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Quizzes

Mastery Quizzes

There are three "mastery quizzes", these quizzes serve two purposes:

1) Give you a chance to practice on the kinds of questions on a paper programming exam. (for this final, or certain interviews)

2) Allow you to ensure that you are retaining the important concepts, and not overly relying on StackOverflow/GPT/etc. when solving problems.

Each mastery quiz will be scored out of 30-40 points.

These scores are for primarily your own benefit, there is no penalty for doing poorly or even not taking the quizzes. Make-ups will only be available in exceptional circumstances.

If you get more than 90% of the available points, you have demonstrated mastery of the subjects at hand and will waive that third of the exam.

If you do not receive above 90% on any portion, you may elect to use one of your quiz grades as a substitute for that portion of the exam. (See Example 2 below.)

Final Exam

The final exam will be given in Week 10/finals week. It will scored out of 100 points, and will cover all topics from the course. It will be made up of three parts, corresponding to the three mastery quizzes.

As mentioned, you may opt to take only some portions of it (or skip it altogether) depending on your performance on the quizzes and desired final grade.

Example 1

  • Quiz #1: 28/30 (93%)
  • Quiz #2: 20/35 (57%)
  • Quiz #3: 30/35 (86%)

This student has demonstrated mastery on the topics covered by Quiz #1, and will not need to take that portions of the final exam.

They take the final exam:

  • Part 1: Waived/30
  • Part 2: 32/35
  • Part 3: 29/35

Their final exam score is 30+32+29 = 91.

Example 2

  • Quiz #1: 20/30 (66%)
  • Quiz #2: 14/35 (40%)
  • Quiz #3: 27/35 (77%)

First, this student did not perform poorly!

The mastery quizzes are given quickly after content is introduced, and if it is new to you (which is the hope for most people in this course!) you are unlikely to have already fully digested it.

Instead this student can recognize that the material covered on Quiz 2 is their weakest, and plan accordingly.

They take the final and do much better, having now seen the kinds of questions that may be asked and focusing on the ones they struggled with:

  • Part 1: 28/30
  • Part 2: 35/35
  • Part 3: 26/35

Their grade went up significantly in Part 1 and 2. Part 3 they did a point worse than the quiz on, but overall a marked improvement.

Their final grade here would be: 28 + 35 + 27 = 90.

The 27 is used from their Quiz 3 instead of their slight decrease in Quiz 2.

(This will only be done for one section, you may opt to use this rule to skip a single section of the final if you wish to focus your efforts on two others and accept a sub-90% quiz grade instead.)

Example 3

  • Quiz #1: missed (0%)
  • Quiz #2: 34/35 (97%)
  • Quiz #3: 34/35 (97%)

This individual has earned a 70 on the exam without even taking it (full credit for parts 2 and 3). Depending on what they need for the final grade they want, they may decide to take Part 1 of the final, or skip it altogether.