[threeonefour]

inspired by the 'is this fair post?' i was wondering what you all considered to be some horrible mistakes made by your professors in class. it doesn't have to be about grading.


my example is very similar to the 'is this fair post?'


My sophmore year my ethics professor wanted to have an extra credit assignment. the median grade in the class was something like 50 so this extra credit assignment wasn't really optional since the class had no curve. it was supposed to be a way to shift all the grades up a few % points so that the class got a decent grade distribution.


this is how the extra credit assignment was to be scored. the amount of extra credit available to each individual was:

(100-MINtestscore%)/2

so if your lowest test score was a 20% and you got a 90% on your extra credit that was equal to 36 points of extra credit ((100-20)/2 * .9).

this however wasn't exactly a very good method from a 'fairness' perspective. this is because it didn't give people who had lower averages the chance at more extra credit (his obvious intention) it gave students who bombed one test a chance at more points.

basically, the test taker with the higher variance was favored. if you still don't get it, two people could have a 75% in the class (which was actually higher than the highest grade in that class) and have a different amount of extra credit available. or even more drastically, someone could have 75% in the class and have more available to him than someone who currently had a 65%. and the only reason why the 75% guy has more extra credit available to him is because he is LESS consistent. which i couldn't see why a grader would want that build into his class.