EXAM GRADING POLICIES:

• This course is not graded on the traditional curve. The grade distribution is determined by what students learn in the class. For example, last semester, 38 out of 70 students received grades of A or A- and the large majority received B or better.

• Letter-grade averaging will be used. A letter grade will be assigned for the total homework and for each of the four exams. For example, an "A" and "C" on two exams would average to a "B." This type of grading moderates the bad effect one low exam score would have on several high exam scores.

• Grades from the class spreadsheet will be available for each student on the web using "username" and "password." Hosted on our Mallard system, this provides a secure way for you to see your grading records.

• There will be a total of three regular exams and one final exam. All exams, including the final exam, will be worth 100 points.

• Grading Criteria is the following:
• Each of the three regular exams:   20% (total is 60%)
• Final Exam: 20%
• Homework: 20%

• Everyone takes the final exam. No grades are dropped. Make-up exams will be take-home problems.

• Incentives: To reward their good efforts, the students having the top 10 scores on the final exam will receive an automatic semester grade of "A" regardless of their previous exam and homework scores.

HOMEWORK GRADING POLICIES:

• These policies have been created to help the graders do their best job of fair grading for every student and to minimize grading errors and lost homework. Also, the graders are graduate students who must carefully schedule their grading time each week
• Homework is due at class time on the due date posted in the lecture notes.
• Points will be deducted for late homework as follows: 10% per day for each day late.
• If a student cannot attend the class when the homework is due, he or she should give the homework to the TA or the instructor before the class time. In extenuating circumstances, please contact your TA and make suitable arrangements.
• Do not turn your homework into anyone but the instructor or the TA, i.e., don't turn your homework in to someone in a department office.
• All homework must be done on engineering paper. Use good engineering practices such as name, date, and page number on each page. Homework received on other paper will be penalized 25%.
• Each homework assignment must be done on a separate set of pages and stapled together. This helps us to keep from making spreadsheet errors when the grades are entered.
• Each homework assignment will be graded separately with 10 points per problem. The total number of points will be variable according to the number of problems assigned.