CS/ECE 374: Grading Policies

If you have any questions or concerns, please ask in lecture, during office hours, or on Piazza.


Graded work


Regrade requests


Final course grades

We will determine final course grades as follows. (What do you expect from an algorithms course?)
  1. Compute raw totals from homework and exam scores, excluding extra credit. Course work is weighted as follows:

  2. Compute adjusted totals, which include extra credit points. Extra credit points are not necessarily worth the same as regular points.

  3. Remove outliers at both ends of the curve.

  4. Determine letter-grade cutoffs from the raw totals. Outliers are excluded from the cutoff computation to avoid unfairly skewing the curve. By default, the mean is a borderline B–/C+, and each standard deviation is worth one full letter grade. For example, the B+/B cutoff is 2/3 standard deviations above the mean, and the D/D– cutoff is 5/3 standard deviations below the mean.

  5. Compute final letter grades (for non-outliers) from adjusted totals.

  6. Adjust grades upwards as necessary to account for exam difficulty, student marked improvement, or to take into account other miscellaneous factors. Remember that the curve sets a lower bound on your grade in the class, not an upper bound. In particular, if everyone does well, then everyone will get a good grade.