Midterm exam notes

Hi class-

I realized that I swapped your midterm and the midterm without bonus numbers on your mid-quarter progress sheets. The higher of the two is the midterm with the bonus points included. In general, the bonus points didn't really shift the course distribution.

The letter grade ranges listed at the bottom of the sheet are highly approximate, and perhaps slightly more stringent than what will likely be the case. Here are some statistics from last year's course:

A > 79% (6 students)
B > 71% (21)
C > 57% (19)
D > 53% (4)
F < 53% (3)

Keep in mind that these grade ranges factor in the final, which is 45% of your grade. The average on the final last year was 63% with a standard deviation of 16%.

Ultimately, in assigning letter grades, we tend to look for natural breaks in the score distribution, but we also take into account the class performance as a whole relative to previous years.

Please do see me if you have questions about the midterm or the material this far. It is very important that you have a good understanding of all of the material up to this point, as we will only build on it in class.

MSS