CS 561: Fall 2004, About Test #1

The high score was a perfect 100 (congratulations!); the low score, however, was only 22; the median was 55. The distribution of scores is shown below.

Range    Number of scores in range

86-100: 	 3  (A-/A/A+)
76-85:  	 7  (B/B+)
66-75:  	 2  (C/C+/B-)
56-65:  	10  (D/D+/C-)
46-55:  	10  (F)
36-45:  	 9  (F)
 0-35:  	 4  (F)

As a rough guideline, I'd say that anyone with a score below 55 clearly failed the test and should review their position before continuing with the class; that scores between 55 and 64 indicate real, but probably fixable, problems; and that scores of 65 and above, while not necessarily predicting good grades (a 65 is a low C), mean that you are not at risk. (Recall that the lowest grade assignable to a graduate student is C: there is no such thing as a C- or D grade at UNM for graduate students: the next grade below C is F.)

I'll assign a WP to anyone who prefers to withdraw now. If you continue, you can benefit from the fact that I do not average scores: if your second score is a clear pass, you will pass the class no matter how bad your first score was; yet be sure that you have done all you could to correct whatever went wrong in the first test -- two successive scores of 60 or below will definitely cause you to receive an F in the course.

Some general remarks about the test results:

• Since you took the trouble, on my request, of typing in everything, I find it curious that so many tests average at least one typo or spelling mistake per line.
  Whatever became of spell checkers? Under Linux, at least, aspell, ispell, or many others would have fixed 95% of the typos and spelling errors I saw. You've probably spent a fair amount of time on the test, so why not make sure its presentation reflects well on your effort? Use spell checkers whenever you are writing something to turn in to someone else.
• I caught one flagrant case of copying, but had to write warnings on another 2 pairs of tests. All of you should re-read my presentation on ethics (accessible from my web page): using materials from the web without attribution, plagiarizing, etc., are all forms of unethical conduct as grave as just copying from your classmate.
• Problem 3 proved to be most everyone's undoing, simply because most of you just tried to use the old potential. The results were either dead-ends or "creative" arithmetic, such as 3x <= 2x (for a positive x). Several of you attempted to analyze paired searches, which works if you double the value of the potential (two searches, so twice the potential!) and carefully track positions; a very few of you saw that the simplest way out was to ensure that a change in the flag would cause a drop in potential (that could then pay for that first search) and proceeded accordingly.