Grades
This class may be taken only for a letter grade.
| 50% | Homework |
| 10% | Mid-quarter examination 1 |
| 10% | Mid-quarter examination 2 |
| 30% | Final examination |
Grade Component Statistics
| Component | Minimum | Mean | Median | Maximum | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Homework 1 | 9.5 | 49.7 | 55.0 | 60 | 60 |
| Homework 2 | 14 | 53.9 | 56.5 | 60 | 60 |
| Homework 3 | 20 | 28.0 | 28.0 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 4 | 18 | 54.9 | 58.0 | 60 | 60 |
| Homework 5 | 18 | 28.4 | 30.0 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 6 | 15 | 28.5 | 30.0 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 7 | 9 | 28.2 | 30.0 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 8 | 20 | 29.7 | 30.0 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 9 | 19 | 70.3 | 71.2 | 90 | 90 |
| Homework 10 | 8 | 50.8 | 55.5 | 59.5 | 60 |
| Homework 11 | 17 | 27.05 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 12 | 7 | 25.9 | 27 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 13 | 20 | 29.5 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 14 | 10 | 29.6 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 15 | 16 | 28.8 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 16 | 10 | 28.8 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 17 | 14 | 27.9 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 18 | 12 | 29.1 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 19 | 3 | 26.5 | 30 | 30 | 30 |
| Homework 20 | 22 | 41.0 | 58 | 60 | 60 |
| Examination 1 | 33 | 65.0 | 65.5 | 94 | 100 |
| Examination 2 | 28 | 60.3 | 57.5 | 91 | 100 |
| Final Eaxamination | 38 | 62.6 | 63 | 94 | 100 |
Homework
- Homework is due no later than 12:55 in the homework boxes in Harold Frank Hall, 2108.
- Homework solutions are discussed during the Discussion section that immediately follows the homework due date, and sometimes in class on the due date.
- Late homeworks are not accepted.
Conduct
You are required to work on the homework assigments on your own. Please check the UCSB catalogue on the topic of Academic conduct.
"The core of a university's integrity is its scholastic honesty. Academic dishonesty vitiates the university's educational role and defrauds all who comprise its community. It is expected that students understand and subscribe to the ideal of academic integrity and are willing to bear individual responsibility for their work. Any work (written or otherwise) submitted to fulfill an academic requirement must represent a student's original work. Materials submited to fulfill academic requirements must represent a student's own efforts. An act of academic dishonesty, such as plagiarism or other forms of cheating, is unacceptable and will be met with disciplinary action.
"Using or attempting to use materials, information, study aids, or commercial "research" services not authorized by the instructor of the course constitutes cheating. Representing the words, ideas, or concepts of another person without appropriate attribution is plagiarism. Whenever another person's written work is utilized, whether it is a single phrase or more, quotation marks must be used, and sources cited. Paraphrasing another's work, i.e., borrowing the ideas or concepts and putting them into one's "own" words, also must be acknowledged. Although a person's state of mind and intention will be considered in determining the University response to an act of academic dishonesty, this in no way lessens the responsibility of the student."
Examinations
Content
You are responsible to understand the material contained in the reading assignments and the lectures. An in-class examination is at most a 75-minute test. It thus cannot cover all the material that you are responsible to know. If you want to guess what material you can safely ignore, that, of course, is your option. I would like you to understand all of the material. Thus, in the interest of encouraging you to learn all the material, I will not suggest that it is safe for you to omit any portion of it from your study plan. If you think this is unfair, feel free to say "Pete Cappello did not tell us which portion of the reading and lecture material we could safely assume would not be examined." That is an accurate statement. This is a university, not a community college. You are computer science majors. I implore you: Devote as much time as it takes to understand this material in its entirety. I am happy to help you learn. Always feel free to ask questions during the lecture period, and out of class. Minimizing the effort to get by is no way to approach your career. Being a competent computer scientist requires a lifetime of intellectual effort. Embrace it.
Process
- There must be at least 1 empty seat between every 2 students.
- You may not leave the room during the examination, even to go to the bathroom.
- You may not use any personal devices, such as calculators, PDAs, or cell phones.
Make-ups, Exceptions, and Incompletes
For me, grading is the distasteful part of the course. Because grades, for better or worse, are important to success as a student at UCSB, some students will request that course policies be relaxed for them.
- You cannot request a make-up examination on the day of, or after, the examination.
- The course grade policy will not be modified for anyone. Don't ask. It is my job to protect the every student in the class from students who privately petition for exceptional treatment. Regarding grade policy, no student is treated differently from any other, no matter how compelling they feel their personal circumstances are.
- If you have personal problems, I may either sign your petition to drop the course or permit an incomplete grade. I will not modify the course grade policy for you.
- Consider the course drop option carefully. Once the drop deadline has passed, you are here for the whole ride, except in circumstances as mentioned above.
Questioning a grade
You have at most 2 weeks from the time the graded item was handed back to question a grade. You do this by seeing the person who graded the item during their office hours. After that period, the grade you received is final.
Maintaining the Grade Data Base
Please keep your graded material. If there is a discrepancy between the grade information that you received and what is recorded in our database, please provide your grade evidence to either me or your TA. We will correct the database.