Math 307A • Spring Quarter 2013
Rules for exams and quizzes
You are responsible for reading and understanding the rules. If I see that you did not follow the rules, I will report you to the university for cheating.
Quizzes (online)
- You may use your book and your notes.
- You may use a calculator.
- You may not discuss the quiz with anyone, in person or over the internet, until the quiz is due.
- There will be a time limit (usually 2 hours).
- You cannot change your answers after submitting.
- You are responsible for submitting the quiz in time.
Exams (in class)
- You may use one sheet of notes, in your own handwriting.
- You may use a simple scientific calculator.
- You may not use a calculator that can graph or do symbolic manipulation, nor a phone or any other electronic device.
- No make-up exams! If you have an emergency and need to miss an exam, your remaining exams will be weighted more heavily to make up for the missed one.
Score-to-grade conversions for tests and quizzes
To convert your quiz scores into a numerical grade from 0.0–4.0, use the following formula: first, figure out your total quiz score as a percentage of the possible score. Call this number P. Then use this formula:
Your quiz grade = P/25 + 0.4
This formula means that 90% (and up) gets a 4.0, 85% gets a 3.8, and so on. Quiz grades above 4.0 are rounded down to 4.0. Remember that your lowest score will be dropped when I compute P.
You will be able to see the numerical grades that correspond to your exam scores on Catalyst. For the first midterm (out of 48 points), here are some data points for the conversion: 43 points is a 3.7, 38 a 3.2, 32 a 2.7, and 25 a 2.0.
Old exams for practice
Here are some exams I gave to my 307 class in Winter 2013:
The tests above follow the same schedule as your class: first midterm about Chapter 1 and Chapter 2, second midterm about Chapter 3, and a comprehensive final that's slightly weighted towards Chapter 6.
Many other instructors have old exams on their websites too, so you should look around. For example, Austin Roberts made this exam archive that you're welcome to visit. More recently, Peter Caday put up this nice list of old exams.
Keep in mind that every class is different. Some of the exams in Austin's archive ask about things we aren't covering this quarter. On the other hand, I could ask you about things that aren't on some of the practice tests. For example, my old exams from Winter 2013 do not cover substitution tricks to make differential equations separable or linear, and they don't cover section 2.6. Your exams may include questions on any or all of those topics. The exams linked here are meant for practice and to give you a general idea about the format and type of questions to expect.
If you're ever in doubt about whether something would be fair game for one of our tests, just ask.