Chapter 13 General Course Policies

  1. Any concerns or questions regarding these general policies, the teaching assistants or the course itself should be directed to Dr. Love, if at all possible.
  2. All student work is subject to the University’s policies and procedures.
  3. Registration is required. I do not permit anyone to audit the course, without exception.
  4. Grading. You are not in competition with each other for grades. I have no set percentage of students who will receive any particular grade.
  5. Attendance is expected, and your absence will be noted. If you need to miss class, inform Dr. Love via email before the class you will miss, or as soon as possible thereafter. I will assume you have a good reason - details are not necessary. You are responsible for all missed work, regardless of the reason for your absence. All work is turned in electronically, except for the final project presentation.
  6. Late work is unacceptable under anything but the most harrowing of circumstances. Dr. Love (via email) is the person to discuss this with, at least 48 hours prior to the deadline, if you feel your circumstances are sufficiently dire to warrant an exception. It is far better to turn in timely, but only partially complete work than nothing at all.
  7. Feedback on assignments - deadline. On every assignment, Quiz, project-related task, whatever, we will be delighted to respond to email questions up to 18 hours before the assignment is due. After that time, you are on your own. The reason for this is that Dr. Love and the teaching assistants will regularly post responses to frequently asked questions about assignments, and we need sufficient time to accomplish this task.
  8. On Getting Help Quickly and Effectively: In general, we don’t have a way to diagnose your problem with R, R Studio or Markdown if you don’t show us what you’re typing that causes an error, or a lack of results. If you wrote a Markdown file, send it, along with a specific question (or series of them) about specific error messages or strange results you are getting. We need to replicate the problem in order to know how to fix your problem, and it also helps if we know what error message you’re seeing, or what strange result you are getting.
  9. Using a Laptop Using a laptop to follow along, take notes, or try things out during class, can be very helpful. Feel free to do so.
  10. Computer You will need access to a computer (PC or Mac - a ChromeBook won’t do) outside of class to do every assignment. You need to be able to install software on this computer, and update it frequently.
  11. Distractions. Silence your phone during class. The temptation to look at your phone or Facebook or email during class is nearly irresistible. Resist anyway, if only to avoid distracting your instructor and your fellow students. Dr. Love has absolutely no shame about embarassing people on this issue. If it’s critical, just step out of the room.
  12. Research Usage. Any and all results of in-class and out-of-class assignments and activities are data sources for research and may be used in published research. All such use will always be anonymous.
  13. Audio-Recording. Anything you say during a class session may be audio-recorded.
  14. Typos. Dr. Love makes occasional typographic and grammatical errors, which irritate him enormously. Please email him if you find any in this syllabus or any other course materials. If you are the first to let us know, and we make the change, you will receive a small amount of bonus credit in your class participation grade.

13.1 Grade Appeal Policy - Wait until December!

For each assignment and Quiz, after it has been submitted, we will publish a detailed answer sketch and a grading rubric. You will also learn your scores on each individual item.

Clarification of concerns related to potential typographical or other errors in these answer sketches is welcome at any time, but haggling over points on assignments and quizzes can be a real time sink in a large class.

  • To that end, students are requested not to dispute any grading until December.
  • Students are permitted to ask questions about grading during the term, and the teaching assistants and I are happy to discuss why points were taken off, but we make it clear that no grades will be changed until the end of the term. The one exception is if there is a mistake in adding up points, or some similar clerical error. Those are corrected immediately, of course.
  • In early December, we will provide a form listing all completed Assignments and Quizzes. Any student who wishes to dispute points can specify the number of points in question next to each relevant assignment or Quiz, and the details of the issues that concern them.
  • If you wish to dispute a grade, just fill out the form in December. All forms must be submitted by the end of the final project presentation on December 14.

In mid-December, after Dr. Love has worked out what letter grade to give each student, he will go through the requests and determine for each whether the student’s letter grade would change if all of the points in dispute were granted. If the answer is no, then we don’t even look at the disputed grade(s). If the answer is yes, then we look very carefully to see if enough extra points are merited to change their grade. (It will not help your case if you submit any frivolous requests.)

The main advantage of this system is that it saves all of us (you, the TAs, and Dr. Love) the hassle of haggling over points that are never going to mean anything anyway. It also provides “equal access” to students who are too timid to approach us in person with their concerns. Finally, if there is an issue with grading a particular problem or assignment that needs to be reconsidered, Dr. Love will have access to all papers and can make a universal decision1

  1. I got this idea from Jessica Utts at http://www.amstat.org/publications/jse/v22n2/rossmanint.pdf.↩