Scaling grades et al

hot_choco
Fri, 06 Apr 2007 11:32:19 +0000

hey doverdemon, you must be talking about the psychology department in UBC. For first year, the average of the course must be 66-68%, in third and fourth year its 68-70%. I also feel that its quite unfair especially since in other departments they dont do that so its actually harder to get higher marks in psychology (compared to other departments) especially if the class is very competitive. However, one of the profs I know, if the average of the class is higher than 70%, they will use statistical technique to compare if the class is actually more competitive than other class that the prof taught. For example, they will compare the results of current midterm with last year’s midterm and see if the students did much better (since midterms are usually different from year to year, they will only compare the same questions they put in both years). But capping the average at 70%, means that as long as you do better than everybody else, youll be fine.

I think the grading policy that is unfair in UBC is for math especially the first year course. If your class’s average for the midterm is high, and the final is low compared to other sections, they will scale you down. Sometimes we cant do anything about it, because its the prof’s fault.