<p>Back in the dark ages when I was at a large public university, many of my classes had a midterm, paper(s), and a final. Or maybe just one or two of those components. If there was a midterm, it would often be the only graded assignment that had been returned heading into the final. </p>
<p>My older D attends a small LAC, and receives a lot more feedback and also more class assignments. Many of her classes include class participation in the grade. It’s a lot easier to grade a smaller class more frequently than a huge lecture class.</p>
<p>Also, some schools curve grades (either up or down) so while a student may know their grades going into a final, they don’t know where those grades will ultimately land them. D’s school has a policy for 100 and 200 level classes with at least 10 students that the mean grade can’t be higher than a B+.</p>
<p>^^^ My D had the opposite experience. Her large classes all had well-defined syllabi that with grading curves detailed up-front. So going into finals, she knew exactly where she stood and what she needed to score on the final to lock-in a given grade. In contrast, the prof of her 17-person humanities class gave no clue how he’d weight papers and projects and class participation.</p>
<p>^ I think D’s school is the same. The larger classes gave out the out average and high after the tests while the one required humanities class which was not small did not provide any feedback. </p>
<p>B or B+ curving for averages sounds about right and one standard deviation is supposed to be an A.</p>
<p>In my day, the class average was a C and the grades were figured from that with one standard deviation up being a B and two up being an A. Is this why they say there is grade inflation now?</p>
<p>I was reading about how grading is currently attempted to be done in college now. The curve you are talking about is called a distribution curve and the problem with it is that it lays out so the same number of people to get "A"s and as get "F"s. Meaning some people have to get F’s even if their scores are not so bad. </p>
<p>What I understand is that currently it is thought that fair grading is where 20-25% get A, 30% get B, 40% get C and 5-10% get D or F.</p>
<p>I don’t know if that is considered to be grade inflation but it does make for a curve that is skewed towards Bs and C’s.</p>
<p>D’s grades were as expected so she is fairly happy. She feels as she gets more into her chem major, she will do better. Fewer humanities to drag the GPA down.</p>
<p>All I said to her when she left in the fall was: you need a 2.5 to maintain your scholarship. Anything above will be wonderful!</p>
<p>I’m not a fan of the way Princeton does grading (see their policy overview statement below). It just seems a recipe for disaster to me to take highly intelligent, highly-achieving students and tell them only a percentage of them will get an A no matter what. They are all clearly capable of it or they wouldn’t have gotten in. </p>
<p>Good Morning,
I haven’t checked in since the kids left for school. We had a big adjustment period with all three leaving and I just didn’t have the heart to spend much time on CC. Also spent way more time on moral support than I was expecting, it was sucking the life out of me for awhile. Everything is going well though.</p>
<p>S at RIT is doing wonderfully. He was the one I worried about, in his “class of 3” he was always “3rd”, very rough on him, he always thought he wasn’t smart. Well it turns out he is, made Dean’s List his first quarter and his advisor told him that if he keeps it up he could get invited into the Honors program, which he finds very motivating. And I can’t say enough about a school that admits kids to a specific major, and gets and advisor in that major immediately (obviously doesn’t work for anyone who isn’t sure what they want to do), he got to take two classes in his major first quarter which was also very motivating. He also seems very happy as a liberal arts major in a tech school, has lots of friends. He is on a wellness floor (full of health conscious kids) and they apparently hang out at the gym a lot and play various sports in their spare time.</p>
<p>S at UNH is also doing well (although we had no clue until his grades came back a few days ago). Looks like 2 kids made the Deans List. We are not thrilled with the huge classrooms (he had one class that he went to online - and was only allowed into the classroom for one lecture during the semester. We are hoping that as he moves up he will get smaller classes. He is my “vague” child - only knows how to get to places on campus he needs to go to, has no idea what is happening around him lots of the time, didn’t manage to find a job (missed the job fair). We really have no idea what he does, he has an active dorm that plans lots of activities, and we think he just hangs there. We are hoping to get him motivated to join a few clubs and find a job. It appears he has way too much free time.</p>
<p>D at F&M had a rough start. She took Chemistry first semester and had an abysmal experience and finally withdrew. She had a very odd teacher, who did things in a very different way which did nothing for her. He had them spend huge amounts of time working in small groups on workbook pages and never gave the correct answers. She tried going for tutoring but the tutors didn’t understand his teaching methods or the way he expected things to be done, and he even told her that a tutor wouldn’t help unless they had taken his class. It didn’t seem right. She was a wreck and needed lots of support; she’d never had a class that gave her that much trouble, and she felt like a failure and that she didn’t deserve to go to school there. Once she finally withdrew, she was much better, and actually did quite well with her other 3 classes. Her schedule next semester looks much better, and we are keeping our fingers crossed that she will do really well and gain her confidence back.</p>
