(Sorry for the long explanation—lots of information to take into account!)
So one of my AP teachers this year gave all of her classes a diagnostic test (only multiple choice questions, no free-response) about a week before the AP exam. She told us that if we did well, we could skip the final exam (20% of semester grade) and use our diagnostic scores as our final grades instead. Since the diagnostic was considerably harder than the final exam would have been and we had less time to take it (around 45 minutes for my class period versus 60 on the actual AP exam), she said she would give us a curve based on the raw scores.
Since she was gone the day we took the diagnostic, a substitute teacher administered it instead. We got our raw scores back the next day with the class average sitting around a 55-60%. On the following day, she gave us our curved scores—most people were sitting in the 70-80 range. Then we started comparing scores across class periods and found that her first period class had gotten a considerably larger curve—some people with lower raw scores actually ended up with much higher curved scores. I had the highest raw score in our class period (79) and ended up with a 96 on the curve (no complaints there).
We asked her about the curve and were told that the substitute had “wasted time” in the other class periods, so their curves were adjusted to account for the fact that they had been given less time to take the test. For some reason, she was unable to explain the actual method she had used to get everyone’s score, but we were reassured several times that it was “the same ratio.” She also mentioned that some of the questions were “tricky” and she hadn’t counted them in our scores. Apparently she hadn’t taken into account or wasn’t aware of the following:
- The sub had told us that we could listen to music on our phones during the test. One student took out his phone and looked up the answers as he was taking the test, messing up the curve.
- Although she told us that the curve for each class period was different because everybody had a different amount of time to take the exam, somebody in a different class period who scored 5 points higher than me had an unexplained impact on my score. (She didn't explain why when some of my friends asked her about it, just mentioned that I didn't have the highest overall score. Again, I'm perfectly fine with my grade—just a little skeptical of her math skills.)
- She didn't account for the people who finished the entire test in 20 minutes, regardless of how much time they could have potentially used. In other words, had I been in a different class period and finished the test in exactly the same amount of time, I would have scored about 20 points higher.
- When I talked to her about it, she mentioned the differences in time, etc., but then said something offhand about how "one of my periods didn't have as much time, plus they struggle more than you." Was her ratio based on the relative ability of each class period?
- Some of my friends and I asked her about the discrepancies in curves (the most extreme example being that somebody in first period had 47 points added to his score, whereas one person in my class period only got 11 points), and she got extremely defensive, saying there was a "lack of trust" but still not telling us what the ratio was or how she'd calculated the scores. We tried to approach her as politely as possible, but apparently we still came across as too confrontational. (This was especially difficult for me, as I know that she automatically assumed I was ungrateful for my 96 and just trying to bump up my grade. I did the math, and even if I'd gotten a 100, it would have raised my end-of-year average by half a point, which is inconsequential.)
- Although she explained that, because of the nature of the curve she had used, the people who had higher raw scores would have fewer points added, the aforementioned person in my class period who received only 11 extra points had a much lower raw score than I did (I got 17 extra points). I don't think that even the "tricky" questions she didn't count should have made that much of a difference.
Anyway—thoughts, opinions, recommended courses of action? I’m slightly hesitant to approach her again after she exploded last time. If it’s important, I asked several people and found that most had gotten about a 24-point curve. Almost everybody I talked to was extremely upset about their grades and asked me to talk to her about it, but my efforts to negotiate kind of backfired.
For reference, the diagnostic test was 75 questions and looked like it was actually an old AP exam. The semester final she gave last year was 100 questions (considerably easier) and we had 90 minutes to answer them.
Off topic, but it’s true.