Wow, I don't know if I should laugh or feel sorry for these people

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The discussion centers on the alarming trend of low grades in challenging engineering courses, highlighting a specific case where the class average was a mere 16.8%, indicating widespread failure among students. Participants share experiences of extreme difficulty in exams, with one example noting a midterm average of only 6% in a third-year electrical engineering class. The conversation reflects concerns about the fairness and grading practices of professors, particularly when a small number of students perform significantly better, affecting the grading curve for the entire class. There is a general sentiment that many students, despite their competence, struggle under these circumstances, leading to high failure rates. The issue raises questions about the adequacy of teaching methods and assessment strategies in rigorous academic environments.
flyingpig
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I hope this isn't the wrong place to post this. This was a few months old, but I found this in an archive of news

http://www.dailybruin.com/index.php/article/2010/05/students-decry-poor-grades-engineering-class

Has this every happened to guys? Class average was 16.8%, that's not even a F
 
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My brother's friend was in third year electrical engineering course and the class average on the mid term was approximately 6%. It involved one question that took over 20 pages of paper to solve. So clearly everyone messed up at the beginning only slightly and their entire calculation was wrong.
 
Sometimes I find it hard to see that more than 80% out of almost 90 4th year electrical engineering students fail a class. I mean, these students are clearly competent, and the fact that over 50% failed... I don't know. I saw the other thread a while back with lots of people here saying that it was good that the kid with the disputed (chemistry if I remember correctly) test grade was being treated fairly or that the situation was created to benefit him in the future.

Dunno, this is pretty nuts and I don't have any experience or any solid opinion one way or another.
 
hadsed said:
Sometimes I find it hard to see that more than 80% out of almost 90 4th year electrical engineering students fail a class. I mean, these students are clearly competent, and the fact that over 50% failed... I don't know. I saw the other thread a while back with lots of people here saying that it was good that the kid with the disputed (chemistry if I remember correctly) test grade was being treated fairly or that the situation was created to benefit him in the future.

Dunno, this is pretty nuts and I don't have any experience or any solid opinion one way or another.

That kid was me! It resolved itself, at least in my section...
 
flyingpig said:
I hope this isn't the wrong place to post this. This was a few months old, but I found this in an archive of news

http://www.dailybruin.com/index.php/article/2010/05/students-decry-poor-grades-engineering-class

Has this every happened to guys? Class average was 16.8%, that's not even a F

One of my friends had a PChem class that had consistent exams of ~30% averages. His scores were also close to 30% and he thought he was going to fail and never be able to pass it. At the end of the semester, the curve was so much that he and many others ended up with a C. The professor, late in the course, admitted that the only reason he wasn't curving the tests for the whole semester was because one kid in the class was getting 80%'s on the tests.
 
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