Marks! Marks! Marks!

[wmc...@cgl.uwaterloo.ca]

Hi!

I have received several e-mails from students with respect to marks:

1. How can I find out my marks?

2. What will happen if my exam mark is too low?

Here the answers as of mid-afternoon, 19 August, when I am in the
midst of marathon marking of two final exams on the leat two days of
exams.

1. I maintain a spread-sheet of marks with a line for each student.
When the marks go in, or a day or two later, I will send each
student, by e-mail to the uwaterloo.ca address, their line in
the spreadsheet within a day or two of handing in the marks.
Please review them and let me know if you notice any errors or
omissions. (Maintaining such a spreadsheet includes hand entry
of three or four hundred mark. The likelihood that there is a
typo or two is high.)

The medal decisions that the TAs and I have made will also be
communicated in this message. I differ from some other instructors
in not wanting to make it a public event: there's already more
than enough testosterone in the world.

2. The exam was longer than I planned. However, based on the 50%
of marking that I have as yet completed it appears to have been
about the right level of difficulty. The average marks are very
reasonable. Maybe I have not yet marked the unreasonable
questions, so the comments here are tentative.

I have a relatively relaxed marking philosophy. I pass students
who have mastered the material regardless of the rules. Mastery
is what's important to me, not the tokens we use to help us
estimate it.

Enjoy the remainder of your summer, and feel free to drop in on me
any time.

Bill