CS 481: About Test #1

Here is the breakdown of the 40 grades in Test #1:

6 earned at least 20 but below 30
4 earned at least 30 but below 40
5 earned at least 40 but below 50
5 earned at least 50 but below 60
11 earned at least 60 but below 70
7 earned at least 70 but below 80
1 earned at least 80 but below 90
1 earned 102 -- congratulations!

Overall, the median was 56, the low grade was 20.5, and the high grade was 102 (from an undergraduate). For graduate students (14 tests), the median was 63, while for undergraduate students (25 tests), the median was 51.

Rough equivalent in letter grades are as follows. For graduate students, below 60 is failing (6 tests); 60 to 74 is a C (6 tests), 75 to 84 is a B (1 test), and 85 and above is an A (1 test). For undergraduate students, below 50 is failing (11 tests); 50 to 59 is a D (2 tests), 60 to 69 a C (6 tests), 70 to 79 a B (5 tests), and 80 and above an A (1 test).

See the solution sheet for details on answers. The main stumbling block for 90% of the class was Problem #3. Only about 4 of you seem to have realized that what was needed was to avoid partial allocation of resources and thus to implement something very similar to the solution (given during the test) of Exercise #3 on Homework #3; everyone else basically lost 20 to 25 points there.

Since 17 of the 39 tests had failing scores, it may be a good time to reiterate that I only average your scores when your trend in the semester is downwards; when your trend is upwards, I give you a grade that is close to the top of your curve. There will be two more tests, one on the memory hierarchy (our next topic) and a final that will be comprehensive (in order to give you a chance to show that you have mastered the material on process handling).

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