<p>Yes, this. My oldest merely needs to keep his merit scholarship, so needs to maintain a 3.0 and does so. His Cs balance his As and he’s quite content where he goes. He is expecting a job offer once he graduates (just a junior now, but others in his major have had no problems getting jobs), so he has no worries really. </p>
<p>My '16 guy might want med school and knows some of the classes coming up next year (like Organic Chem) are known as killers. He’ll also be getting involved in research and shadowing and a multitude of other things beyond the job and activities he has now. He’s very happy to start off very high… and I’m rejoicing with him. I wonder how he’ll take it when he gets that first non-A as he’s never had one in his life to date. I kind of worry about that, but figure I’ll be there to support him. We have talked about it and how it’s likely to happen.</p>
<p>Both boys know how they compare to many of their peers (probably not all of them) as they are in peer groups that share. Then too, S16’s profs tend to share high, low, mean, and median grades.</p>
<p>Youngest may end up being my “hover around 2.0” guy as he really doesn’t care about grades - just about knowledge. As long as he ends up with a degree that leads to a job (maybe even a box checking ‘have a degree’ job) he’ll do fine in life. He’s also looking at lower level schools where he might thrive.</p>
<p>Different kids. Different levels of “awesome!” And none are “right” or “wrong” IMO.</p>
<p>I’d absolutely hate pass/fail places - esp heading toward med school - but I can see where it could be good for a student who might not handle the transition as well. I do wonder what med schools think if the pass/fail is in one of their weeder pre-reqs.</p>
<p>ps Did anyone else think of General Mom when hearing about that Cinci music student and her parents?</p>
<p>I really feel sorry for General Mom’s son… but upon hearing of the full ride offer from Cinci (just senior year I imagine), I’ll admit to asking youngest if we wanted to consider a different way to finance his years. ;)</p>
<p>Oh, Creekland, that is so funny that you thought about General Mom. I thought about General Mom, too, immediately upon hearing that news. There must be more parents out there like this than we know.</p>
<p>Yes, General Mom came to mind to me as well. tozubri, I am so sorry for the difficulty with your D. That is a case where ratemyprofessor revews should be written and the advice heeded by others. Will dropping a class like Chem affect future plans?</p>
<p>Happy (almost) New Year to all of you! My kids are both loving University of Maryland College Park, though it was a rough first month for my daughter, who felt a bit overwhelmed until she found some amazing friends. Now she can’t wait to go back to dorm life and considers it home. Even though I’d read about that phenomenon, it sure is disconcerting to feel it play out! We’ve always been so close that it’s a bit depressing to know that she wants to be away from home…but I accept that she’s growing up and haven’t shared my ambivalence with her. </p>
<p>DS '16 and DD '16 both are quite happy with their grades. DS earned five As and one B+, and DD earned a mix of As and Bs. Best part is she earned a B in her Statistics course! That was a tough slog for her, but she pulled it out with the help of her twin and lots of diligence on her part. Both achieved grades that serve to maintain scholarships (DS) and limited enrollment program major status (DD).</p>
<p>During the break, DS is telecommuting for his programming job at the college, so he’s up in his room either making money or just playing on the computer for fun. I’d feel bad that he’s not getting much fresh air, except I know he has to walk for miles every day on the College Park campus, so he’ll be out in the wild soon enough.</p>
<p>As for DD, she’s working at Panera when she can and also watching lots of TV and hanging out with friends. </p>
<p>All of us celebrated the amazing Redskins win last night, including my 14-year-old DD, who’s got her eye on being a Terp one day, too.</p>
<p>One semester down, seven semesters :crossingfingers: to go!</p>
<p>Good to hear from some parents who’ve been away from CC. Our kids’ experiences are so different, it seems, even tozubri’s 3 seem to have had such different ones.</p>
<p>S’ appeal letter was met with a request to appear in person on the morning of the 4th. This could mean anything but they could have accepted his appeal by mail if they’d wanted to. Now they will make a decision either while he’s there or later that day, not sure. Classes begin on the 7th so this cuts things close. I would really, really like to have this resolved but i guess we wait.</p>
<p>OHMom- I wish it was resolved for you (and more importantly your S!) but I’m glad that there was some response. </p>
<p>D is happy with her 1st semester grades (and very surprised by one of them.). I’m trying to get her to focus on summer jobs. She wants to sleep and watch videos. Sigh.</p>
<p>OHMomof2 – They could have also told him “no” by mail. My gut says this is a formal reading of the riot act and stipulation of terms. Best wishes to my fellow bass player. :)</p>