exam.
For various reasons, some students may take the exam at a different time than you, possibly including students who you don’t even know are enrolled in the course who might overhear your conversations with others. You must not discuss the content of the exam in any way with anyone prior to it being graded.
If we believe you have cheated, we may apply an arbitrarily harsh grade penalty up to and including an F in the course. This penalty is independent of (and potentially in addition to) any findings of the University Honor System.
If you may require an accommodation to fully access this course, please contact the Student Disability Access Center (SDAC) at (434) 243-5180 or sdac@virginia.edu.
If a religious observance or other religious beliefs impact or are likely to impact your work this semester, please let us know as soon as you are aware of this impact. See EOCR’s page on religious observances for more.
Bad things happen. People forget things and make mistakes. Bad days coincide with due dates. Etc.
If you believe that circumstances warrant an change in deadline, a second chance, or some other accommodation in order to more accurately synchronize grade with knowledge, come talk to your professor and we’ll resolve the situation as best we can.
When something interrupts your ability to meet the expected schedule for one course, it is likely it also interrupts your other courses too. It can be productive to contact a dean and explain the situation; the dean can then contact all of your instructors and help streamline your getting appropriate accommodations in all of your courses.
If you are in the College of Arts and Sciences, contact your association dean at 434-924-3351 or directly by email.
If you are in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, contact an academic coach and consultant at the office of undergraduate programs.
All students may also use the central office of the dean of students.